And the ARRL claims to be a voice for ham radio? Its not the ham radio I
knew and loved. I don't know what it is anymore.

Dan/W4NTI

I know what it is, is a Group I use to belong to. Even if there proposal doesnt
come abou, there no longer getting another Penny

(Art Harris) wrote in message . com...
"Chuck...K1KW" wrote:

What really amazes me is you folks don't know what the real test is for
getting on HF!!!! You have to do it!!! That means really figuring out how
to put up the appropriate antenna, tuning it, tuning and running your rig
properly, ect.

It can't be that hard; after all, hundreds of thousands of CBers
managed to get on 11 meters. Modern rigs don't require much "tuning"
and most newbies tend to buy pre-assembled dipoles or multiband
verticals. The rigs are plug and play with microphones included.

We had a pretty good license structure in the mid '60s. Most folks
started with a (non-renewable) Novice ticket with very limited
privileges to get their feet wet. Then they upgraded to General with
full amateur privileges.

That wasn't good enough for ARRL. They insisted we needed more license
classes and more exams (incentive licensing). FCC bought into it, and
we all had to upgrade or lose privileges. Now, ARRL is cheapening the
value of those higher class licenses they insisted we get.

I figure that in about five years we'll have only one license class,
and that it will require only a single simple multiple-choice exam.
Will that re-energize ham radio? I doubt it.

Art Harris N2AH


I hope that I am not particularly out of line here, but I just passed
my technician exam by mostly memorizing the question pool. I happen
to learn best by doing, and while I've been studying morse code, and
can send okay, I cannot receive very well. How much more of a "lazy,
bum, low-brow idiot" can I be if I learn to receive and send code at a
decent speed? (5WPM is so slow, it hurts my ears, by the way. I hate
it. I like 10WPM most, in terms of copy.)

The technician license really isn't a big deal at all. I'm seeing
this SOLELY as an opportunity to get my feet wet, and if I wan't more,
I'll GET more. It only took me three days of reading the first half
of that ARRL book, and memorizing the test pool questions (though I
did miss two). I'm anxiously awaiting my license, and looking forward
to chatting with some folks on a repeater (I have an Icomv8000) And I
*EXPECT* to learn more and more about this hobby by association.

As soon as I get my callsign, I'm going to join the ARRL, and I'm
STILL going to learn morse code, even if they drop it. I happen to
think that it has practical use OUTSIDE of radio, to be honest...
(Lights, etc...) and it's demise *IS* a tragedy. I jumped into this
hobby at age 30, LATE in the game. The three days I've spent studying
to take the test are a testament to my ability to MEMORIZE certain
concepts, and while I'm proud to get to be a ham, I'm not particularly
proud of the means. I will therefore conduct myself in the best
manner possible at all times, and through my sincere intellectual
pursuits in this regard, I will make my license mean more. Not
necessarily YOUR way, I'm sure, but it's MY way.

I made a promise to myself that if I wanted an upgrade to my license,
that I would fully understand all of these critical concepts before
proceeding forward with this hobby. I wanted to get to know the
community, learn by doing, and go from there. I figured I'd find out
sooner rather than later what I wanted out of this hobby. I apologize
for my digression, but I sincerely believe that there are many such as
myself who are interested in learning more about ham radio, AND
putting that knowledge to use. For someone to do any serious DXing,
they will need some kind of help making antennas, and knowing what to
do to make them work the way you want them to. You cannot help but
learn a thing or two when doing this. It's not all for naught.

I would also like to add that until I bought my icom, I have NEVER
touched, or personally seen a ham radio. I do not have an elmer, I
have done every bit of this ALL BY MYSELF, with the help of only a few
books from the ARRL. (I have until July to try and get my General,
which I plan on doing, but... I digress)

I understand the sentiments of you vets out there. The instant
gratification crowd, you can just hear the boom boxes of that rotten
group of "kidz" who're gonna "rock da wavez"... I won't lie to you,
the disrespectful punks and riffraff that are bound to come on the air
and start messing things up for everybody, but they'll eventually get
bored of it. Ham radio *IS* dying as-is. It needs to be energized,
and while I have mixed EMOTIONAL feelings about the "dumbing down" of
the tests (which does cheapen the license much as our public education
system has cheapened the high school diploma, which DID mean something
before...) We'll still have people wanting to participate on field
day, actively mailing out QSLs, etc... And at first you may have a few
idiots get on HF (For God's sake, I've heard MANY an idiot on HF!)
God knows that there are plenty on 2 meters, but I digress.)

