On Sep 8, 7:51*pm, Lawrence Statton wrote:
AJ Lake writes:
You need to understand that the FCC really doesn't want to be
bothered with Ham Radio at all.

I think that the ARRL had more to do with the snafu's of that era. For
example incentive licensing.

So, I'm a young whippersnapper (42 y/o ... got my Tech+ ticket in
1988): *Can someone, without adding TOO much editorial slant, explain
what the 1970s push to incentive licensing was, and with as little
slant as possible explain why it was a SNAFU (or as one 1x2 in the
first club I was in said: *Ruined the service).

Look in the letters section of a 50's QST, there's rants and raves
from both sides on incentive licensing.

Look in the letters section of a 60's QST, there's rants and raves
from both sides on incentive licensing.

The controversy in the 70's was the Technician license, a ticket that
required no code, as a way to get some CB'ers to take notice. I myself
came to ham radio in the 70's but had no interest in anything having
to do with Technician privileges. I know many other hams who did come
in that way in the 70's, 80's, etc.

Tim N3QE

Tim Shoppa wrote:

The controversy in the 70's was the Technician license, a ticket that
required no code,

Interestingly in the 50s the Technician (and Novice) was given
by mail. And any ham friend could give you the code test.
Anyone else could proctor your exam and certify that you
were honest. However I'm sure it won't surprise you to learn
that there were many Techs who never took a code
test and had open book exams.

I always wondered why if the Tech was an experimenters
license as the FCC claimed it was, why they required a code
test.

The Tech was a very popular license, especially in the
late 50s when we had the best sun spot peak on
record. I had a modest Globe Scout 680 with about
20W out on 6 meters to a 5 element Taco beam
up about 30' , AM of course. The Rx was a war surplus
BC455 (7$ brand new mail order) and an International
Crystal 6 meter converter. The Tx was crystal controlled
so you called CQ and then tuned the lower band for
an answer. The band was open stateside every day
and my state count on 6M was in the 40s before
I got my General and moved to 10M which was even
better. DX openings were often and my country count
was in the 50s. That was indeed a fun time...

On Sep 9, 1:52*pm, AJ Lake wrote:
Tim Shoppa wrote:
The controversy in the 70's was the Technician license, a ticket that
required no code,

The Technician required 5 wpm from its creation in 1951 until 1991.

Interestingly in the 50s the Technician (and Novice) was given
by mail. And any ham friend could give you the code test.
Anyone else could proctor your exam and certify that you
were honest. However I'm sure it won't surprise you to learn
that there were many Techs who never took a code
test and had open book exams.

From 1951 until about 1953 or 54 the Novice and Tech were given at FCC
offices unless you lived beyond a certain distance from an FCC exam
point.

But the new licenses made so much work for FCC that they changed the
rules and made both those licenses "by mail".

There was also the by-mail equivalent of the General license, called
the Conditional. In the mid-1970s it was merged with the General.

I remember that when it was announced that the Conditional was being
phased out, there was a false rumor that FCC would require all
Conditionals to retest. You should have heard the cries of anguish! I
found that puzzling because the tests weren't *that* hard. Now I have
a little better understanding...

I always wondered why if the Tech was an experimenters
license as the FCC claimed it was, why they required a code
test.

Because the international treaty required it. Over time that changed,
but in the 1950s any license that allowed a ham to use the bands below
1 GHz required a code test.

73 de Jim, N2EY

Tim Shoppa wrote:
[snip]
The controversy in the 70's was the Technician license, a ticket that
required no code, as a way to get some CB'ers to take notice. I myself
came to ham radio in the 70's but had no interest in anything having
to do with Technician privileges. I know many other hams who did come
in that way in the 70's, 80's, etc.

Tim N3QE

The original Technician license required passing of a 5wpm receiving &
sending Morse test.

73,
Bryan WA7PRC

Bryan wrote:
Tim Shoppa wrote:
[snip]
The controversy in the 70's was the Technician license, a ticket that
required no code, as a way to get some CB'ers to take notice. I myself
came to ham radio in the 70's but had no interest in anything having
to do with Technician privileges. I know many other hams who did come
in that way in the 70's, 80's, etc.

Tim N3QE

The original Technician license required passing of a 5wpm receiving &
sending Morse test.

73,
Bryan WA7PRC



I concur from experience in 1982 when I got my Tech license. I had to
take the 5WPM code test at the FCC office. We had the same HF
privileges as Novices and could operate on any frequency above 50.000
MHz. I can't recall, but I "THINK" the first code-free Tech licenses
did not have HF privileges. Now that there is no code requirement for
any class, I think Techs have some HF privileges again...a bit confusing

Scott
N0EDV

Scott wrote:

I think Techs have some HF privileges again...a bit confusing

I was happy when they gave the Technician Class License HF CW privileges
because I thought that it would help the sagging numbers found on
the CW bands. Currently they have the same CW privileges as the General
Class on 80, 40, and 15M HF bands.

