Swearing in F1

[astracrazy]

from what i understand it works like this:

all the team radios are encrypted (because remember team radio isn't just between driver and pitwall, but also pitwall and garage etc) but FOM get full access to all driver communication. If anyone uses sky sports f1 race control, you'll know that a lot of pit radio is then played out (which the commentators and teams also get access to - in fact Ted mentioned it a race back that ferrari use something similar to race control for other teams pit radio). What is played on tv is a very concentrated amount of that.

I've also heard that some drivers, i seem to remember Webber mostly, always adds a swear word when using the radio so it can never be repeated by FOM for other teams to see/hear

i may be wrong, but that's what i have picked up from reading various posts over the years

[strad]

What? Y'all thought they were saints? You don't think they all swear? Shame on you.
What I find offensive is all the people in the public eye that pretend NOT to swear. Politicians etc. The all like to act all goody goody til ya hear them uncensored.

[raymondu999]

strad - we're not talking of swearing as a natural human habit - we're talking of swearing on purpose as a strategy to keep their radio messages off the air.

[Cam]

strad - we're not talking of swearing as a natural human habit - we're talking of swearing on purpose as a strategy to keep their radio messages off the air.

Which got me thinking. As the FOM (as I believe) filter the messages and release what they approve, surely this would have a factor on the race - thereby, to some extent FOM actually can to some extent effect the outcomes of races by choosing to, or not to, release some radio messages.

For instance, if a radio message was released saying a leader had problems, the other teams hear that and tell their own driver to push - how is that not effecting the race? If all messages were released, or none at all, then its fair - however bias can be a factor with this current system.

[raymondu999]

strad - we're not talking of swearing as a natural human habit - we're talking of swearing on purpose as a strategy to keep their radio messages off the air.

Which got me thinking. As the FOM (as I believe) filter the messages and release what they approve, surely this would have a factor on the race - thereby, to some extent FOM actually can to some extent effect the outcomes of races by choosing to, or not to, release some radio messages.

Yeah. How many times have we heard on a driver's inlap, his radio go "box this lap?"

For instance, if a radio message was released saying a leader had problems, the other teams hear that and tell their own driver to push - how is that not effecting the race? If all messages were released, or none at all, then its fair - however bias can be a factor with this current system.

Yeah. Look back for example at a race like Barcelona 2009 where Massa is told to save fuel. Alonso (behind him in the Renault) was immediately told of it. Which lead me to ask a while back whether or not teams used unidirectional microphones in the pitlane:

[Cam]

Wait just so I am clear on this, teams can only hear their rivals' radio when FOM plays snippets through the world feed?

That is my understanding. I read it somewhere and I'm now truing to find the link. Will post when I find it.

EDIT:

I'm still looking for that link and I know I saw it how it described a group of people lsitening to the radio messages and they then decided which ones to release. I'll keep looking.

In the meantime, this is in the regulations:

8.7 Driver radio :
Other than authorised connections to the FIA ECU, any voice radio communication system between car and pits must be stand-alone and must not transmit or receive other data. All such communications must be open and accessible to both the FIA and, where appropriate, broadcasters.

So perhaps its the FIA that deem what's 'appropriate', which is very interesting. Seems there might be a double standard.

Quality - The highest standards of fairness and accuracy are expected as a minimum quality requirement from the press.

Source

and then there's this:

27. Fair and impartial coverage
The organiser of an event shall ensure that the person entitled to exploit the broadcasting rights will procure that any broadcast coverage is fair and impartial and that it does not misrepresent the results of the event.

Source

[raymondu999]

Wait just so I am clear on this, teams can only hear their rivals' radio when FOM plays snippets through the world feed?

That is my understanding. I read it somewhere and I'm now truing to find the link. Will post when I find it.

I'm not a team member so I don't have first hand info - but I'm sure they can also hear The Pit Channel.

The Pit Channel is like a radio station where commentators also tune in to (which is what I was alluding to above) - it broadcasts more than the FOM feed, but it's still not 100% of all radio. I'm not sure how they choose which messages to broadcast there though.

[Cam]

There's this article from 2009 that shows the FIA released a significant portion of McLarens radio message - not just the usual snippet we get on TV. So the FIA obviously have some power on what is released and not released.

Listen to MP3 - duration 3:24

Source

Seeing as they're having a long and drawn out conversation, multiply that by all the drivers and that's a lot of raw information to filter. There must be a group that does this - so who signs off on what is released to the broadcasters??

[Jersey Tom]

multiply that by all the drivers

You're assuming that they're interested in listening to ALL of the drivers.

[Cam]

As mentioned above - to ensure fairness - you'd expect them to listen to all drivers. To not would be unfair and simply biased, which the FIA simply cannot be......

[Jersey Tom]

As mentioned above - to ensure fairness - you'd expect them to listen to all drivers. To not would be unfair and simply biased, which the FIA simply cannot be......

I meant more the TV announcers. Nothing unfair about ignoring the last place car's radio transmissions. People want to hear what Alonso, Hamilton, and Kimi are talking about.

[Cam]

Found that link:

It is an employee of Bernie Ecclestone's TV production company, sitting in the mobile broadcasting centre, who monitors the chatter between the teams and their drivers. He identifies what we might like to hear and brings it to the attention of the director, who pastes it into the broadcast.

Source

LOL - so "we' might like to hear news where, coincidentally, competitors change their actions upon hearing it. There's no way this is fair and impartial.

Also, so in theory, if every driver swore on every transmission, we'd hear NO radio exceprts?

[raymondu999]

In theory. I read a while back that FOM decided bleeping out swearwords was too time intensive for a live feed. They also decide it for the show, in a way. They release a lot of funny stuff, just for humor.

Didn't stop Montoya though, but I don't remember if this was live:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnBaZFihD-M[/youtube]

I'd imagine swearing happens a lot in NASCAR though (the swearing). I don't watch it, but jT, what do they do there?

[Cam]

How does swearing affect conduct for the sport. Vettels 'gherkin' and 'idiot' comments a while back had some wanting to punish him for misconduct.

“He (Vettel) has breached the code of conduct. You sign it when youget the super license. Then you have to behave accordingly,” ex-Swiss F1 driver Marc Surer was quoted as saying.

Source

Nothing occurred then, just as nothing occurred in these latest incidents, but it does beg the question of where the line is and what is and isn't acceptable. Granted, that was a personal attack and these latest comments were not, so what is the line?

[Jeffsvilleusa]

A little off topic, but something I remembered in terms of using pit radio to a team's advantage:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctbYEnlb ... B859894A69[/youtube]

The team asks Jenson about his front wing, which he can't see, and they repeatedly ask him, to Jenson's frustration, but when the video feed zooms in on his car the engineers see the wing is fine.