I will agree that the HF bands will be inundated, at least initially,
with those that can only be described as "low-brows". But they'll need
money, time, and patience setting up an HF rig, and if they have the
patience to do all that they will at least do one of two things:

a.) Get bored and quit.
b.) Reform themselves, and become good hams.

I guess a provisional c. would be that they'd become a lid, and make
everybody mad, but even a lid (and they're semi-rare, I think) doesn't
generally be a lid on purpose. lol

The worst trait you can see in a ham is one that I'll admit I possess:

Impatience.

I spent a full day setting up my small rig and antenna, learning what
to do, soldering for the first time in my entire life, and I haven't
DARED press that transmit button. It is *KILLING* me that I can't
transmit yet while I'm listening to some of these nets. There's a
vast expanse of information just waiting to be unleased, and a nice,
friendly community that I look very forward to joining. I look forward
to the adventure. I'll do it right from here on in, and while I'm
interested in morse code, I will agree that even 5WPM is a joke... It
*IS* an insult, mostly because it SOUNDS TERRIBLE at 5WPM! I don't
like it, in fact I hate it. 10WPM at LEAST, but I don't make the
rules. I see morse ONLY as a practical thing to know. Not
technologically necessary to ham radio.

We're left with the ultimate reality that this nation is being
inundated with instant gratification generation X, Y, Z, and that ham
radio is *DYING* in America. I wasn't even EXPOSED to ham radio until
I was 25 years old. (I wish I were exposed to it MUCH earlier! I'd
have loved it!). It's been exclusively a money issue that's kept me
from getting a rig set up, so when the money was there, I really
applied myself to pass the tech exam ASAP, and once I get my feet wet,
I've decided...

1.) I'll either go forward full force.
2.) I'll quit, and possibly sell my gear.

I'm pretty sure that I'll choose #1, and to THAT end...

My ultimate goal will be to build my own radio from scratch. Not from
a kit, but from parts that I will have to buy myself. From a
schematic that I will design myself. It's a worthy challenge, and one
that I'm really not afraid of, because the laws of electricity don't
change. All you have is what you have. If something doesn't work,
you have only yourself to blame. haha

Knowing this, though, at first, I will probably put together a kit
radio to start, but my ULTIMATE goal is a homebrewed HF rig. We'll
see how it goes, and I'm sure I'll be posting here from time to time.

I have a very sincere desire to learn, and I want to learn MY way.
I've taken advantage of the current situation, because the situation
is there, and it has enabled me that I CAN learn my way. I'll be the
proudest ham in the world when I achieve my first big goal of putting
my own rig together, and if, Lord willing, I can get in the shape to
do some serious hill climbing and DX'ing, I'll try to win me a field
day contest.

So the means to the end are how important in my case?

Am I wrong to be proud to be a ham now? It's still going to be a
close-knit fraternity. The idiots who will go on the air to jam, and
to make body cavity noises will still be there, but if continued
interest can be generated... I don't see this as a bad thing. (God,
I've only studied code a week, and can send A-Z, 0-9, and some basic
punctuation marks... And that's at 15 WPM, COPYING is another
story..)

Again I digress, and I blither... I hope to catch some of you on the
air someday, and I hope you understand my love and interest in this
hobby is sincere. The blood doesn't get much newer than this. I'm
still waiting for my callsign.

With all respect, and sincere admiration to you vets out there.

73

DJM

(Art Harris) wrote in message . com...
"Chuck...K1KW" wrote:

What really amazes me is you folks don't know what the real test is for
getting on HF!!!! You have to do it!!! That means really figuring out how
to put up the appropriate antenna, tuning it, tuning and running your rig
properly, ect.

It can't be that hard; after all, hundreds of thousands of CBers
managed to get on 11 meters. Modern rigs don't require much "tuning"
and most newbies tend to buy pre-assembled dipoles or multiband
verticals. The rigs are plug and play with microphones included.

We had a pretty good license structure in the mid '60s. Most folks
started with a (non-renewable) Novice ticket with very limited
privileges to get their feet wet. Then they upgraded to General with
full amateur privileges.

That wasn't good enough for ARRL. They insisted we needed more license
classes and more exams (incentive licensing). FCC bought into it, and
we all had to upgrade or lose privileges. Now, ARRL is cheapening the
value of those higher class licenses they insisted we get.

