[GreenKeys] QSO's with glass tubes
w8au at sssnet.com
w8au at sssnet.com
Wed Feb 5 15:08:23 EST 2014
At 02:09 PM 2/5/2014, Teletypeparts KB1FDW, wrote:
>Interesting info and I think you are right.
>
>At our local ham clubs Boy Scout QSO day, the
>scouts are always most impressed with CW. I
>should say I dont go to that particular event,
>but hear from others in the club.
With reference to "Jamboree on the Air," cited
above, I agree with the comments, and add some
additional information.
As opposed to the now stereotyped image of todays
kids, those in the BSA program have it instilled
in them all the basics of good (old fashioned?)
conduct, preservation, personal skills, civic mindedness,
family life, and about ninety-some other aspects
of good citizenship - while also embracing the latest
in technology as it improves society.
As a Radio Club instructor in our training
classes (including a separate class on CW training) I have
found that the youth interest comes mostly from
Boy Scouts, not the average teenager. In my coming
Code class beginning next week I will have five
students. (Code class is not the most popular, of course)
Of these five, three are Scouts of teenage years.
In my past help with their annual "Jamboree on
the Air," I have had many belated thanks from those boys
for letting them have "on the air" fun at
campouts. (station in a tent with tree supported wire antennas).
The satisfaction received from their enthusiasm
only increases my desire to focus more on this up-and-
coming demographic of society as one way to keep
the "do it yourself" aspect of Ham Radio alive into
the future. Their accomplishments in Amateur
Radio will, of course, be noticed by their school peers
and friends, thus increasing the exposure.
Our focusing on BSA will not limit our training
promotion, of course, and we know that the
majority of kids will not be exposed to BSA or
GSA (girls). But we should be grateful for those that are.
Perry w8au
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Keelan Lightfoot <keelan at beefchicken.com>
>To: gbuda <gbuda at cyberwright.net>
>Cc: greenkeys <greenkeys at mailman.qth.net>
>Sent: Wed, Feb 5, 2014 1:59 am
>Subject: Re: [GreenKeys] QSO's with glass tubes
>
>The appeal of amateur radio is going to change.
>With global communication becoming a commodity,
>the future generation of hams will be attracted
>for different reasons. The future of amateur
>radio will see the hobby getting back to its
>roots. In the face of dwindling sales, the big
>manufactures will give up on producing amateur
>equipment. Surrounded by software defined radios
>that make every mode of communication a matter
>of just downloading the right software, the
>amateur of the future will want to get back to
>the basics of building radios with just his
>hands, a fist full of discrete components, and a
>solid understanding of RF electronics. QRP will
>gain in popularity. Why dump a kilowatt into the
>atmosphere to talk to someone in Guam, when you
>can Skype them in full high definition video and
>near CD quality sound? The appeal in amateur
>radio will shift away from ‘best’, ‘more'
>and ‘faster' towards a mentality of ‘cheap’, ‘less' and ‘creative'.
>
>The age of the glass TTY will die out. It
>already seems a bit silly using software to
>emulate a protocol that has been bettered by
>other protocols (PSK31), especially when the
>same software is usually capable of both.
>So-called ‘Glass TTYs’ will be reflected
>upon as a blip in time, a moment of bad
>judgement, while the mechanical TTYs will
>continue to capture the imagination of folks for years to come.
>
>Show an 20 year old a glass TTY, and he’ll say
>“So what, I can text my friend in South Korea
>right now with my iPhone, and I don’t need to
>sit down at the computer." Show a 20 year old a
>running Model 28, and you’ll see his curiosity
>oozing out. To kids born and raised in a world
>defined by software, things that solve problems
>mechanically are pure magic. Point a
>store-bought yagi at Alaska and feed it a
>kilowatt from a store bought radio with store
>bought linear amp, and a 20 year old will remind
>you about Skype. Have that same kid witness a
>QSO made with a radio constructed dead-bug style
>in a sardine can, using an antenna strung up in
>a tree, and you’ll have his imagination reeling.
