[Dx-qsl] Re: LOTW vs QSL CARD

[Wes Quinn]

Hi Hamad, 

I upload my logs via LOTW and I also respond to all direct and buro requests. I'm a county hunter (and I'm chasing IOTA plus a few other awards) and I understand your concern. I think most people that use LOTW are good QSLers and QSLing is the main reason they use LOTW. It saves a lot of postage costs and mailing time, especially to some areas of the world where there are mailing difficulties. 

And there are some contacts that I get via LOTW and I still mail out a card, mainly cuz I want to have a memory of it and hang it on my wall, so I don't think LOTW will eliminate QSLing. It does help on QSLing, whereas if you are going for the Challenge award from ARRL, and there are 335 entites times 10 bands, comes out to 3350 cards, so that can be extremely expensive and time consuming. Hence the reason to use LOTW. Also, the same thing if you are chasing 5B DXCC or 5B WAS. It helps to save on postage costs, filling out thousands of cards, and waiting to get them. 

Plus how many cards do you need from one station, especially if you do contesting and operate on different bands/modes? If the awards you are chasing don't care about the various bands, then you just need one card, but if you chase DXCC/Challenge/WAS awards, then you need one for each band and mode. Hence a big cost savings for QSLing. 

It only takes a few minutes to upload your log to LOTW too, so it isn't adding much time. You don't have to to it daily, but you can do it once a week or once a month or even less frequently. Whenever it is best for you. 

Right now the ARRL is only allowing DXCC and WAS awards for use with their logbook, but it will eventually grow to allow other awards too. So if you are chasing DXCC and WAS, then it would be very beneficial for you to use LOTW. Plus applying for those awards via LOTW is quick and easy too. 

It is a lengthy and complicated process to get new awards added to LOTW, so it takes time. They do have the county info in LOTW, so I think they will eventually have county hunting as an award, but it'll be a while before it is used for that award. They also track the IOTA info, so hopefully that award will be added or the data also used some day too. 

I hope this helps. Please let me know if you have any other concerns or questions. Hopefully others will respond soon too. 

If you chase counties and need Chatham county in NC, just let me know and we can work out a sked. :-) 

73! 
Wes K4WES 
Pittsboro, NC 
Chatham county 

Message: 1 
Date: Mon, 26 Jun 2006 02:02:09 -0700 
From: 9K2HN <9k2hn at 9k2hn.com> 
Subject: [Dx-qsl] LOTW vs QSL CARD 
To: qsldx 
Message-ID: 
<20060626020209.f525e73412627d4fd5552e8eeafbe035.93bb1b006d.wbe at email.secureserver.net> 

Content-Type: TEXT/plain; CHARSET=US-ASCII 

Hi, 

I don't know if this has been discussed before, I do like collecting 
qsl cards my self and I enjoy changing the design of my qsl card from 
time to time, plus confirming qso's made years back with the bureau qsl 
cards is a great pleasure for me. That is why I don't have a qsl manager 
yet, because I still feel that I have the time to do my qsl work and I'm 
having fun doing this. 

Now I'm getting requests to add my log to what called Log Book of The 
World or LOTW, regardless what is my personal opinion about eqsl thing. 
Is this new way of qsling going to kill the normal qsl card which in the 
past considered a part of our great hobby? or in my case; will I get 
less cards if i submitted my log to the LOTW? If this is true; this 
means lot of other awards that many of us track will be effected 
specially the awards which need a qsl card on hand such as JCC, German 
DOK and US County....etc. For example assuming i worked some one in a 
US county which I need and he got my confirmation in the LOTW will he 
bother answering my bureau request to enable me to get his county 
confirmed? 

Bottom line I feel as a resident of a semi-rare DX country and not a 
dxpedition, this system will not give me any benefits and in the other 
hand i will be spending more on direct request. 

What do you think? 

de 9k2hn 
Hamad