Don't mean to nit-pick here but it was the FCC which dreamed up
Incentive Licensing, not the League. The FCC proposal was far more
Dracinian than was the League's response to it. In the end the FCC
bought into some of the League's arguments but imposed it's own
"vision" in other cases. If you go back thru the history of ham
regulation you'll find that it's usually been the FCC which decided
to generate the regulatory lurches, not the ARRL.


I figure that in about five years we'll have only one license class,
and that it will require only a single simple multiple-choice exam.
Will that re-energize ham radio? I doubt it.

Art Harris N2AH

Brian w3rv

"Daniel J. Morlan" wrote


Again I digress, and I blither... I hope to catch some of you on the
air someday, and I hope you understand my love and interest in this
hobby is sincere. The blood doesn't get much newer than this. I'm
still waiting for my callsign.


Dan,

Two things:

Thing #1) With your attitude, you're going to be an asset to the
Amateur Radio service, and Amateur Radio is going to be an asset to you.
I've been a ham for over 40 years, and it just keeps getting better.

Thing #2) Always remember that the inbred world of rrap is not Amateur
Radio, so don't get discouraged by what you may find here.

73, de Hans, K0HB

Harris wrote in message ...
Leo wrote:

400,000 upgraded licences = 400,000 happier ARRL members.

Not true. Only a small percentage of licensees are ARRL members, and they
tend to be the folks that have been hams a long time.

About 25% of US hams are ARRL members. The percentage of *active* US hams who
are ARRL members is higher, of course.

The ARRL is sticking
it to the folks who worked hard in the past to pass 20 wpm and the Extra
Class written test.

Not just them. What about folks who worked hard in the recent past to get
5 wpm and the General class written?

Ironically, those licensees who stand to gain the most
from this proposal are the ones least likely to join the League.

Keep code for Extra licence = a 'tip of the hat' to the 'Extra' class
members, to give them something to be happy about (although keeping
code testing as a requirement for a licence class that provides only
additional phone bandwidth as a perk is pretty odd

5 WPM for Extra Class is an insult, not a tip of the hat. The Extra Class
ticket grants exclusive 25 kHz CW segments on 80, 40, 20, and 15 meters.
These are prime DX frequencies and the proposal doesn't change that. A
higher speed code test for Extra would be more appropriate.

Agreed! And *none* of the segments are CW only.

-and- the big one:

New entry level licence with 100W on HF phone, plus simplified test =
a whole bunch of happy new potential ARRL members = lots more
potential members....and voters....and customers.....

Maybe. And maybe not.

This is what the proposal is all about, saving ARRL and the jobs of its
staff.

I don't think ARRL is in much trouble on that account.

But as we learned after the No-Code license was created in 1991,
most new hams don't join the League.

Indeed!

73 de Jim, N2EY

(Brian Kelly) wrote in message . com...
(Art Harris) wrote in message . com...
"Chuck...K1KW" wrote:

What really amazes me is you folks don't know what the real test is for
getting on HF!!!! You have to do it!!! That means really figuring out how
to put up the appropriate antenna, tuning it, tuning and running your rig
properly, ect.

It can't be that hard; after all, hundreds of thousands of CBers
managed to get on 11 meters. Modern rigs don't require much "tuning"
and most newbies tend to buy pre-assembled dipoles or multiband
verticals. The rigs are plug and play with microphones included.

We had a pretty good license structure in the mid '60s. Most folks
started with a (non-renewable) Novice ticket with very limited
privileges to get their feet wet. Then they upgraded to General with
full amateur privileges.

That wasn't good enough for ARRL. They insisted we needed more license
classes and more exams (incentive licensing). FCC bought into it, and
we all had to upgrade or lose privileges. Now, ARRL is cheapening the
value of those higher class licenses they insisted we get.

Don't mean to nit-pick here but it was the FCC which dreamed up
Incentive Licensing, not the League. The FCC proposal was far more
Dracinian than was the League's response to it. In the end the FCC
bought into some of the League's arguments but imposed it's own
"vision" in other cases. If you go back thru the history of ham
regulation you'll find that it's usually been the FCC which decided
to generate the regulatory lurches, not the ARRL.

I wuz gonna post something similar but ya beat me to it.

Some details:

FCC's 1965 proposal included such doozies as:

- all Advanceds (40K of them, about 15% of US hams at the time)
*DEMOTED* to General class

- new "Amateur First" class license, with new written test and 16 wpm
code test, plus 1 year experience as a General.

