On Jan 5, 2:48 pm, wrote:

What I do see are requirements that prospective members prove
themselves by actually getting on the air and working existing members,
using CW, at a given speed or better.

Yes, exactly.


What I see as the flaw in their system is that they state that they
want to create a renaissance in CW. Okay, that's a worthy goal. I do
question how they are going about it.

But setting the bar at 25 wpm is not going to produce that goal.

Why not?

Let me give an example from my own world.

In the PAQSO Party, we like to encourage the use of OOK Morse. That's
why we give more points to them. In a year or two, I'm going to
increase that point value on the bands above 80 meters to 2 points
from 1.5 per CW QSO.

That's telling people that if they want to get more points per QSO,
all they have to do is use OOK Morse. I'm not telling them they have
to do it at a certain speed, just giving a gentle push. And I'm not
trying to single out Morse, because I also give out 2 points for PSK31
and RTTY also. I want people to use those modes too.

And yes, I have had some Morse enthusiasts who became angry when I
added the other modes. They wanted the extra points exclusively for
themselves. Sorry, but I'm an equal opportunity promoter. But that
does tell me that the increased points per QSO is a powerful
incentive.

The main reason that I don't believe that they will be successful in
promoting Morse code is that they are only open to people who are
already proficient in the art. The only rationale I can come up with
that comes out as promotion is that someone will really really want to
join the CWops, so he practices a lot so he can get to 25 wpm, so they
allow him to join. IOW, they are promoting on the side of CW Ops who
are already there. In reality, there aren't likely to be too many
people who will decide to learn and use OOK Morse in order to join
that club.


CWOps isn't the only game in town. FISTS has been around a long time,
for example. SKCC has attracted thousands of members in just a few
years. Second Class Operator's club is another example. All have pretty
minimal entry requirements. That's not a bad thing.

We Second Class Operators are a little different though, in that our
motto is "Competence is tolerated, but not encouraged". We're kind of
the antithesis of exclusive, and we make fun of everything, including
the other members. Great place to let your hair down - if I had any to
let down. 8^)


So I think there's room for a club like CWOps, too. It will be
interesting to see how membership grows.

Absolutely.


"Which one are you copying?" I asked

"All three" said the OT, logging another one. "Now get me another
beer"

I went to get it, and decided right then that someday I'd have that
level of skills.

I'm partway there, I have the beer part down...... ;^)


- 73 de Mike N3LI -

On Wed, 6 Jan 2010 08:56:38 EST, "Michael J. Coslo"
wrote:

In the PAQSO Party, we like to encourage the use of OOK Morse.

What is OOK Morse, and how does it differ from regular Morse code?
I looked at the PAQSO Party site, and OOK is not defined.

Dick AC7EL

wrote:

In the PAQSO Party, we like to encourage the use of OOK Morse.

What is OOK Morse, and how does it differ from regular Morse code?
I looked at the PAQSO Party site, and OOK is not defined.

Hi Dick,

OOK stands for On/Off keying Morse. It's really what most people call
CW. I think the distinction was made when some folks questioned the
distinction between Morse and CW, which technically speaking isn't
actually CW. Just kind of a semantics thing - I ended up settling on
OOK Morse - mostly anyhow - It's probably the most accurate. That
being said, everyone does know what we're talking about when we say
CW.

-73 de Mike N3LI -