in" or "listen in" operation. With a spark transmitter, when the telegraph key was up between Morse symbols the carrier wave was turned off and the receiver was turned on, so the operator could listen for an incoming message. This allowed the receiving station, or a third station, to interrupt or "break in" to an ongoing transmission. In contrast, these early CW transmitters had to operate continuously; the carrier wave was not turned off between Morse code symbols, words, or sentences but just detuned, so a local receiver could not operate as long as the transmitter was powered up. Therefore, these stations could not receive messages until the transmitter was turned off. Obsolescence All these early technologies were superseded by the vacuum tube feedback electronic oscillator, invented in 1912 by Edwin Armstrong and Alexander Meissner, which used the triode vacuum tube invented in 1906 by Lee de Forest. Vacuum tube oscillators were a far cheaper source of continuous waves, and could be easily modulated to carry sound. Due to the development of the first high-power transmitting tubes by the end of World War I, in the 1920s tube transmitters replaced the arc converter and alternator transmitters, as well as the last of the old noisy spark transmitters. The 1927 International Radiotelegraph Convention in Washington, D.C. saw a political battle to finally eliminate spark radio. Spark transmitters were long obsolete at this point, and broadcast radio audiences and aviation authorities were complaining of the disruption to radio reception that noisy legacy marine spark transmitters were causing. But shipping interests vigorously fought a blanket prohibition on damped waves, due to the capital expenditure that would be required to replace ancient spark equipment that was still being used on older ships. The Convention prohibited licensing of new land spark transmitters after 1929. Damped wave radio emission, called Class B, was banned after 1934 except for emergency use on ships. This loophole allowed shipowners to avoid replacing spark transmitters, which were kept as emergency backup transmitters on ships through World War II. Legacy One legacy of spark-gap transmitters is that radio operators were regularly nicknamed "Sparky" long after the devices ceased to be used. Even today, the German verb funken, literally, "to spark", also means "to send a radio message". The spark gap oscillator was also used in nonradio applications, continuing long after it became obsolete in radio. In the form of the Tesla