"KH6HZ" wrote in
:

"Dave Heil" wrote:

The idea of communicating without a landline phone being involved?
The thought of being active in public service communications? The
interest in DXing? Tinkering with circuits or antennas? Being able
to modify commercially built equipment to make it better? Setting up
and operating a fast scan TV station on one's own? Being able to stay
in touch with local buddies who are also radio amateurs?

None of this draws people to ham radio these days (in large numbers,
I'm sure there are always exceptions and there are some people who
join the amateur ranks for the reasons you list.) In reality I do not
disagree with anything you have posted in your followup message.


I'm not sure exactly why large numbers of people would be drawn to
Amateur radio ever!


All one has to do is view the licensing stats at Speroni's site to see
the future of ham radio.

Those stats are very skewed at the moment

Amateur radio licensees peaked in 04/03 at 687,860 -- exactly 12 years
(10 years + 2 years grace period) after the introduction of the Tech
license, which illustrates all the no-code Tech license did for ham
radio was stall the inevitable negative slope in licensing statistics
we see today.

And so many of those Technicians had not been active in Amateur
Radio after cell phones took over for local communiations. Another group
left after the magnificent treatment that they reveived from the
"superior" Hams.



In the past 43 months, Amateur radio has lost 31,000 licensees. In the
43 months preceeding that high point, Amateur Radio added 11,919.
Thus, we are losing amateurs at 2.5 times the rate we added them in
just the same period before.



I do not believe that elimination of the code test will reverse this
trend, because:

a) I do not believe the code test represented a significant barrier to
entry for many people (post 2000) looking for HF privileges. At 5WPM
the cost test did little more than to test the applicant's ability to
rote memorize a table of dits and dahs, and perform a mental table
lookup. For this reason, I do not feel there is this huge untapped
reservior of people waiting in the wings to get a ham license, as
there were when the code test was eliminated for VHF. I'm sure there
are *some* people, I simply do not feel it is a statistically
significant amount.

I have issues with maintaining my weight, yet my wife remains as
slender as the day we met. She has difficulty understanding how some
people cannot control their eating.

I was a 3 pack a day smoker, and in 1977, I decided to quit cold
turkey. She continues ot smoke, and apparently it is impossible for her
to quit.

My point is just because it is such a simple matter for some people
to learn Morse code, it does not mean that others will find it so
simple.

One of the most amusing things about those who would have Morse
code testing as the metric of an Amateur's worth, (of course, testing at
above 5 WPM) is the dichotomy of learning the code was apparently easy
for them. I see that all the time.

If learning Morse code is easy, then how does it become the metric of an
Amateurs Worthyness?

And at what point is it the measurment ofhow good a Ham is? 5 WPM?
7 WPM? 20 WPM?

There are apparently some superhuman young people in Europe that
can do better than 150 WPM! Nww those must be Uberhams! 8^)


b) I do not feel the "problem" with ham radio is the code test, or
geezer operators bitchin' on the air about non-coded operators.

I do. If I had a person in the shack to demonstrate the ARS to
them, I would never ever put 75 meters on.

For
reasons that clearly we can debate for eons, the younger generations
that I work and interact with on a daily basis simply are not
interested in ham radio the way folks 20+ years ago were. My 8 and 12
year olds would rather play XBOX than sit around learning radio
theory. EE/CS students I work with are thinking "consumer
electronics", not "old fogey HF radios".

And I know quite a few EE students who *are* interested in RF, and
have gotten the Tech license. Many have gone on to advanced license
classes.


- 73 de Mike KB3EIA -