wrote:
On Feb 27, 9:00 am, Michael Coslo wrote:
What attracted you, and can we get some ideas from that to attract or
identify and attract new blood?

From as far back as I can remember, I was interested in technology -
how things worked and what they could do. The kind of kid who's always
asking questions, taking things apart and putting them together, etc.
I found electricity particularly interesting.

This interest was aided and abetted by reading everything I could get
my hands on. Libraries and bookstores were special places to me.

I did the usual Erector-set and battery/flashlight bulb stuff at a
very young age. Then at about age 10 I found a book called "All About
Radio and Television" which explained the basics of radio and how to
build a simple radio using a razor-blade-and-pencil-graphite detector.
I built one, strung a wire out to the crabapple tree in the back yard,
and heard WPEN. I was hooked.

I remember my first crystal set. It worked not very well, and my kid's
mind thought "maybe if I put a battery in the circuit it might work
better." Lot's of crackles and noises in the earphone, and pretty little
sparks at the pencil/razor blade interface. Still didn't work, but I was
still hooked.

That battery reaction should have held a clue why it didn't work in the
first place. But hey, I was a dum liddle kid! ;^)


The book also mentioned various kinds of radio besides broadcast radio
and TV. Of greatest interest to me was something called "amateur
radio", where ordinary people of all ages and all walks of life had
their own radio stations that they used to communicate with each other
over great distances. Also of interest was "shortwave broadcasting"
which came from other countries.

My first exposure to amateur radio came from a Boy Scout merit badge
cook in which the scout would learn Morse code. I didn't get that badge,
I stumbled over... well you know. Set mo off on the road to perfidy, hehe.


Nobody in my family was a ham, nor were any of my neighbors. None of
them knew any hams, either. Not much detail on amateur radio was given
in "All About Radio and Television", but I knew where to look for more
info - other books.

I was taking a lot of household appliances apart, and not being real
clever about putting them back together. This caused quite a problem
until my Grandfather decided to send me a "care package about every two
months that had old radios and other electronic junk that he salvaged
from where he worked. Joy!

IMHO the way to "sell" amateur radio isn't to present it as a
replacement for something else, but as a unique activity with many
facets. Some will get it, others won't, no big deal.


Sounds good to me.

- 73 de Mike N3LI -

"Michael Coslo" wrote in message


[snip]

: : What attracted you, and can we get some ideas from that
: : to attract or identify and attract new blood?
: :
: : - 73 de Mike N3LI -

I'm not ashamed to admit it, I came into the hobby from CB. Some friends
had formed a CB club back in the early 80's just when CB became legal here
in the UK (sadly using different frequencies and FM rather than AM as in
the US) but we soon realised its limitations and when a few of them became
licensed I was quick to join them.

Just celebrated my 25th anniversary, licensed on 21 February 1983 :-)

73 Ivor G6URP

"Michael Coslo" wrote in message
...
The ARS numbers Feb 2008 thread got me to thinking, when the topic started
shifting toward who knows about what relating to Ham radio.

I think it is pretty fair to say that the ARS will never be a mainstream
hobby or avocation. I really don't think that that is even a good idea,
after some thought.


For myself, I am a inveterate tinkerer, and love to build things. My
license allows me to legally access some pretty high powered stuff and
work on the same. My path to the fold was in looking at ways to apply
amateur radio to my other hobby, Amateur astronomy. Funny though, the Ham
radio took over, and is now my main hobby, I never did apply it to
astronmomy.

What attracted you, and can we get some ideas from that to attract or
identify and attract new blood?

- 73 de Mike N3LI -


I don't think my path will be very useful to use as a tool. My second
husband dragged me to a class with the comment "Let's do this together".

Dee, N8UZE

On Wed, 27 Feb 2008 21:18:18 EST, "Dee Flint"
wrote:

I don't think my path will be very useful to use as a tool. My second
husband dragged me to a class with the comment "Let's do this together".

My wife has been married before, and all three of her husbands (I am
the last and longest) were hams. She never was interested in ham
radio until a while back when she expressed an interest in being able
to "slide into the seat" when I did emergency hospital communications.
As an electrical power and instrumentation engineer of some 40 years'
experience, theory was no problem for her. She started to take the
three-session class offered by our radio club, using the ARRL's video
tapes which in my view are insipid.. Halfway through the second tape
she got up and left, declaiming "what the hell am I doing here" and
strode out of the room. She never became interested again and I'm not
about to press the issue.

