"Larry Gauthier (K8UT)" wrote in message
...
Although these raw figures show growth up until 2000, they produce a false
sense of a ham radio as a "healthy hobby".
....
- consider the average age of licensed hams (
http://users.crosspaths.net/~wallio/LICENSE.html US figures are available
for comparison... we'll have to extrapolate that other nations are
experiencing a similar trend) the hobby could be seen as being terminally
ill, with very little fresh blood being infused by young hams.

I'm a relatively new ham (licensed in 2002), and I'm what the average ham
would consider "young" at 42. I was mildly surprised when I joined the ham
club where I work - MITRE, in Bedford MA. We host a Winlink node (club sign
is W1ON), we host a field day every spring. All the officers of the club,
except one, are younger than I am - late twenties/early thirties. And we
have at least a couple of women. Granted, MITRE is a technical company (R&D
for the US Govt), so we have a ready pool of technical men and women. But at
least we're contrary to the stereotype.

My point is - all is not lost. There is a younger generation in the wings.
Instead of complaining, get out and promote amateur radio. Yeah, cell phones
are cool, but they require a multi-billion dollar infrastructure to make
them work. Ditto for the Internet. Show a kid how a cell-phone sized radio
can talk directly to someone halfway around the world - without having a "4
bars" connection to the neighborhood cell tower, and you open up their mind
just a bit more than the normal classroom fare.

I wish the statistics proved otherwise, but I think your celebration of
the IARU charts is a bit mis-guided.
--
-larry
K8UT

BTW, Larry - my dad's name is Lawrence also. Nice to know there's more than
one Lau(w)rence Gauthier in the world. And one that spells Gauthier
correctly, too!

Jon Gauthier
KB1HTW