One finger hunt n peck typing system dude here.About two or three words
per minute,all depends on how long the words are and how often I scratch
me arse and pick my nose,,, hold out your coffee cup and catch this
booger,KLINK!!! Go bragg (Fort Bragg is Bragging every day) on your
typing skills.Show us how fast you can type,BUT,that doesn't prove
anything.
cuhulin

That old IBM computer that dates to back around 1990 is still sitting
over there at the Goodwill thrift store since a week ago.I know a guy
who has worked with computers for 47 years and he knows every computer
operating system there is.He told me that old IBM computer works on the
old DOS (Disk Operating System) operating system and only old timers
know how to program and work that computer.I believe him too.This
afternoon,I offered the lady at the checkout counter $5.00 for that
computer.I really don't need or want that old computer,but I want it any
damn way!
cuhulin

With arthritis in my fingers,how fast (Johnny ****erfast!!! come home to
supper! Gee whiz mom,I am ****ing her fast as I can!) do y'all expect me
to type? Just wait till arthritis catches up to you,and you can be sure
it will too.
cuhulin

wrote:

Hmmm...since you seem to think that learning an antiquated and absurdly
slow way of communicating isn't the stumbling block, please tell us why
young people are not signing up in droves like they did in the 50's and
60's. And please tell me what "Yankee Can Do" means and how it is
supposed to attract badly needed young blood to a rapidly aging hobby.

Sad to say, but your attitude parrots that of the ARRL and it is
exactly what is going to kill this hobby. Yes, I know it hurts the
pride a bit to realize the test so many hams once had to pass does not
produce meaningful results. Much of the ham test is about as relevant
as requiring buggy skills of prospective automobile driving licensees.
And requiring that new hams pass the old test because the oldtimers had
to will just continue to turn the new blood away.

Ii would be nice to say that hams provide a service in times of
emergency, but the specific instances where they actually benefited the
emergency worker or had a positive impact on locals are fewer and
fewer. I've tried listening to H&W nets in hurricane season and they
seem to degenerate into chaos more than provide a useful service.
People trampling over one another, sending code on top of voice, etc.
It is as though many of them were trying for the contact rather than
trying to help.

If the designation of licensed radio amateur was a desirable goal then
wouldn't we see more young people trying to attain it? But just the
opposite it happening. The graying of the hobby and the inexorable
reduction in the number of active hams is obvious to anyone who listens
in.

And if the greater ham community and the ARRL collectively decides to
continue playing gatekeeper by requiring meaningless tests to become a
licensed radio amateur there will come a time that that nobody will be
knocking at the gate.


I see no reason to become a ham. Never did. Even back when I first
started listening to SW, some 20 years ago, I saw ham conversations as
incredibly dull compared to the programming of the regular broadcasters.
I've NEVER been an avid listener to the ham bands. I'd rather listen to
North Korea. I'm just over 30 years old. Ham radio is increasingly
irrelevant, at a time when China and WWCR are adding transmitters. Hams
no longer provide essential communications in an emergency, not with all
the other methods of communicating. Hams no longer provide worthwhile
experimentation. Hobby broadcasting would reinvigorate the hobby, but
the oldtimers refuse to consider it. They're arrogant and irrelevant,
and rarely communicate anything of importance. Amateur radio's glory
days are long gone, and after the boomer hams die the hobby will die
with them.


----== Posted via Newsfeeds.Com - Unlimited-Uncensored-Secure Usenet News==----
http://www.newsfeeds.com The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! 120,000+ Newsgroups
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"running dogg" wrote

/snip

Hobby broadcasting would reinvigorate the hobby, but
the oldtimers refuse to consider it.

I agree with that. But the FCC has approved low-power FM broadcast licenses,
they just haven't got their heads out of someplace to make it easy enough
that it takes hold. And there is no conceivable reason that every
neighborhood couldn't have a dozen such stations if they wanted them. There
are almost as many groups advocating the free right to such low power
broadcast (without any kind of license at all) as there are those that
espouse income taxes to be unconstitutional. Hopefully the FM broadcast
groups actually have a chance of persuading legislators - we know taxes will
never go away, lol.

Jack Painter
Virginia Beach, Virginia

"running dogg" barked and slobbered in message
...
SNIP SNIP
Hams no longer provide essential communications in an emergency, not with
all
the other methods of communicating. SNIP

I direct you to the following URL's
http://www.arrl.org/w1aw/2002-arlb012.html

http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2003/10/29/102/?nc=1

http://mrtmag.com/news/sept2002/radi...teurs_nonstop/

http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/03/0801/ See San Diego Tribune article

Dozens more on request - or use google if you know how.

You Sir, simply don't know what you are talking about.

The 500+ Amateurs who participated in these disasters would agree with me as
well as the civil authorities and the public who benefited from the Amateur
Radio communications when the silly phones were overloaded and the phone
lines were toast.
--
Lamont Cranston

Yankee Can Do! Us Yankees are Hunting down and Killing the terrorist
ragheads who want to kill us every day! We! Are! Doing!
cuhulin

wrote:

Yankee Can Do! Us Yankees are Hunting down and Killing the terrorist
ragheads who want to kill us every day! We! Are! Doing!
cuhulin


You must be THE advisor to the White House. A twin brother to Wolfowitz, no doubt..




mike

wrote in message
oups.com...
The ham radio hobby really needs to rethink the way that it controls
access to the hobby. Continuing to require seriously outdated tests
like morse code is a turnoff to many potential amateur radio buffs.
Why not try something revolutionary such as live testing for safe
and
courteous operation using voice and digital modes.

