[geeks] can't wait for Vista

[Geoffrey S. Mendelson]

On Wed, Nov 08, 2006 at 09:43:16AM -0500, velociraptor wrote:
> Admittedly as a non-ham attendee, I didn't have the insight into the
> "behind the scenes" aspects, but I would have at least expected
> grumbling in the hallways as you see happening in other conventions
> when issues arise (e.g. SF fandom, gaming cons, Anime Cons, etc).
> But, I heard nothing of the sort.

Most hams have a keep their head in the sand and it will go away attitude.
They are so busy worrying about keeping a morse code test as a requirement
for HF operation than anything else.

The ARRL has a policy of "if it doesn't affect us, we are not going to
fight it". Which makes sense from their point of view, they record the data
and present it to users of other services, but they are not really organized
and don't really want to see it either.

The system funded by Google specificaly has the ham bands turned off,
but there is nothing to stop them from turning them on. As much as his father
had a "give the Arabs anything they wanted" policy, former FCC chairman
Michael Powell has a similar policy for large corporations. Even with a 
replacement chairmain they give the telephone companies the ability to
do anything they want and charge anything they want. They also do the same
for the electric companies with BPL and the cable companies. 

As Will said, the ARRL is playing poltics, they don't want to end up like the
NRA. The NRA opposed any laws that would restrict the private ownership of
firearms and therefore ended up being the "bad guys". All of their good work
of education and training is ignored the by the politicians the moment 
a white person gets shot.

Some people are so enamoured of Google or make too much money from their adsense
program to care. The person who runs eHam for example told me that his web
site would not exist if it was not for the money he gets from Google. Therefore
he was not even going to complain, let alone make a protest. 

He offered to allow me to post an article stating my complaints, but since that
would only draw more people to his Google ads, I declined.  
 
The problem with ham radio is that most of the hams are older than I am
(almost 53) and basicly computer illiterate. If they don't trip over themselves
with the morse code issue, they may actually attract new blood. 

Here in Israel (which still has a morse code requirment) there were 20 new
hams licensed this year, including ones that took a no code VHF only
license. Compare that to the Philly around 1996 when the one testing center
sponsored by a radio club I belonged to passed that many a month.

Geoff.
-- 
Geoffrey S. Mendelson, Jerusalem, Israel gsm at mendelson.com  N3OWJ/4X1GM
IL Voice: (07)-7424-1667  Fax ONLY: 972-2-648-1443 U.S. Voice: 1-215-821-1838 
Visit my 'blog at http://geoffstechno.livejournal.com/