The moral of the story - good wishes have to be backed up by solid
support.
--

73 de K2ASP - Phil Kane

From a Clearing in the Silicon Forest
Beaverton (Washington County) Oregon

e-mail: k2asp [at] arrl [dot] net

The moral of the story - good wishes have to be backed up by solid
support.
--

For me the moral of the story is that you need to match the training to
the individual. Surely someone with the qualifications you listed could
simply look throug a book for an hour or two and pass the test. Sending
someone that highly qualified to the sort of experience you mentioned
that is aimed at folks with no background at all is not apropriate IMHO.

Jerry

Phil Kane wrote in
:

She started to take the
three-session class offered by our radio club, using the ARRL's video
tapes which in my view are insipid.. Halfway through the second tape
she got up and left, declaiming "what the hell am I doing here" and
strode out of the room. She never became interested again and I'm not
about to press the issue.


It seems like your xyl did the same thing as my wife, only in the opposite
direction. She's every bit as intelligent as me, a quick study, and she has
expressed some interest, but says "I could never do the things that you
do", referring to the homebrewing and design I do. I keep telling her it
isn't like that at all for a majority of Hams, but so far she has not gone
for it. And likewise, I'm not going to press the issue! ;^)

- 73 de Mike N3LI -

"Phil Kane" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 27 Feb 2008 21:18:18 EST, "Dee Flint"
wrote:

I don't think my path will be very useful to use as a tool. My second
husband dragged me to a class with the comment "Let's do this together".

My wife has been married before, and all three of her husbands (I am
the last and longest) were hams. She never was interested in ham
radio until a while back when she expressed an interest in being able
to "slide into the seat" when I did emergency hospital communications.
As an electrical power and instrumentation engineer of some 40 years'
experience, theory was no problem for her. She started to take the
three-session class offered by our radio club, using the ARRL's video
tapes which in my view are insipid.. Halfway through the second tape
she got up and left, declaiming "what the hell am I doing here" and
strode out of the room. She never became interested again and I'm not
about to press the issue.

The moral of the story - good wishes have to be backed up by solid
support.
--

73 de K2ASP - Phil Kane


I suspect that what happened here is that for a woman of her abilities, the
material was presented too slowly and at the level of the lowest common
denominator and she couldn't stand it (too boring). She would probably have
done just fine with the Question & Answer book and it's brief explanations.

Dee, N8UZE

Michael Coslo wrote on Wed, 27 Feb 2008 09:00:40 EST:

I think it is pretty fair to say that the ARS will never be a
mainstream hobby or avocation. I really don't think that that is even a
good idea, after some thought.

You managed to get that sentence approved by the moderators?!? :-)

My path to the fold was in looking at ways to apply
amateur radio to my other hobby, Amateur astronomy. Funny though, the
Ham radio took over, and is now my main hobby, I never did apply it to
astronmomy.

Back in the 1960s, my lead man at Electro-Optical Systems was both
a technician class licensee and a very hands-on telescope maker.
He had ground his own 6" mirror for the telescope he was using and
was slowly grinding a 10" for a bigger scope. I came up with a
design and breadboarded a crystal-controlled time base for a
sideral drive for the ten-incher. Done with now-obsolete RTL
from Fairchild, it would be a snap to do it today with a single
Microchip IC plus a small stepper-motor or synchronous motor
driver circuit. Doug moved to Hawaii to work on the BIG
telescopes there so the ten-incher project (and its final
drive) were put on hold.

BTW, he had been into amateur radio first, then converted to doing
amateur astronomy. Folkses mileage differs. :-)

What attracted you, and can we get some ideas from that to attract or
identify and attract new blood?

Do we HAVE to 'attract new blood?' Serious question.

I've already told my personal story. It seems to rankle
some old-timers because it is non-standard to the 'common'
experience of USA radio amateurs...so I won't repeat it.
shrug After starting in the electronics industry 54
years back, doing high-power HF communications transmitting,
the elimination of the morse code test allowed me to get
a license (told that story, too, but it is also non-standard).
In talking to the applicants a year ago and several others
locally in the past year, their interest in getting a
license vary considerably. But, nearly all of them go the
Technician class route for local radio contacts, a sort of
social order thing possible in a large urban area. It was
like the CB radio craze and then the BBSs that preceded
the Internet era. Few of those got involved via the
supposed paradigm of 30 to 50 years back that lots of old-
timers repeat. In this newer world of the Internet and many,
many components available for lots of different electronics
things, plus ten kinds of consumer electronic products
(at relatively low cost) on the marketplace, the old
concept of 'having one's own personal radio station' is
diminishing rapidly.

