It has taken me quite a while to adjust to the new amateur radio paradigm.
It has not been easy, to say the least.

Today's HF bands sound like CB SSB of twenty five years ago. How do I know?
I was there. It was before I became a ham. I had lots of fun there too, but
the truckers finally drove me towards ham radio. That and the CB crowd, most
of them, did not like it if you spoke the least bit technically in those
days.

I operated Air Force RF communications systems in the sixties and got my FCC
GROL with radar endorsement before I was a ham, so I don't want to hear any
wisecracks about being a CBer at heart.

I operated a lot during the early to mid eighties. There were a lot more
people on the VHF/UHF bands in those days. I operated CW and AMTOR/RTTY on
the HF bands back then. Living in the center of town and not having room for
a real antenna kept me from using HF phone on the lower bands. Besides, from
what I could hear, there was no real reason for me to go down there, even
back then. I'm not into listening to drunks argue and people impersonating
various dog barks.

These days I still enjoy VHF/UHF more than HF, but the number of operators
seems to have diminished quite a bit. I am about to get back into HF
digital, but with all new modes to try. That should keep me busy for a
while.

I enjoy using computers with ham radio. Talking for hours on SSB is boring
to me. I'm not knocking it. I'm just not interested in operating phone on HF
that much. To each his own.

Even back in the seventies, there were a few hams telling other hams that
they were not real hams, for one idiotic reason or another. Nothing has
changed that way. You'll find obnoxious people where ever you go.

Ed Cregger



"Paul Vanasse" wrote in message
.. .

"Zoran Brlecic" wrote in message
...
So if these are all legitimate concerns for you, why not just get a
cellphone and dial randomly from a phonebook or switch to chat rooms
exclusively? Why is it necessary for you to pretend that you are a ham
radio operator, when you are obviously not?

DITTO, DITTO, DITTO

73 de Paul