[CW] Ain't it awful?

[N2EY@aol.com]

In a message dated 4/13/02 4:55:29 AM Eastern Daylight Time, 
k4kyv@hotmail.com writes:

> ...when they started playing with the licensing requirements,
>  > > > and Incentive Licensing, which was botched by the ARRL by not
>  > > > making adequate grandfathering provisions, began the NCTA and the
>  > > > ultimate Balkanization of the ARS we experience now.
>  
>  Actually, Incentive Licensing was botched by the FCC.  The original ARRL 
>  proposal was to return to something similar the Class A - Class B licence 
>  structure that existed from before WWII until about 1951. 

Yep. The FCC asked the ARRL for ideas, and the initial response was "reopen 
the
Advanced and require an Advanced or Extra for full HF 'phone privileges" - 
just like
it was before February of 1953 (when FCC gave all privs to all hams except 
Novices
and Techs).

>  It was the FCC 
>  that concocted the present-day "compromise" that chopped up our bands into 
a  
>  ridiculously complicated subband structure.

Actually, it's a bit more complex. In the wake of the 1963 ARRL BoD proposal, 
FCC 
put out a general request for ideas. FCC also made it clear that they were 
going to do
SOMETHING - they weren't going to leave things as they had been since 1953. 

This general call for ideas brought in a ton of replies, mostly from 
individuals and small
groups. At least 10 of them were taken seriously enough by FCC to be given RM 
numbers.
The complex subband structure and other twists came from those RMs.

> If they had followed through 
>  with the original plan and in addition had grandfathered existing General 
>  class and above licensees, Incentive Licensing might have had a positive 
>  effect on ham radio.

Maybe. But FCC was concerned about the knowledge and skills of existing hams,
not just newcomers. Grandfathering would have set up an uneasy situation where
the new folks had to meet much tougher requirements than those with existing 
licenses. And the desired effects would take a long time to percolate through 
the ARS
because only newcomers would have to meet the new requirements. 

FCC initially rejected all grandfathering suggestions. In fact, FCC wanted to 
demote 
Advanceds to General class because all existing Advanceds had taken their 
tests
more than 10 years earlier. FCC wanted to replace the Advanced with a new
"Amateur First Class" license that would require 16 wpm code (!), a new 
written,
and 1 year experience as a General or Conditional. The initial FCC subband 
restrictions 
were even more draconian than what was eventually put into place. It was all 
the ARRL 
could do to shoot that down and get existing Advanceds grandfathered.

All of this is explained in the pages of QST for the era (1963-1970). 
>  
>  The tragedy is that Incentive Licensing was a dismal failure in terms of 
its 
>  intended purpose, to enhance the technical and operating expertise of the 
>  amateur community.  

How so? Extras made up about 2% of the ARS in 1965. Today they are almost 
15%. "IL" me to go for Extra in 1970.

>  Despite this obvious failure, neither the League nor the 
>  FCC are willing to fully admit they made a mistake, so there seems little 
>  liklihood that Incentive Licensing will be rescinded in the foreseeable 
>  future. 

What mistake did the League make? They knew that flatout opposition was a 
losing game.

> Following the recent restructuring, what purpose does Incentive 
>  Licensing continue to serve?

The basic concept is this: Hams who have full privileges should have a 
significant 
amount of radio knowledge. But to require that level of knowledge from 
newcomers 
is not reasonable for most people. So the license system is set up so that 
there are
licenses that require less knowledge but grant limited privileges. FCC used 
to think
that 5 classes were needed (Tech Plus is actually the sum of Novice and Tech) 
but now
they think 3 is adequate. 

--

The real history question is - what caused the FCC to decide, back in '63, 
that there 
was a serious problem in US ham radio that had to be fixed by complicating the
license structure and raising the license requirements? Why was FCC so 
unhappy with ham radio back then?

73 de Jim, N2EY