Yes indeed there is an agenda, and that agenda does NOT
use Amateur Radio to move the traffic. The entire concept
is flawed when you consider how it will fail in emergencies.

--

... Hank

http://home.earthlink.net/~horedson
http://home.earthlink.net/~w0rli
"Jerry" wrote in message
...
John, Winlink has from day one (Aug 2004) when I called Steve k4cjx and
asked how can I help.. And was told all packeteers are (Explicitive
removed). If you must know email me privately
... Quickly found found that winlink wants to coexist with NO ONE.. So we
tried that in fact I have tried 5 times nmow to solicit cooperation from
winlink.. they have an agenda... They want to pursue that agenda and do it
alone...



If you wish to file your comments with the ARRL regarding their bandwidth
proposal, there is little time left to do so. Comments should be sent to:



It is my understanding that the proposal, in it's current form, will allow
WL2K stations control of nearly 40% of ALL of our current allocations in
the 10, 15, 20, 40, and 80 meter bands. This does not include their
efforts to swallow up 1/2 of the 30 meter band. CW users will give up the
most when you consider that these users will share their remaining
bandwidth with all "narrow" digital modes ... which is everything BUT
WL2K. Also, packet radio will forever be laid to rest on the HF bands, as
the proposal will eliminate those miniscule parts of the bands for their
auto-forwarding.

If it's OK with you to give up 40% of your favorite bands to internet
e-mail spewing Pactor III robots, then disregard this message, and your
wish will come true. The ARRL is wearing blinders, and can only see one
direction at this time, and that's WL2K. I don't intend to stand idly by
and give up 40% of our most popular bands so some rich dudes in their
motor homes, or on sailboats, can enjoy cheating the legitimate ISP's out
of the fees that they charge for providing this service.

I am all in favor of reorganizing our allocations in an effort to
accommodate new digital modes, but this proposal takes way too much from
the 98% of amateur radio operators who are not interested in turning our
hobby into a cheap internet e-mail gateway for the rich and priviledged.
Oh yeah, they will cry emergency communications, and the "amateur radio
inernet e-mail for every EM's desk" motto, but it's just not worth it.

Tell the ARRL how you feel ... this could certainly be your last chance to
do so.

Ponder this ... if these new wideband modes are soooo efficient, then why
do they require 20 Khz of space? If you give packet radio 20 Khz, it too
could be much faster. The speed limit on packet radio is now determined
by the pitiful amount of bandwidth allocated to them. Why does WL2K, a
proprietary mode, with very high startup costs deserve all of this
spectrum when packet radio has had to deal with the microscopic slices of
bandwidth for all of these years??? It just smells of yesterday's
garbage, and I don't think that the proposal, in it's current form, will
benefit anyone but the 2% minority fighting for 40% of our bands.

For the record ... I do NOT, nor do I plan to utilize packet radio on the
HF bands. My concerns are for the service in general, and the negative
impact this proposal will have.

Best 73,
Luke Bannister AD4MG

--------------
Deputy State Emergency Radio Officer - Digital Communications
Virginia RACES, Inc.

"John Galt" wrote in message
om...
"Charles Brabham" wrote in message:

APRS was developed as a packet radio "killer application" by folks
associated with TAPR in the US.

Hi Charles:

I don't believe that is true. If you'll check early issues of Gateway
(I think around 1993) you'll see APRS was initially developed to track
sailboats out of the U.S. Naval academy in Annapolis, MD. So if you
want to go pointing fingers, point it at the U.S. Navy.

Now, if your claiming TAPR shameless tried to ride the coattails of
APRS, then I will agree with you. Their only real contribution to APRS
was to form the APRS working group, which they quickly cut and run
from leaving a adminstrative FUBAR'ed mess behind.


The idea is to kill any interest in packet by eliminating its most
interesting and useful features, substituting a pointless
internet-dependent
activity sure to put just about anyone to sleep.

Have you even run APRS? Up until about 1998 it didn't even use the
internet, and the way it uses the internet is as a giant data
collector. APRS is firmly in the RF domain, even if some people use it
to track their homes ;-(

APRS fits TAPR's ideal of a "killer application" perfectly - It kills
off
all interest in the hobby.

TAPR bashing aside, APRS has generated quite a bit of interest in the
hobby, and a strong case could be made it has prolonged interest in RF
based packet radio.

The more TNC's they can talk hams into tying up
so they can report thier house's position on the internet, the less will
be
used for communicating as hams or doing anything else that may be
interesting or useful.

Ahh.... now that is the rub, isn't it? "anything interesting or
useful"

What do you suggest? The only other popular packet application on the
horizon I see is WinLink. You may not like that, but those are the
facts. And oh, did I mention, WinLink has a form of APRS position
reporting in it as well.

Charles, you interest in some of streaming protocols is well placed.
This could be a killer application if further developed and refined.
If your that concerned, I suggest putting efforts into that.