"JEP" wrote:

(snip) Amateur Radio as a service is
gone. It is only self serving now. Not
a service but a high priced hobby.
After all, it is called the Amateur
Radio Service.


First, you're obviously confused about the word "service." In FCC
terminology, "service" refers to a group of frequencies meant to serve a
particular purpose for the users of those frequencies, not anything done by
the users of those frequencies. As a result, we have the Amateur Radio
Service, Radio Broadcast Services, Cable TV Relay Service, Maritime Service,
Personal Radio Services, Citizens Band Radio Service, Fixed Microwave
Services, and so on through a long list of other radio services. In other
words, the word "service" in Amateur Radio Service does not refer to any
"service" we might provide to others.

Second, you're completely wrong about "service" being gone within the
Amateur Radio community. Based on what I've seen, I'd estimate as much as
75% of the current operators are involved in some form of public service
related activity in any given year. Of course, the need for our help is
high, meaning even more should become involved, but that hardly suggests the
idea of service is gone today.

The newsgroups "rec.radio.shortwave" and "rec.radio.cb" were deleted from
this reply (off-topic in those newsgroups).


Dwight Stewart (W5NET)

http://www.qsl.net/w5net/