PSA: FEMA testing Presidential Alert System on US phones this Thursday. People on Twitter already pissed.

Click.

The National Wireless Emergency Alert System will be testing a presidential alert on Thursday at approximately 2:18pm EST. Unlike Severe, Emergency, and AMBER Alerts, the presidential alerts cannot be opted out of.

The alert system has existed since 2012 and FEMA reiterates that the system is for emergency use only and it would be illegal to use it to send political messages. A lot of angry people either aren't buying it or simply don't want Trump on their phone for any reason.

Thoughts? Will you have your phones silenced this Thursday so you can ignore the test alert?

I'm in IT and on-call 24x7. I can't silence my phone. Not that this will bother me, though.

Carry on with your test.

I'll probably be mildly annoyed (I seem to get most amber alerts when I'm asleep and they are loud), but honestly this is something I generally approve of the government doing.

Not sure I see any problem with it. It's just a warning message being broadcast.

Why should I be annoyed by this?

Most of the people pissed are mad because they don't want a message from Trump popping up on their phone regardless of the reason for the message. The fact that it is an emergency alert test and not a political tweet is irrelevant to them.

What people are mad? The article you linked said nothing of the sort.

Compensating for Puerto Rico much?

Don't care for the Trump administration in any way, but being upset about this is quite petty.

That's my fault for not being specific or posting links. On the replies to the tweet in the original post alone, a lot of the replies were people complaining about how they were disgusted or feeling violated because a message from Trump would pop up on their phone with no way to opt out. I could dig up more info, but it's late and I still have to work tomorrow.

As long as it doesn't say imminent missile threat coming towards my way.

I'm not either it's just, idunno, funny timing.

Trump: "Death toll in peurto rico wasn't that high"
Everyone with a Soul: "that's not the point; by arguing this fact, you're saying you essentially don't take us seriously, you don't care about us"
Trump: "Oh, I'll show you how much I care"
*orders a pointless testing of emergency system*

Usually my phone sound is low. So most likely I will get a low sound.

@drunk_pi: because of the inevitable orange dick pic meant for Putin

Seeing some whiny people on twitter does not indicate that 'most people' are pissed. I think you need to let go of this unconscious bias you seem to have. You're letting anecdotal evidence dictate your view point and projecting it. I haven't even heard anything on this until your thread.

“Hey everyone, it’s your favorite president (me!), giving you an announcement to tell you what a wild success it was to let 3,000 of our citizens perish from our tremendous efforts in Puerto Rico! Unpresidented in history!”

It's a test. Why on earth would people complain about something like this? You will rather have this working but never needing it than the other way around.

Seems the conservatives are complaining about it though...............lol.

I feel your pain.

Well Obama did sign a law in 2016 that FEMA has to create a system to allow the president to send cellphone alerts.

In my country it is opt-in. And that works very well.

But with how sprawled out people can be in the USA I kind of understand there is more need to make it opt-out. I wonder what presidential alerts could be about. Are you going to get FAKE NEWS alerts on your phone? XD

BTW I don't think that silencing the phone makes the alarm silent. In my country we can set the volume of the alert ourselves, but it is independent of the phone volume.

It is probably a good move especially for more densely populated parts of the USA. This is a step towards more people using things like AMBER alerts.

No one should be telling them what to do. They should only tell everyone else :P

Good, when Elizabeth Warren gets to power, conservatives will say how this is the worst thing ever.

Warren/Avenatti or Avenatti/Warren.

I cant decide which would work better

nope it will be better if she stays Senator and become leader of the Senate once the Democrats take office.

so its Avenatti for president

Good choice, personally I'd love Warren/Sanders. The faces of the republicans when 2 socialists are leading the country will be absolutely epic.

I didn't say most people were pissed, although I will admit that I did use the phrase a lot. Maybe it would have been better if I linked a story talking about it, since it would be more reliable than the countless messages I read, (not just on FEMA) since some them could easily be trolls.

Looking at it from another point of view, it reminds me of when people judge all conservatives based on a few Fox News and Brietbart comments, and all liberals based on a few Huffpost and Salon comments. The loudest aren't always the majority.

Because you're going to be receiving midnight texts from trump ranting about various conspiracies.

Arplane mode for me, all Thursday. I don't want that scumbag on my phone.

They should make the notification sound the Inception horn

I didn't get a text. I guess Trump wants me die. :(

@ad1x2: This does not bother me at all.

A test is a test , just not do like they did on Hawaii.

LOL apparently like all trump touches.........it didn't work.

How difficult can it be really?

this would be better