>
>I suspect that in the future, the “off the
>shelf†era of amateur radio will be looked
>back upon with some degree of derision, as a
>period of time when we let big companies steal our hobby out of our hands.
>
>This isn’t just pure fantasy either, other
>hobby industries have seen a similar
>transformation. An example? Knitting. For a
>period of time, there existed quite a
>substantial industry around home knitting
>machines — amateur machine knitting, if you
>will. Big names, Brother, Toyotta, Husqvarna to
>name a few, were all involved in the business.
>Knitting machines evolved, becoming fully electronic computer controlled.
>
>Then one day, something happened: in the face of
>declining sales due to an aging customer base,
>Brother, the market leader, pulled the plug on
>their home knitting machine business. One by
>one, all of the others followed suit, and the
>“industry†collapsed in the late 90’s. To
>the financial observer, the business collapsed
>overnight. But to the hobbyist, that isn’t the
>case at all. For many machine knitters, this
>industrial abandonment was a prompt to get back
>into hand knitting, and that hobby has seen a
>significant increase in interest. As the
>computerized and electronic knitting machines
>break down (replacement parts are getting very
>expensive to source), knitters are dragging
>their old punch card controlled machines out of
>the closet. Hobbyists are taking apart their
>electronic machines and developing custom
>controllers and software for them. People are
>learning how the machines really work, and
>they’re trying interesting and creative things
>with them that the automation made impossible.
>Lacking a huge body of fashionable at-the-ready
>patterns, people are more apt to create their designs from scratch.
>
>I’m convince that the most satisfying part of
>a hobbyist pursuit comes after the “big
>boys†have moved on for more lucrative territory.
>
>- Keelan
>
>Footnote: My mom was a busy publisher of machine
>knitting patterns and books; declining sales, a
>cancer diagnosis, and the loss of the big
>manufacturers saw her shuttering her business in 1999. She beat the cancer.
>
>On Feb 3, 2014, at 4:39 PM, gbuda at cyberwright.net wrote:
>
>>It has been many years since I’ve had my
>>machines on RTTY. I gave up when trying to
>>work the glass tube operators. They don’t
>>understand the concept of CR, LF & LTRS at the
>>end of each line and some of the software
>>doesn’t even offer you CR and LF options,
>>just word wrap. I had a software developer
>>tell me I had to “get with the timesâ€
>>because his software did not have CR and
>>LF. Need to be able to speak to the lowest
>>common denominator…which is why we sometimes
>>have to slow our Morse code down to 5
>>wpm. Painful, yes, but worth the investment!
>>Gary WA0NDN
>>NNNN
>
>
>______________________________________________________________
>GreenKeys mailing list
>Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/greenkeys
>Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
>Post: mailto:GreenKeys at mailman.qth.net
>
>2002-to-present greenkeys archive: http://mailman.qth.net/pipermail/greenkeys/
>1998-to-2001 greenkeys archive:
>http://mailman.qth.net/archive/greenkeys/greenkeys.html
>Randy Guttery's 2001-to-2009 GreenKeys Search
>Tool: http://comcents.com/tty/greenkeyssearch.html
>
>This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
>Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
>
>______________________________________________________________
>GreenKeys mailing list
>Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/greenkeys
>Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
>Post: mailto:GreenKeys at mailman.qth.net
>
>2002-to-present greenkeys archive: http://mailman.qth.net/pipermail/greenkeys/
>1998-to-2001 greenkeys archive:
>http://mailman.qth.net/archive/greenkeys/greenkeys.html
>Randy Guttery's 2001-to-2009 GreenKeys Search
>Tool: http://comcents.com/tty/greenkeyssearch.html
>
>This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
>Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.qth.net/pipermail/greenkeys/attachments/20140205/a42565a1/attachment.html>
More information about the GreenKeys
mailing list