Dick Carroll wrote in message ...
My response to the document "Amateur radio in the 21st century" by Jim
Wiley, KL7CC of the NCVEC
--------------------------------------------

Will we lose something because we will no longer have the knowledge
that all hams can at least understand and send CW, even if very slowly?
Maybe, maybe not.

It would appear that Dick enters the literary world, even if very
slowly.

You would be surprised at the number of applicants
I see that actually want to learn CW - they think it will be fun.
There’s a novel concept - someone learning a skill because it is fun,
not because the government says you must do it.

Now you're on to sumptin!

Yes, there's always a few who want to learn it for the sake of learning
a new skill-after all, there is always a small segment of the
population who are actually motivated. Some are around these days. I've
been in contact with several recently.

Holey Moley! Dick acting as POC for interested parties. Quick,
somebody, anybody, releive Dick of command lest we lose them all.

Obviously, removing the Morse test requirement will make it easier
for thousands of interested persons to join our hobby. There are many,
who for whatever reason have a real, not imagined, problem with learning
the code. Call it stage fright, a psychological block, hearing
problems, poor recognition skills, whatever you want; there are indeed
those who literally cannot master the code, no matter how hard they try.

Why not call it what it is? Improper preparation to learn, and total
lack of dedicated study, and usually the poorest of learning technique
for the task at hand. Learning the code isn't difficult, it just
requires one to WANT to. Whatta concept!

Gee whiz, not all that long ago I used ARRL (ARRL ARRL ARRL ARRL ARRL)
study material that was comprised of REAL Morse Code (not Farnsworth)
and it couldn't get anyone above 10wpm if their lives depended upon
it.

Yet we have some hick from Missery saying that you just
gotta-wanha-doit...

Whatta (fuchin) concept!!!

Why did I spend months at it if I didnah wannah doit?

Lazy, you say? Anyone can make it to 5 WPM, you say? They just
don’t try, you say? Apparently you have not participated at hundreds
of exam sessions. I have. I have seen grown men and women with tears
in their eyes, frustrated, angry, sometimes back next time, sometimes
giving up on ham radio altogether.

This is the legacy of the anachronistic radio relay limited.

This one is pure nonsense. Yes, I *HAVE* participated in "hundreds of
test sessions" over a period of nearly a decade. NEVER did I see any
such a spectacale. Yes, I've seen plenty of people fail the code test.

With a gleam in his eye...

For good reason- they didn't adequately prepare to take the test. And
the VE code tests have never been difficult, as code tests go, or as
they existed under FCC testing.

Says lucifer...

We always gave every considreation
possible under the rules, constructed tests to be as easily passable as
legally possible. You see, we too, wanted people to pass and become
licensed hams. But to show up for a current version 5wpm test and fail
in a frustrated tear-jerking session, male or female, is something I
never saw, nor even anything remotely approximating that scene. It just
never happened, in all my testing years.

Thank God that you quit.

What I did see was an elderly gentleman who showed up each test
session, loaded with nerves, and he failed 13wpm a few times. Each time,
what he got from the testing team was plenty of friendly words of
encouragement to keep at it, and welcome, be sure to come back next test
session. He did, and on the 8th try he passed his 13wpm test.

That was the time you quit being a VE and disbanded your VE team
because these Tech plusses just weren't worth the effort.

I am
convinced he'd never have made it without those words of encouragment,
but never once did he give in to his certain frustration. To fail a
5wpm code test in tears us beyond shamefuhl, both for the examinee and
the testing team.

Huh?

OBTW-- the pass/fail rate of all applicants tested by my team was
always almost exactly the national average - two thirds passed, one
third failed, all elements. It never varied beyond a percent or two. So
I always believed we were doing it pretty well correctly.

But, but, but you said that you tired of the tattooed trucker biker
scum that merely tested and tested again till they passed the multiple
guess exams...

Where’s the gain in having someone give up?

A better question is WHY would someone who truly wanted to be a ham give
up? I can't think of a single valid reason-except that they really
didn't want a ham radio license. As a kid of 14, wild horses couldn't
have kept me from getting one. For darn sure no code test would, nor
did. Is it so different for people today? If so, why? I can't think of
a single reason.

The attitude of the VE team...

Are you proud that you “made it”?

Why would anyone who would be a credit to ham radio NOT be proud of
the accomplishment of earning a ham radio license?
If not, why do they want to be a ham in the first place? Is it
antisocial to be proud of reaching a goal?

But if the VE Team leader doesn't recognize it as a goal...