As I see it, the old reasons-for-being of amateur radio
aren't applicable anymore. Technology in electronics has
long since leaped ahead of any state-of-the-art advances
done by amateurs long ago. What I see are two areas -

1. The just-plain-for-fun boosting, for whatever purpose in
communications, whether in a local urban area or a bit
farther out...and an emphasis on trying out things on a
personal-enjoyment level. We are NOT required to DO certain
things in the hobby just because some old-timers say we MUST
do those besides the regulations that all must obey.

2. De-emphasizing the 'necessity-to-be-a-part-of-the-
community-as-a-service.' Now, I know that amateur radio CAN
help in emergencies and all that 'service-to-community' PR
can persuade some lawmakers to this 'amateur cause' but it
seems to me to have gotten too big a share of the open
political statements in periodicals. Those who really care
about community service can just as easily go DIRECT to such
existing organizations. With a total licensee database
showing 720+ thousand licensees today, that should be large
enough to show lawmakers that amateur radio has a large
following.

I'm no expert on PR or marketing, don't have the explicit
solution to get more newcomers. As I observe the hobby, it
will last at least a couple of decades. That's good enough
for me. USA amateur radio stands or falls by what its
publicists say and try to convince new members...seldom by
what the old-timers claim. Times have changed (many times
over in my lifetime) and all must adapt to that, not to
hold onto ancient paradigms that no longer apply.

73, Len AF6AY

AF6AY wrote:
Michael Coslo wrote on Wed, 27 Feb 2008 09:00:40 EST:

some snippage



What attracted you, and can we get some ideas from that to attract or
identify and attract new blood?

Do we HAVE to 'attract new blood?' Serious question.

We do need new people to replace those who leave for one reason or the
other. I want someone to talk to on the other end, and don't want the
Amateur radio community to become closed and eventually die out.


more snippage

As I see it, the old reasons-for-being of amateur radio
aren't applicable anymore. Technology in electronics has
long since leaped ahead of any state-of-the-art advances
done by amateurs long ago. What I see are two areas -

1. The just-plain-for-fun boosting, for whatever purpose in
communications, whether in a local urban area or a bit
farther out...and an emphasis on trying out things on a
personal-enjoyment level. We are NOT required to DO certain
things in the hobby just because some old-timers say we MUST
do those besides the regulations that all must obey.

I'm fortunate that I never had that experience. Of course, if someone
ever did tell me how I was supposed to use my time in the hobby, I think
I would politely decline, and go do what I wanted to do. 8^)


2. De-emphasizing the 'necessity-to-be-a-part-of-the-
community-as-a-service.' Now, I know that amateur radio CAN
help in emergencies and all that 'service-to-community' PR
can persuade some lawmakers to this 'amateur cause' but it
seems to me to have gotten too big a share of the open
political statements in periodicals.

Here we agree. While I am impressed with what Amateurs have done in
emergencies, the way that the public service genre of the hobby has
morphed is a little troublesome to me. I don't know if you were watching
the group a few weeks ago, but I related a story about an emergency comm
person speaking at a club meeting. When a member noted that the ARS
frequencies were there for use after the normal comms weren't working,
he replied " Every thing we do is a matter of life and death, so we can
use your frequencies any way we wish".

That was not only wrong, but scary that people that think in that manner
are coming into the hobby with such an attitude. He (and some like him)
come in to talk to the people who will be building and maintaining
repeaters and infrastructure, and lay one like that on them?


- 73 de Mike N3LI -

Michael Coslo wrote on Thu, 28 Feb 2008 09:36:39 EST:

AF6AY wrote:
Michael Coslo wrote on Wed, 27 Feb 2008 09:00:40 EST:

Do we HAVE to 'attract new blood?' Serious question.

We do need new people to replace those who leave for one reason or the
other. I want someone to talk to on the other end, and don't want the
Amateur radio community to become closed and eventually die out.

