"Carl R. Stevenson" wrote in message ...
"N2EY" wrote in message
om...
"Carl R. Stevenson" wrote in message
...

NCI's Petition for Rulemaking with the FCC.

It is available in .pdf format at http://www.nocode.org
under the "Articles" link ...

OK, let's cut to the chase.

Obviously the main request is to dump Element 1 ASAP. And there's
probably lots of reasons given for doing so, including the
Commission's own words "no regulatory purpose".

But what else was in the petition?

I gave you a URL where you could read it ...

That's not what I asked.

Here's the answer, to save others the bother of reading 20 pages to
get the answer to my question:

NOTHING.

The NCI petition consists of a request to drop Element 1 without
further delay or discussion and give Techs the same privileges as Tech
Pluses. No other changes proposed. Most of the 20 pages is supporting
reasons to make the change.

Some will undoubtedly say "What took you so long?"

The answer is simply "We wanted to do the best possible
job of getting it right."

What did it take - six weeks? Not really long at all. Plus there was
always the chance FCC would have simply dumped Element 1 on its own,
instead of doing the whole NPRM thing.

What surprises me personally is that NCI didn't have a proposal ready
to go before WRC-03 even began. But that's all water under the bridge
now.

There was some question as to whether S25.5 would be suppressed
or modified (as it was) to eliminate the Morse requirement ... that
uncertainty made us decide to see the final outcome before developing
a final strategy/proposal.

99% of what was in the petition would have been the same regardless.

As you have pointed out, Carl, FCC hasn't even given any of the
proposals an RM number yet. And it's reasonable to assume there will
be more proposals - from NCVEC, ARRL, and other groups. FCC may assign
numbers, or they may take ideas from each one and produce an NPRM.

NCVEC already filed a petition, as have several individuals.

It's clear NCVEC isn't done yet. They're talking about other changes
too.

From a meeting I had at FCC on Thursday, the indication is that
they will lump them all together in whatever course of action they
decide to take.

In terms of requested rules changes, the NCI and NCVEC petitions are
essentially identical.

ARRL doesn't need to file a petition on the Morse issue, unless, of
course, they wise up and decide to ask the FCC to eliminate Morse
testing ASAP so they won't continue to alienate a portion of the
US amateur population that's larger than their current total membership :-)

Who is this alienated population? You can't mean NCI members, because
they are less than 1% of US hams.

(They don't need to file a petition to keep code testing, because that
is the status quo ...)

They may want changes other than elimination of Element 1.

And of course those wheels turn slowly.

We shall see ...

You in The Pool yet? (see rrap thread by that name)


73 de Jim, N2EY