I've been debating posting on this, but I must concur with Bret. I know I have not been the mentor nor ambassador to amateur radio many of my Elmer's were. I intend to improve on this in the coming New Year.
I would like to add that I believe we are heavily discounting the damage a lot of the inappropriate behavior on the bands is causing. Just a few years ago two of the younger engineers on my team (I was at Northrop at the time) asked for a demonstration and I had them over to my shack. As I tuned down to about 3.715 we could hear some jack @ss (with a LOUD signal) burping and making other sounds (use your imagination). Try to convince someone reasonably intelligent that this is a great hobby after a performance like that. The fact is, they could listen to that by spending about 100$ for a 27mhz rig. These potential hams were guys who were trained as EEs and wanted to build and experiment again because much of their jobs had morphed into software and project management. Just the sort of people we'd like to have join our ranks. Perhaps this chaos as well as covenants have taken their toll. Some CW has actually gone to the Internet. A ham in the Northwest wrote a utility called MorseKOB that does an excellent job of American Morse. I must confess, I go there for good rag chews and because many of the old gentlemen I QSO'd on 40 have passed away. Additionally, they are experimenting with RTTY. I might add that to date I have yet to hear anyone pass gas or speak of "p*ss weak" signals on these ports. I would much prefer that this CW and Rtty return to the amateur bands where it rightfully belongs. The really good news is, since nothing sounds as good as an AM signal through a hollow state receiver, AM is in no danger of ending up on the Net like some of our CW and Rtty have! --... ...-- and a very Happy New Year John, WAØSTX/4 I ----- Original Message ----- From: "Todd, KA1KAQ" <[email protected]> To: "Discussion of AM Radio in the Amateur Service" <[email protected]> Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2009 2:02 PM Subject: Re: [AMRadio] WABOOF - Good News on HAM RADIO > On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 10:06 PM, Brett Gazdzinski > <[email protected]> wrote: >> I remember what sparked my interest, an old radio shack dx100 I think it >> was, a little, crappy receiver that LOOKED nice, it was really a >> transistor >> radio with some short wave bands and a BFO. >> But I heard some interesting AM qso's on it, got my general so I could >> join >> in. > > I had one of those receivers for a while, it did look better than it > worked, by far. The later 300 was even worse, though it had LEDs and > gobs-o-knobs. > >> Way back, CB was nice, no foul mouth or CB lingo, just people talking, >> and I >> was into that before the ham stuff. > > There was a time when we used Citizen's Band for SAR work when I was > in the Explorer Scouts. Local Taxi cabs used it as well. Then came the > 'boom'. > >> Realistically, I don't think ham radio has much future, not when you can >> call someone on a cell phone, text them, surf the web, do VoIP, etc, its >> kind of silly to have a basement full of equipment so you can talk with >> the >> other 20 old guys about their basement full of equipment. I don't see >> much >> to attract young people to the hobby. >> Most hams would not think of building any radio stuff as far as I can >> tell. >> Kids might be interested in the flex radio stuff, with its computers and >> displays and so on.... > > That's funny - I enjoy the stuff exactly because it *is* radio, a room > full of gadgetry to fiddle with. The telephone has existed longer than > radio, and serves the purpose fine if all you want to do is talk. > > Rather than not seeing anything to attract young (or any) people to > amateur radio, I don't seen any noticeable numbers of amateurs out > there trying to attract anyone. Most seem to being doing it all for > themselves, whether contesting, collecting, building, or talking. > Amateur radio was never for everyone, rather a relatively small > segment of society showed any interest. Show a kid a plastic box with > LEDs and expect them to get excited over something that looks worse > than their iPhone, you probably won't get their attention. Show them a > big, black wrinkle box with dial lights and tubes glowing, relays > clacking, and some decent audio coming out of a speaker, you stand a > chance at piquing their interest IMO. WWII surplus gear especially, > since some have seen these in movies or other shows. Not because it's > some new technology, but precisely because it isn't. It's hands-on > history. > > Of course, it's always easier to assume no interest and not bother, > but that hasn't been my experience. It does require some effort, and > most folks are 'too busy' to be bothered. This isn't limited to > amateur radio, either. > > ~ Todd, KA1KAQ/4 > ______________________________________________________________ > Our Main Website: http://www.amfone.net > AMRadio mailing list > Searchable Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ > List Rules (must read!): http://w5ami.net/amradiofaq.html > List Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/amradio > Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.html > Post: mailto:[email protected] > To unsubscribe, send an email to [email protected] with > the word unsubscribe in the message body. > ______________________________________________________________ Our Main Website: http://www.amfone.net AMRadio mailing list Searchable Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ List Rules (must read!): http://w5ami.net/amradiofaq.html List Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/amradio Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.html Post: mailto:[email protected] To unsubscribe, send an email to [email protected] with the word unsubscribe in the message body.
