J. D. B. wrote:
Al, someone who passes a code test should be more proficient in code
than someone who cannot pass the code test. That simply makes that
person proficient in code, not necessarily a more proficient operator.
should be? I beg you pardon

well I know can't pass a code test and I can use Morse code did a few
eme contacts using a spectrograph to make out the didt and dah and
feedto an pc for translation I have done the same (with code reader as
well) to see if I could do that made a sweep in a cw sweepstakes (with
aid of another hams call)

You may be able to use the code, but if you cannot use modern digital
methods, use sat communication, able to handle emergency communication,
able to set up digital networks and use them effectively, build modern
solid-state equipment, etc., then you are not a more proficient amateur
operator, you just are more proficient in code and that is not going to
help us much in the 21st Century.

As I said before, PSK31 can be copied when the human ear cannot even
hear the signal, if you cannot hear code, you cannot copy it period. So
code is no longer the be-all-end-all. Modern 21st communication methods
have replaced it.

If we are going to attract new people to the service, we need to get
into the 21st Century and get the old farts away from the old code and
tubes crap.

Al Klein wrote:

Someone who can do something is, by definition, more proficient at
doing it than someone who can't. Requiring code tests and real
technical testing (the current tests are a joke) makes sure that most
of the people who get licensed are more proficient at receiving code
and with technical matters.