I hang mainly on 80 and 40 CW and average a couple of QSOs a day. To this
date I have yet to contact a Tech. (I check QRZ.com when making entries in
my computer log.) So at this point it doesn't seem to have increased CW
activity as much as I had hoped.

BTW using the internet makes QSOs even more interesting. QRZ.com often has
blurbs and photos of the guy you just talked to. Also using Google Maps you
can pinpoint his location, and often using Google Streets you can even see a
photo of his house. Amazing.

"AJ Lake" wrote in message
...
Scott wrote:

I think Techs have some HF privileges again...a bit confusing

I was happy when they gave the Technician Class License HF CW privileges
because I thought that it would help the sagging numbers found on
the CW bands. Currently they have the same CW privileges as the General
Class on 80, 40, and 15M HF bands.

I hang mainly on 80 and 40 CW and average a couple of QSOs a day. To this
date I have yet to contact a Tech. (I check QRZ.com when making entries in
my computer log.) So at this point it doesn't seem to have increased CW
activity as much as I had hoped.

BTW using the internet makes QSOs even more interesting. QRZ.com often has
blurbs and photos of the guy you just talked to. Also using Google Maps
you
can pinpoint his location, and often using Google Streets you can even see
a
photo of his house. Amazing.

I hate Google Streets. It would seem to be an invasion of privacy for
someone to go around taking pictures. The only use is if you are trying to
buy or sell a house. Or plotting a crime. My PO box is on my license.
Perfectly legal since it gets sent out all over the World

I went from Novice to Advanced, having failed the 20wpm the first time. I
still loved to hang on 40 CW, 2 and 440 FM for years. Then 40 got taken
over by broadcasters. I'm a little bit of everywhere now. With 2 m SSB
becoming popular, I've found cross mode CW/SSB actually works, so more
people find it useful than let on. I had talked to some tech+ on 10 SSB/CW.

"JB" wrote:

I hate Google Streets. It would seem to be an invasion of privacy for
someone to go around taking pictures.

Many people feel this way.

The only use is if you are trying to buy or sell a house.

As I said I use it to see where my contacts live. On occasion I even get to
see the tower and/or antennas. I used it scope out my old neighborhoods in
the Chicago area where I lived as a kid. Also recently I was recently able
to scope out a good parking lot on the beach at Pacific Beach CA (and
actually able to read to read the parking sign hours) prior to driving
there. So I find lots uses for it.

My PO box is on my license.

If somebody really wants to find you they can. If you give your call it
would be duck soup to find where you live, even using a PO box. But even
posting anonymously here on Usenet we can be found. The best advice is not
to make anyone mad enough to want devote the resources and time it requires
to do it.

I still loved to hang on 40 CW

Maybe we have QSOed in the past. My computer log goes back to 1990.
Unfortunately my paper logs are long gone. Give me your call and I'll
check..... ;-)

If somebody really wants to find you they can. If you give your call it...

Yes this is true, but you don't have to make it easy for them. They will go
after the easy meat first.

The best bet is not to leave anything the robots can parse and dump into a
searchable database. Then nut cases and spam machines with lots of time on
their hands will use someone else. I learned my lesson 10 years ago from
using my callsign for my screen name and winding up with hundreds of people
from all over the world sending me hate mail because some veeagra and sealis
salesmen were spooffing my address.

"Scott" wrote in message
.. .
Bryan wrote:
Tim Shoppa wrote:
[snip]
The controversy in the 70's was the Technician license, a ticket that
required no code, as a way to get some CB'ers to take notice. I myself
came to ham radio in the 70's but had no interest in anything having
to do with Technician privileges. I know many other hams who did come
in that way in the 70's, 80's, etc.

Tim N3QE

The original Technician license required passing of a 5wpm receiving &
sending Morse test.

73,
Bryan WA7PRC

I concur from experience in 1982 when I got my Tech license. I had to
take the 5WPM code test at the FCC office. We had the same HF privileges
as Novices and could operate on any frequency above 50.000 MHz. I can't
recall, but I "THINK" the first code-free Tech licenses did not have HF
privileges. Now that there is no code requirement for any class, I think
Techs have some HF privileges again...a bit confusing

Scott
N0EDV

The original no code Tech had no HF privileges since international treaties
required code for frequencies below 30 MHz.

Today's Technician now has all the HF privileges of the Novice class. Those
privileges have now been expanded also. On 40m, 15m, and 10m, their CW
privileges now cover the same spectrum as the General class license.

Dee
N8UZE