Can you not find something that another person can do that you
would find extremely difficult if not impossible? Could you win the
Tour de France bicycle race - even if you trained every day for the rest
of your life? Could you invent the Laser? Could you paint the Mona
Lisa? Not that painting a work of art or riding a bicycle has all that
much to do with radio, it’s just to point out that while you may have
been able to master the code with some degree of success, that doesn’t
necessarily mean that everyone has the same ability as you.

Uphill, both ways...

Or you ain't schitt...

All that is nonsensical blather having no bearing whatever on ham
radio qualification nor testing. More totally inaccurate anologies of
the NCI variety.

Uphill both ways...

I would argue that the ability to master the code has no apparent
connection with how “good” a ham a person is. What we want, I think you
will agree, is someone who will respect our traditions, follow the
rules, bring enthusiasm and vigor to the hobby, and make a positive
contribution.

How about someone who wants to do more than spend ALL their radio time
looking into a microphone?

The last time I "looked" into a microphone, I was rigging up a
repeater controller to a mic circuit.

The code IS a vital part of ham radio, not
just some "hazing ritual" nonsense as so often quoted by the codehating
NCI set.

Hazing ritual nonsense...

So, who’s to say that mastering Morse code skills makes a better ham?
I would not be so arrogant as to think such a thing.

It's NOT arrogance, it's a valid useful qualifcation. You pander to
the codebashers with this nonsense for curious, hidden reasons.

arrogant hazing ritual...

Every time I get to feeling superior, I look around, and guess what?
- - - I can find someone who is better at something, anything, than
me.

Me too, but not DICK.

I can also name several individuals that I think are in one way or
another “better hams” than I, better operators, better engineers, better
at some aspect of our hobby than me. Might that be true with you too?

Nope, not DICK.

Well, how about that! We all have different talents and
qualifications. So for that reason, we must totally downgrade ham radio
to the status of stamp collecting. What a blast! And you have the simple
arrogance to call THAT arrogance!

Coin collectors are superior to stamp collectors, right?

Like anything else, when a person finds he or she has a need to use
Morse code, they will learn it .

**THAT** is truly laughable,

Except in real life situations.

For example, all WWII POW's that used Morse Code were dity-bopping
trained radio operaqtors.

Hi hi hi!!!

They learned what they needed - as they needed it.

particularly so coming from a fellow who
claims to be a code user himelf. Any code user who actually
does use it knows much better than that. You DON'T and CAN'T learn the
code on the spur of the moment, just "when you need it".
What total nonsense!

Yes, what total nonsense those WWII POW's were.

You probably fly their black POW flags upside down.

Rally round McCain.

Will ham radio turn into CB? No, it won’t. In the first place, CB
is essentially an unlicensed service.

I might remind you that CB was a licensed service, until the outlaws
took it over, realizing that there was nothing an undersized
underfunded FCC could do to stop them.

That is the beauty of freedom.

Are you are so uninformed as to
believe that something very similar couldn't happen to ham radio when in
fact it HAS gone well into that direction -as noted by you in this very
document!

I prefer to focus on the foolishness of the coded elite. Its much
more easy to zero in on.

Secondly, there are still the written exams, and add to that peer
pressure from other hams, and the fact that hams must use call signs,
instead of “handles”, and there is just no comparison.

Oh, **HUGE** deal, those question pool writtens and CB handles. The
only thing that has salvaged ham radio in the years since the question
pools and VE testing started *IS* the code test. When that is gone,
there goes the rest of the farm.

Morse Code is my saviour, I shall not want...

Will dropping the Morse requirement remove a “filter” that keeps out
poor operators, “CB Radio” types, scofflaws, and so on? I think not.

I think not, too. Code testing has never been a perfect filter,

PERFECT FILTER???

But you have used it as a filter.

and
there has always been those who got illicit licenses, even in the days
when FCC gave the tests.

Now, now, now. Bruce got his Extra through a VE.

There was the Conditional licensing program,
which was widely abused. And there were always ways to get a license
without actually taking ANY test, such as paying someone to go to the
FCC office and take the test in one's place.

Perhaps for $250 and a perfect score?

Yes, that happened, and no
one knows how often. You see, until fairly late in the FCC testing era
no ID was required, just show up at the FCC office, fill out the forms
and take the tests. One could put any name and address he wanted on the
forms, and that name became the licensee. It wasn't all that difficult,
even then. And you KNOW that all VE's properly handled their test
sessions, right. FCC enforcement logs show otherwise. So to blandly
say that all those HF troublemakers are all code tested hams is simply
assuming an invalid conclusion.

