[AMRadio] "My ARRL, Right or Wrong...!!!"

[D. Chester]

> From: Peter Markavage <manualman at juno.com>

> Pick up a 50's QST and count the monthly ads. Pick up a current QST and
> count the ads. Most likely, you'll find that given the total number of
> magazine pages in each one, there will be a higher  percentage of ads per
> month in the 50's mag.

But look at the content of those ads.  Probably as many of those pages of 
ads are for components and other material useful for building, experimenting 
and modifying, as for finished products by major equipment manufacturers 
like Collins and EF Johnson.  National company used to run a full-page every 
month in QST that was very informative, usually a technical description of 
the workings and design of one of their products explaining why the company 
built it as they did.

I sometimes find the ads in old QST's, CQ's and RADIO's just as interesting 
as the articles.

>
> The in depth technical minutia was all moved over to QEX back in the
> 80's. No reason to keep it in QST.

That's one of my biggest gripes about the League.  QST has been BASTARDIZED.

bas·tard·ize /'bæstər·daiz/ verb, -ized, iz·ing.
–verb (used with object)
1. to lower in condition or worth; debase (from Dictionary.com)

That definition describes PRECISELY what moving the in-depth technical 
articles to a separate publication did to QST.

QST has been turned into an appliance operator's journal aimed primarily at 
new licensees. I think it's a ripoff off that as a full member I would have 
to pay $24 a year extra for QEX on top of the $39 for membership dues/QST 
subscription in order to have access to articles on the facet of amateur 
radio that interests me the most, while QST, which used to be filled with 
plenty of good technical information and construction articles, is now 
filled with nauseating "human interest" drivel crammed in between glossy 
multi-page display ads. If it was practical to include in-depth technical 
articles in QST 28 years ago, why would it not be practical to-day?

As for the reports on League organisational happenings, FCC and other 
amateur radio news, and operating events that appear in QST,  99% of that 
information is already stale news by the time it arrives in the mail with 
the magazine, because I have already read it on the ARRL website, QRZ.com, 
e-Ham, Newsline, This Week in Amateur Radio, or found out about it on the AM 
Forum or this reflector, or one of the numerous other amateur radio websites 
WEEKS before QST was even delivered to the post office by the printer.

Lacking any significant quantity of  technical information that interest me, 
or amateur radio related news that is useful to me, QST is wasted paper that 
contributes to the clutter in my house, nearly indistinguishable from the 
rest of the junk mail that piles up on my kitchen table

Since QEX is a much thinner magazine than QST and only comes out every two 
months, it would not add to QST that much additional printing cost or 
weight,  to put half of the content that goes into QEX, into QST every 
month. Who knows, some of the newbies just might be curious enough to READ 
some of that technical content and actually learn something , and expand 
their amateur radio horizon beyond buying the latest and greatest plastic 
plug 'n play appliance.

I suspect there  lies a profit motive behind having two separate 
publications, each with its own paid subscribers, so it is unlikely that QST 
would ever again be combined with QEX into one publication.  Since nearly 
all the League happenings and amateur radio news that it printed in QST is 
freely and abundantly available over the internet, as a paid member I should 
at least be given a choice between receiving QST or QEX as my membership 
journal.

When my current membership expires, I am seriously considering letting it 
lapse, and instead subscribing to QEX as a non-member, and I would urge 
anyone else who is as disgusted as I am by what QST has become, to do the 
same.


Don k4kyv