That seems a tad premature to me. At present there are 722K TOTAL
licensees and the expiration rate is roughly 27K/year. If that
keeps up without any newcomers, it would be 26.7 years before all
were gone. [of course there will be newcomers...but how many
depends on the attitude of the old-timers they come in contact with]

... We are NOT required to DO certain
things in the hobby just because some old-timers say we MUST
do those besides the regulations that all must obey.

I'm fortunate that I never had that experience. Of course, if someone
ever did tell me how I was supposed to use my time in the hobby, I think
I would politely decline, and go do what I wanted to do. 8^)

Well, from my experience (at work or at play) I've had some
who INSISTED on telling me what I 'should' be doing. Some
of those got rather antagonistic about it. "We don't DO that
kind of thing in fill-in-the-blank" kind of comment. It was
so prevalent among amateur radio licensees that I encountered
that it turned me off of bothering to get a license for a long
time. That's been my experience over the last half century and
I spent that time working IN the electronics industry.

I'll have to say that the above attitude was reflected in the
older amateur-radio-interest newsgroups and was partly due to
the creation of rec.radio.amateur.moderated.

... I don't know if you were watching
the group a few weeks ago, but I related a story about an emergency comm
person speaking at a club meeting.

I was 'reading the mail' but didn't bother with it much. :-)

When a member noted that the ARS
frequencies were there for use after the normal comms weren't working,
he replied " Every thing we do is a matter of life and death, so we can
use your frequencies any way we wish".

That was not only wrong, but scary that people that think in that manner
are coming into the hobby with such an attitude.

That person was more right than wrong. If one bothers to look,
the small-number Parts of Title 47 C.F.R. state clearly that
ANYONE can use ANY radio frequency to call for assistance if
a situation is really life or death...licensed or not. True.

Phil Kane could probably quote the Part and wording off the
top of his head but, not being an attorney, I would have to
search the Parts (all freely accessible). Besides, someone
in here would want to start a whole steamy argument thread on
that, arguing minutiae on the whichness of the what...:-)
Memory says it is the Part on commercial radio licenses but
undoubtedly someone in here will say 'I am wrong.' [sigh]

Radio amateur licensees are not bound JUST to what Part 97
says. The whole of Title 47 applies, even if 99+% has nothing
directly to do with the amateur radio service. But, with REAL
life-and-death situations, anyone can use any frequency at any
time with or without any license.

He (and some like him)
come in to talk to the people who will be building and maintaining
repeaters and infrastructure, and lay one like that on them?

Let's take that IN context. Consider that the attending radio
amateurs might ALSO have an 'attitude' going. Consider that
lots of government infrastructure radio facilities are kept
going 24/7 expressly FOR the purpose of life-and-death comms
needs. Amateur radio repeaters aren't. Amateur repeaters
are there primarily for the benefit of other amateurs.

I don't know about your local group, but I've seen (in real life
as well as in print) some groups that are simply too full of
themselves with self-righteousness. Such folks have a terrible
attitude and couldn't negotiate anything unless it was in their
favor. Anyone coming in contact with them would tend to reply
in-kind.

Now, in my area, I'm GLAD that the commercial, professional
radio services ARE there for anyone's benefit 24/7. LAPD and
LAFD are up and running as are the neighboring incorporated
cities of Burbank and Glendale (with nice cooperative ties
between all the government facilities). The Greater Los
Angeles Emergency Communications Center is staffed and ready
to go into action any time there is a REAL emergency and they
can tie into dozens of utility companies and other firms for
unusual emergency situations. It was put to the test on
17 Jan 94 with the Northridge earthquake and passed. Since
then it was improved via the LAFD Emergency Communications
Service which donated old, unused buildings and bought or
converted busses and radio equipment. I took my amateur
tests at an 'Old Firehouse' that is now part of that LAFD
sub-organization. Nice civic cooperation by the LAFD.

I experienced that Northridge earthquake first-hand and helped
a utility company restore services. All the electric power of
an area populated by 10 million or so were WITHOUT electric
power for half a day. Didn't see ANY sign of 'amateur radio
emergency' groups until two days AFTER the 17th. FEMA flew in
RF-plus-video terminals and put them in service the day after.
I'd like to say something positive about amateur radio since
I am a licensee in the radio service, but there wasn't much
evidence of it. I've been a commercial radio licensee for 52
years and can't forget that...I have to give credit where it is
due from REAL experiences, not some nebulous 'future plans' or
PR write-ups that appear only within amateur radio interest
groups.

73, Len AF6AY