True. Some legitimately passed the 20WPM Morse Code exams, and could
Easily pass a 40WPM exam if it existed. Some people are just jerks,
and Morse Code doesn't make it otherwise, not matter what Parson Jim
or WzeroEX want to beleive.

Listen to 75 meters on any given evening, or 20 meters above 14300
during the day, and all too often what you hear is a cacophony of
indecent language, illegal operation, intentional interference, music,
poor sportsmanship, you name it. And every one of those characters
passed a code test! Whether it was 5 or 13 or 20 WPM, they all passed a
test. Some filter, huh?

Better by far than none. At least some majority of licensees were
people who actually had interest enough to do it right and stay within
the rules and live by some sort of ham's creed. But never all of them,
as noted above. And if you don't know that this situation has gotten
much worse in the past couple decades you haven't been paying attention.

DICK, I might refer you to my comments re the NPRM98:

"What I fear most about the restructuring is the lack of enformcement

and what I fear most about maintaining the status quo is the lack of
enforcement."

i.e., it HAS NOTHING TO DO WHATSOVER WITH THE MORRIS CODE.

Suppose, just for a moment, that a petition got filed requesting
that the FCC make the following changes: Take the present HF Novice
bands on 80, 40, 15, and 10 meters and reassign them to voice operation.

How did I know this was coming??? In an age where digital rules
supreme, we MUST have more room to yak into a microphone.

DICK, do your LE cronies YAK into a microphone, or do they send code
via a Titanic $200 telegraph key?

Move the corresponding phone segments down by the appropriate
amount. Change the segments open to various classes of license to fit,
and let the new “Communicator” licensees have access to the HF bands in
50 or 100 KHz blocks. For example, and this is just an illustration, 40
meters could end up looking something like this:

7000 - 7025 Extra, CW and data only
7025 - 7100 All classes, including communicator, CW and data only
7100 - 7150 Extra, all modes
7150 - 7250 Extra and General, all modes
7250 - 7300 All classes, including communicator, all modes

Naw, 7000 - 7300 all classes, all modes.

Similar adjustments would be done at 80, 15, and 10 meters.
In other words, what we will have done is to “slide” the phone bands
down the equivalent amount of the former novice segment, and allowed the
new communicators access to the top 50 KHz of the voice band.
Traditionally, higher-class licensees have been given access to the
lower frequency segments within a band, and this would remain true. No
one loses anything! Generals and Extras get some new phone bands, even
former Novices, (now upgraded to Communicator) get more room in the CW
segment, and access to a portion of the phone band.

And put all the rank beginners right down against the bottom 25 where
they'll feel right at home! Sure, why not? Nothing like trashing up the
entire band (save a paltry 25khz) with the greenest of the green.

Get to work DICKless. Edjucate the masses. Trashing need not occur.

After
all, this is ONLY a hobby, nobody takes any of it seriously anyway. GAG!

GAG? We've been gagging on your bile for years. Time for you to put
up or shut up.

And don't DARE call me anti-beginner----nothing could be farther from
the truth.

So why did you quit you VE Team again?

Obviously you have no concept of what it takes to get new
hams indoctrinated and assimilated into the hobby or you would never put
forth such a concept.

Welcome to the world of recruiting. Imagine yourself an Army
recruiter and being told to assimilate "an army of uno."

Now don't smear your tears on your sleeve and grab your ball(s) and go
home.

Be a team player or go to Leavenworth.

Of course there should be overlap,
no one wants the old days of the Novice Reservation,

The ACLU might have sumptin to say about that. Beware Billy Jack.

but even that was
useful in its day. But to dump rank beginners all the way down to the
lower 25 is --- I'll go ahead and say it - it's dumb, and does neither
them nor anyone else good service. You carry inclusiveness way too far.

So you want them to shack up at your place till they gradjiate?

Gradjiate from what?

Allow them a good overlap--keep the old Novice segments for them to use-
DIGITALLY with experienced hams to talk with,

Fuch that. You MAKE experienced hams populate that arena and I'll buy
into it.

From here on, all General, Advanced, and Extra licensees must spend
the first TWO hours of EVERY operating period in the Novice ghettos
handing out benevolent CW qso's.

Hi hi hi hi hi!

Never happened in the good ole days, won't happen it he good ole now.

Now what?

plus another 25kc below
into General territory where they can mix it up with experienced hams on
their own turf, digital and CW - oops, they'd have to learn the code for
that. Sorry.

Sorry 'bout what? They gotta spend the first two hours there whether
they have a QSO or not. Sorry, but thats just the way it is. Ham
radio wasn't meant for everybody.

