Bruce, I agree that Bonnie has made some very unfortunate and some would say, extreme comments in the past and some of us look upon her claims of what is legal with some suspicion. But the reason that ARRL proposed changes to the regulation to restrict bandwidth was precisely because current FCC rules are very loose and most of what we do falls under the general concept of "good amateur practices."
Under current rules, we base the use of sub bands on the mode and the content of the information. Lower down we have the text data areas (also typically used for CW, but would not necessarily have to), then it switches to voice/image/cw on most HF bands. ARRL did an absolutely horrible job of explaining their proposal to the rank and file radio amateurs who probably make up close to 99% of the total active operating. Many hams viewed this as a way to force digital voice and wide bandwidth (voice bandwidth) text digital modes (read Pactor 3) on the voice bands. Especially because of the unethical way that the ARRL packed the Digital Committee that promoted Winlink2000. Whether you support Winlink2000 or not, the insuring of a given outcome, and completely short circuiting the democratic process of fair representation was a sad day for ARRL and hurt them severely with many of the more thoughtful and reasonable hams. (After all, the inventor of both AMTOR and PSK31 resigned under protest from the committee when he realized what was going to happen). I am not sure if the average ham understood that we could already use DV in the voice /image portions of the bands. And once you allow that, how could you even tell by ear if the person was sending voice, data, or image if using a multipurpose waveform? If you read Dave Sumner's editorial, he pointed out that just because the FCC changes the rules and allows certain bandwidths in a given area of the band, it does not necessarily mean that the ARRL would support the concept that any mode can be used with that bandwidth. His point was that Band Plans would specify what modes and content are appropriate for specific frequencies and that DV would not necessarily be permitted in areas of analog voice. And certainly not text digital in analog voice areas. This is not what I personally want. My preference is to allow mixed modes in certain overlapping areas, but it appears that very few support this. Under current rules, DV can be used in any analog voice area, because it is voice. So can image/SSTV/FAX. But unfortunately not text digital. This means that we can not coordinate with voice as the SSTV hams do, when we want to experiment with a text digital mode, even a wide text digital mode. The two ways I look at it are: -Leave things alone since they may be worse off for digital users with new regulations. -Go for the changes and then lobby our Division Directors to get the ARRL to accept some mixed mode/content areas, especially for emergency use which is my main interest area. 73, Rick, KV9U bruce mallon wrote: > BONNY YOU CANNOT AND YOU KNOW IT .....GET OFF IT OR > WHY WOULD THEY BE TRING TO CHANGE THE RULES .... > > YOU ARE 1%OF ALL HAMS AND IT'S YOU AND THOES LIKE YOU > THAT GIVE DIGITAL A BAD NAME .... You cannot even draw > people to the bands you have BUT you want more bands ? > > Note HER others running digital SHE is the reason the > wideband digital bunch is being watched ...... > > THEY DON'T CARE WHO THEY HURT IT;S THEIR BANDS TO > DISTROY THEY WANT ALL BANDS .... Just ask them .... > >
