Ric wrote:
yep at a cost to the consumer can you afford to pick up your cell phone an
call your friend in god knows where and talk all day ...i don't know any
cell co. that offer unlimited time on your phone.

again amen brother. Echolink has provided a great service to ham radio
...think of this . when cw of hf no longer does the job. pick up your
dtmf mic dial in you node number talk to home no matter where you are.

There's already a gizmo that does this. It's called a cellphone.


Top posting makes no sense. Especially in groups that use bottom posting
as a rule.

As far as the cost of "calling your friend" is concerned, let me repeat
what I already said: feel free to switch to chat rooms which are free of
charge, and even use Echolink if you want. Just don't pretend that you
are operating an amateur radio station because you're not.

The fact that the digital packets originating from a PC are being
transmitted over the limited links that use amateur radio frequencies,
does not automatically make one a ham radio operator. This whole thing
smacks of a virtual ham radio run on a simulator.

Exclusive Echolink users should just abandon any ham radio pretense and
form their own Internet "Radio" organizations with their own callsigns,
contests, awards etc. Who knows, if the BPL goes through, maybe the rest
of us will join sooner than we think.


73 ..... WA7AA




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