Hi hi hi hi hi.

Give them some phone privileges in each band, yes. But
there is *no* justification for handing them near-carte blanche.

Especially Carte Blanch for the likes of you.

As we all know, several petitions requesting that the FCC remove
Morse code testing have been filed. Depending on how soon a NPRM is
issued, assuming it is at all, then we have to wait while they slog
their way through the rule making process. One of the things that will
happen is that comments, both pro and con, will begin to accumulate.
After a several weeks or at most a few months, and assuming the majority
of comments are in favor of eliminating the code as a licensing
requirement, then we plan to file for a waiver asking for an immediate
end to code testing. Obviously, this can only be done if there are
enough favorable comments on file for the FCC to justify granting such a
waiver. The actual change in the FCC rules will still be in progress,
but if we can show that there is enough interest, and that such a waiver
will be beneficial to Amateur Radio as a whole, then there is a good
chance it would be granted.

Let's not count our NPRMs before they're hatched. FCC has said,
correctly, they're in no hurry to close out the book on code testing -
if it does it at all.

They didn't say that.

There is *NO*
valid reason to dump all code testing, although most everyone seems to
be ready for reasonable HF access for those with no code test. I agree
with John Johnston, at least partly, in that it is a true fact that no
Extra class could ever be considered an expert amateur without proven
ability to use radiotelegraphy, radio's most basic mode.

Jim says radiotelephone is the equivalent of radio's most basic mode.

Why do you disagree?

I hope you do
know that it remains as the second-most-used mode in ham radio.

Next to phone, which Jim says is one of radios most basic and
elementary modes, re 1906.

Strangely that seems to make no difference to you and Fred and your
Agenda. Yes, you have an Agenda. You're doing a marvelous job of
describing it here.

Jim says phone is the equivalent of CW in primacy and equivalency with
CW.

CW is a great mode. It’s fun. I enjoy it. And, it’s time to move on.

Well, move on at your pleasure. But don't think you can move the rest
of ham radio so easily. Reminder: Radiotelegraphy **IS TODAY**
the second most used mode in ham radio.

Jim says that radiophone was essential as far back as 1906, years
befor the requirement of radiotelephony at 10 wpn was required.

Why don't DICK and Rev. Jim get together and work out the details of
the PHONE and CW debate and get back to use at their earliest
convenience.

To blithely attempt to dump it
just because you're interested in other pursuits, like making yourself
famous by asserting your own version of restructuring ham radio just
won't work. There's too many guys like me still around.

So when did you dump FSTV?

Are we “dumbing down” amateur radio? Are you kidding? Have you
looked at the new Extra class tests? Could you honestly say you could
pass one, picked at random, “cold”? I couldn’t, at least not without
some serious study of the books.

Oh Jeezus. Here goes the whole Bruce thing again.

What,you no longer have a useful memory? For that's what the question
pools require- a good working memory, not for learning the material but
for basically learning which answer goes with what question. Yes, still.
You "learn the test", how to pass it and get the license, not to learn a
lot of radio. Trying to actually learn what all that stuff means
actually gets in the way of the goal of getting the license for those
unschooled in radio. To assert otherwise is nonsense. Remember, I too
have given *lots* of VE tests. Fortunately many new hams are actually
interested enough to go ahead and learn some radio after licensing, but
that is by no means a general trait. If you don't believe it you haven't
been paying attention.

Are you DICK CARROLL, or Dick Bash?

I've been licensed since the late 50's. Extra since the 70’s.
Even had a “First Class” commercial radiotelephone, with both the radar
and aircraft endorsements - passed all the elements in one sitting,
missed at most 3 or 4 questions on any given section - a couple were
perfect. And, except for the Novice, did this while sitting in front of
the FCC themselves, no less. Never flunked a FCC code or theory exam.
Never. So what? That and a dollar will get me a cup of coffee.

So what's you're fuchin' problem with latter day saints?

So welcome to the club.

Sechond du nuone.

I took the Novice exam in late December
1956,and received the license the first of March, 57.

Did you copy the Russkies satellite on 20M cw?

By late May I was
ready for the Conditional - I lived 260 miles from the FCC district
office.

Whaaaaah!

I was contented to remain there indefinitely until Incentive
Licensing took away some of my favorite spectrum.

Whiiiiine!

So instead of carping
forever I studied up and sat in on many a session of W1AW code practice
and soon took my Conditional ticket to the FCC at Kansas City and
brought home the Extra.

You dah Mahnnn!

That required that I go through the 13 wpm code
test, General and Advanced writtens, plus the 20wpm code test and Extra
written, all in one session. But I made it. Oh, I too had a First Phone
with endorsements.