When I listen to the guys on HF my sense is that their average age
continues to increase. I also detect that overall participation is
way
off from a decade ago - lots of open space in what were once crowded
chunks of spectrum. I hear very few young and virtually no female
voices of any age. Ham radio needs to think of changes to become a
worthwhile alternative to the many other modes of communicating
that
do not require a license. If it continues doing business as it has
then it's future will indeed be short - possibly much less than 2050
as
mentioned in the earlier thread. The remaining members can look
forward to the FCC continuing to divert more amateur radio spectrum
to
commercial interests that want to use it.

Hard to say. There is a significant difference between
a radio amateur and a radio user. A radio amateur
implies a degree of sophistication that you don't get
from a regular old radio user. Remember CB?? The
people who would have found CB trendy would find
cellphones trendy. Simply turning on a 2M handheld
and talking into it doesn't make one a radio amateur;
you need to understand what it is you're doing. I, for
example, don't qualify as a radio amateur because I
know how to use a cell or the internet. I'd need to study
radio theory and understand what it is that I'm doing.
Does that mean I'm for code?? No, I really don't care
about that very much, because there are enough friends
that I have who are content to be Techs without code.

Do the Feds have the right to take away the spectrum?
Sure; but the spectrum that's getting the most noise
(outside of BPL, of course) is the real high end stuff
in the GHz range, far beyond 2M and the other bands
most of us think of as the Ham bands.

Could hams become irrelevant in the future?? Sure
they could if everyone uses cells, but in the end
things like music and movie industry reps wanting
payment for their copyrighted material will probably
influence the direction that satellite, internet radio
and regular radio will go more than the hams. A local
radio station ended up having to sell it's regular
broadcast station because they got way into debt
providing money to the recording industry for their
internet broadcasts, which the recording industry
wanted top dollar for, not the discount that they give
the broadcast radio stations. If the recording industry
does that to satellite and internet streamers, it'll kill
off most of them pretty darn quick, and the "need"
to take the hams' frequencies will evaporate.

By way of background I come from a family of radio amateurs. My son
(an electrical engineer) considered the hobby, but thought the
licensing requirement silly and the morse code requirement laughable
in
todays world. He can talk around the world several ways via the
internet. He has a cell phone that does much the same thing a
handheld
tribander does - allows him to talk with other people. It looks a
lot
like a handheld, but it costs less and doesn't require a license.

The cell may cost less initially, but to use it you keep
pumping money to the provider company. Get a
secondhand 2M, and the cell company's fees will
eclipse it in a year or two. Of course, if you want to
do other things with your cell phone, like do pictures,
that'll cost you extra.

Time for the hobby and it's gatekeeper to wake up before it is too
late.


Ric Trexell wrote:
I was reading a few of the posts about how there will not be a
need
for ham
radio in the future due to all the new ways of communicating. Tha
t
has a
lot to do with it but I think the biggest problem with ham radio
is
the hams
themselves. CB'ers killed CB'ing with bad language and hams are
doing it
with those stupid contests. I remember as a kid getting my first
SW
radio
and listening to hams talk about their lives and the area that
they
lived in
and stuff like that. Now when I turn it on I get guys talking
only
about
their radio or calling CQ CQ contest. Then another will come back
and say
they are 5 and 9 out here in Kansas and soon the guy is calling CQ
CQ
contest again. Does any one think that people are going to invest
in
a
radio and all the learning to do what are nothing more than fancy
radio
checks? If that is what the ham bands are going to be used for,
then
I say
turn them over to business and telephone radio freqs. Ric.

On 02/03/2005 9:30 PM, Ric Trexell wrote:
I was reading a few of the posts about how there will not be a need for ham
radio in the future due to all the new ways of communicating. That has a
lot to do with it but I think the biggest problem with ham radio is the hams
themselves. CB'ers killed CB'ing with bad language and hams are doing it
with those stupid contests. I remember as a kid getting my first SW radio
and listening to hams talk about their lives and the area that they lived in
and stuff like that. Now when I turn it on I get guys talking only about
their radio or calling CQ CQ contest. Then another will come back and say
they are 5 and 9 out here in Kansas and soon the guy is calling CQ CQ
contest again. Does any one think that people are going to invest in a
radio and all the learning to do what are nothing more than fancy radio
checks? If that is what the ham bands are going to be used for, then I say
turn them over to business and telephone radio freqs. Ric.


Your comments are certainly going to spawn a lot of commentary! I hope
the vitriol stays reasonably low, as I can see where you are coming
from. In my short experience, rag-chewers talk about a.) the weather
b.) their equipment and c.) their cats.

I wanted to get into amateur radio when I was a kid -- it was exactly
the kind of technology I was fascinated by -- but for various reasons
never really got beyond building my own VHF "scanner" and learning how
to solder. All these years later, the purchase of a SW set has
rekindled my interest in amateur. I've recently decided to get my Basic
Qualification just for fun.

However, I've noticed many of the same things you have, and I /have/
wondered if the glory days are over, and I'm just too late. I think
there is no surprise that the mean age of amateurs has only gone up.
With the rise of internet radio, and the scaling down of some of the
stations, much the same good be said for SWL, as well.

I decided to go for it anyway, and to even practice Morse (I'm learning
at 15 WPM just to set a challenge.) I figure I can give myself a few
years on the +30MHz areas until I get my code endorsement (or the ITU
recommends dropping code, and Industry Canada follows suit),
participating as I can.

I think contests might be a fun way to meet people outside of your local
"net", but agree that unless you promise to hook up at a later time, the
pressure is really just to work 'em and log 'em and move on. I'm going
to a ham swap meet in the summer to scope out my local amateur community.

As someone else said in this thread, amateur cab be about more than
talking about gear and the weather on SSB. What the hell. I'll
discover that for myself.