Sounds like a good way to lose your ham license. The amateur service bands aren't supposed to be used for commercial activity, and packet radio transmissions have to be in the clear. *Maybe* you could get away with syncing a Bitcoin node over the airwaves, but I can't see, e.g., connecting two lightning nodes that way.

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Now, running a nostr relay over packet radio, *that* might be doable…

Define “commercial”.

I’ll have to look into the FCC’s definition.

See, e.g., this, from their FAQ. At the end of the day, it's probably "stuff the FCC doesn't approve of". But my interpretation is that syncing Bitcoin nodes would be OK, since you're not receiving compensation. But routing fees would be verboten, even if encryption were allowed.

What might be interesting would be broadcasting blocks and/or transactions a la Blockstream's satellite service. Or, if that's too bandwidth-intensive, maybe setting up a service where your node could accept transactions submitted via packet.

I like your last idea there. Was where I hope to take it. You don’t need a license to receive