Phone? What da fuch a fone?

I was a graduate of Fort Monmouth and the Signal
School.

You got paid to earn an amateur license?

So typical of the "I had to do it and you damed well have to do it
too" genre!

But unwilling to pay the next guy.

I agree, it means little now. But to blithely dismiss all that
in favor of near-instant licensing of anyone with the mildest of
interest in ham radio is not the answer to securing the future of the
hobby/service.

As I said, you pay today's homeless three hots and a cot and they'll
be 20wpm Extras too, and you can discuss all day long (via CW) the
menu at the Salvation Army kitchen.

To say that the past has no value in considering the
future is to dismiss all that has gone before.

DIS-missed!

I think we know better
than that. "The past is prologue".
It's difficult to see how you "change it all" types can't understand
that the future builds on the past.

Yep, like sliding crappy code on a bug to thwart real digital copy.

Slime ball.

It's getting late, so... To wrap this up , I agree with part of your
proposal. We do need a valid equivalent of the old Novice back again,
updated to meet the times, of course. But let's not leap too far for our
footing, lest we wind up swimming in a swamp of inexperience. Give the
beginners plenty modes to learn and plenty of room in which to learn
and use them. But let's retain some semblence of normalcy. And
yes--experience, tenure, knowledge and skill, *including Morse code
skill* *DOES* still count for something.

Jeesus! Keep thumping that drum.

To dump all code testing for the Extra class license will be the
beginning of the deterioration of ham radio such that I really don't
want to contemplate where it would end.

One (1) smart guy will revolutionize all of the ARS. Why must you
keep shooting remington high speeds when federal match will put you in
the 10X ring?

The experience of the past 30
years is a good but cautionary indicator of where it leads.

Oh, yes. Let's be cautious. Let's discourage that one (1) smart guy.

You idiot.

Yes, I'm
talking to some degree of what happened to CB, and to ham radio as a
part of that CB degeneration, for a great many hams have come from CB.
Many of them have become good hams. But far too many have brought the
worst attributes of CB with them. To ignore the certainty of adding to
this baggage by making full HF access much too easy is unconscionable
and potentially destructive to an extent that is most unpleasant to
contemplate.

73, Dick W0EX

Extra DICK, you have brought some of the worst attributes of CB with
you. Why did you have to do that? Did you think we needed your
CB-like absolutism in the ARS?

Sayonara.

Brian

"Dick Carroll" wrote in message
...
My response to the document "Amateur radio in the 21st century" by Jim
Wiley, KL7CC of the NCVEC
--------------------------------------------

Will we lose something because we will no longer have the knowledge
that all hams can at least understand and send CW, even if very slowly?
Maybe, maybe not. You would be surprised at the number of applicants
I see that actually want to learn CW - they think it will be fun.
There’s a novel concept - someone learning a skill because it is fun,
not because the government says you must do it.

And as I have been saying all along.... these are the ones that the
pro-coders need to cultivate and work with if there is actually any merit to
morse code. Refusal to do something like that demonstrates the lack of
merit of morse....




Like anything else, when a person finds he or she has a need to use
Morse code, they will learn it .

**THAT** is truly laughable, particularly so coming from a fellow who
claims to be a code user himelf. Any code user who actually
does use it knows much better than that. You DON'T and CAN'T learn the
code on the spur of the moment, just "when you need it".
What total nonsense!


I believe he was referring to casual use, not necessarily in an emergency.
Albeit slow, a person could still send code via a chart/cheatsheet if in an
emergency. Granted, decoding it may be a challenge for the person, but a
person could still alert someone for help. (Not saying this is a viable
normal solution though.)




--
Ryan, KC8PMX
FF1-FF2-MFR-(pending NREMT-B!)
--. --- -.. ... .- -. --. . .-.. ... .- .-. . ..-. .. .-. . ..-.
... --. .... - . .-. ...

"Brian" wrote in message
om...
:
: Rally round McCain.
:

You guys could have done worse. Oh, it seems you eedjits did do worse! Now
you all rally round a bush.

BGO

--
"All persons, living or dead, are purely coincidental, and should not be
construed."

In article . net, "Grümwîtch
thë Ünflãppåblê" writes:

"Brian" wrote in message
. com...
:
: Rally round McCain.
:
You guys could have done worse. Oh, it seems you eedjits did do worse! Now
you all rally round a bush.

BGO

History will determine if the bush was burning or whether it was just
a large weed.

LHA




Holy Moses, Grum, you've sprung us into theology in this sermonary!