[KCDXC] re: Your Opinion Is Sought

[Marty Tippin]

Hi Wade

Writing to let you know that I'm in favor of discontinuing morse code testing
as a requirement for amateur licensing.

Clearly, amateur radio is a dying hobby in the US as well as around the world.
And morse code testing only serves as a barrier to those who might otherwise
take up the hobby or advance their license class. There's no question that
learning to receive CW at 5 words per minute takes almost no effort, but that's
not the point; the point is that CW is irrelevant to amateur radio as a testing
requirement.

If we're going to test applicants on their abililty to receive CW, we might as
well also ask them to show that they can properly tune an RTTY or PSK-31
signal, identify by ear whether an SSTV signal is using Scotty-1 or BW-43, have
them listen to a 6m signal and identify the propagation mode, and make them
prove that they can rattle on about absolutely nothing for 10 minutes at a time
on 75 meter AM. 

When put into perspective where it belongs, CW is just another mode that
amateurs should be able to choose to use if they want to. We don't require any
particular expertise in other "special interest" modes, and we shouldn't
require it for morse code either.

73 

-Marty NW0L
 martyt@pobox.com

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