Of course, for con #2 to matter, said thief would have to be aware that ham radio even exists *sigh*

$14 in NY, IIRC. I don't have one, but I had thought about it. A number of my friends have them.... KB2NEA and W2BEJ come immediately to mind.

Actually, a few years ago when KB2NEA got his plate, he emailed me a pic of his Subaru Impreza sporting it and about three antennas. The subject of the email said, "Okay, I am now über geek." He is a computer geek, also (as am I) and a professional video geek.

Well, it took a full 4 months from Nov. 2005 to March 2006 until I got my ham plates from California DMV. It may seem like an anomaly, but I have ham plates on a car that has no ham equipment--or any kind of radio at all installed. My car is a base model with stick shift, hand-crank windows, and no air conditioning. My feeling is ham radio is something I do at home, not while driving. Driving a stick shift car means paying attention to driving, not B.S.-ing like some lid on a cellphone. At ham radio club meetings, Field Day, etc. it's neat to see all the vehicles with ham plates. As to spam e-mail, you don't need ham plates to receive it! Also, it's not just the "qrz.com" database; the dedicate snoop can find out almost everything about everyone given enough persistence and expertise. Anonymity is nearly impossible in an age of "computerism." As to vanity call signs, it seems that almost 50% or more of 1x3 callsigns are vanity callsigns of newly minted Technicians--rather than original calls of oldtimers. Such 1x3s now signify this, increasingly, rather than longevity. The newly writted "omnibus" ruling by the FCC may permit the bequeathing of a callsign between family members. So the options increase to fulfill most desires.