- distinctive callsigns for all license classes so you'd know right
away who was who.

- subbands that were even more restrictive (like the lower 50 kHz of
the CW/data subbands being Extra only, and even more 'phone being
taken away
from Generals)

And the ancient history is even more interesting. Before 1951 there
were effectively only two license levels and one code test speed. FCC
thought
that wasn't enough, and in '51 brought out three new levels and placed
new restrictions on HF 'phone. Then in late '52 they reversed
themselves and
gave all hams except Novices and Techs all operating privileges. Why
the
turnabout? Nobody seems to know.

But after just 5 years (1958) of the new system, FCC was unhappy with
it
and wanted changes. By 1963 they were so unhappy they said that things
were going to change one way or another, and wanted proposals. ARRL's
original 1963 proposal did not require any additional code testing for
full privileges, and only one more written test (the old Advanced).
There
were also at least ten other proposals, many from individuals, and FCC
took elements from many of them.

Personally, I think FCC had a bad case of "Sputnik Fever".

I figure that in about five years we'll have only one license class,
and that it will require only a single simple multiple-choice exam.
Will that re-energize ham radio? I doubt it.

Oddly enough, in the years following "incentive licensing", the number
of US hams grew like mad after having been flat through most of the
1960s.

Go figure - they upped the requirements and ham radio grew...

73 de Jim, N2EY

In article , Leo
writes:

That's one way of looking at it, Jim. To me, it looks like a purely
political move - that is, trying to please the greatest number of
members...and voters...and customers...

400,000 upgraded licences = 400,000 happier ARRL members.
Drop code = some number of happy new HF - using members.
Keep code for Extra licence = a 'tip of the hat' to the 'Extra' class
members, to give them something to be happy about (although keeping
code testing as a requirement for a licence class that provides only
additional phone bandwidth as a perk is pretty odd, I'd say...but it
does make the Extra level licence harder to get - that's what
everybody wants, right?).

The problem is that the 15 old men of the BoD have just
disenfranchised themselves from over 200K Technician class
licensees who will now carry the wonderful class name of
"Novice."

The ARRL has less than 170K members now. The number of
existing Tech class licensees here is greater than that now.
Those aren't likely to become members to support a group that
thinks they are all "Novices."

NOT good PR to attract membership.

-and- the big one:

New entry level licence with 100W on HF phone, plus simplified test =
a whole bunch of happy new potential ARRL members = lots more
potential members....and voters....and customers.....

"Customers" they already got. Membership is lagging.

ARRL is down to a measly $12 million annual budget (according
to the IRS forms).

All of these proposals are good news for the manufacturers of ham
equipment, and perhaps for us too - if demand is increased, production
will increase and prices of HF radios might do down!

...and Ten-Tec Orion software might finally be completed...:-)

Plus, each one of the above members that got something additional
added to their privileges if this proposal is accepted would have the
ARRL to thank for it. In theory, anyway.

Considering that, following the ITU decision to make code optional
most of the world is moving towards removing the mandatory Morse Code
requirement outright, there isn't much else that they could do without
looking like defenders the status quo, and annoying even more of their
members....and denying them the rights being granted to their fellow
amateur radio neighbours in the rest of the world.

They could have changed the Tech class name to something
they must be thinking of...like "Scum of Radio" or "Not Real
Ham" class.

When the BoD met, they must have arrived with their baggage
intact. Emotional baggage.

Like, for instance, those just north of you have proposed to do - and
that's likely to happen fairly soon, I expect.

I hope that powers-that-be in Canada are with those of us in this
millennium, not the fantasyland of olden days as in the League.

LHA / WMD

"Chuck...K1KW" wrote in message
news:HG2Pb.89209$5V2.165673@attbi_s53...
And to really improve HF operations on ham radio...we must get rid of the
archaic mode divisions on each band. I would like to see us have the same
privileges as the rest of the world's amateurs enjoy....or are we not good
enough???


As I mentioned in one of the other newsgroups, we need to divisions to
protect us from our own rudeness. I just don't see us as being that good in
following voluntary band plans in the heat of a contest or whatever.
Excluding Japan, the US has more amateurs than the rest of the world
combined. The rest of the world isn't too good about following band plans
in contest either.

I exclude the Japanese as many of their licenses are for quite low power.
In addition, many of the Japanese are inactive. They were licensed as kids
and since they issue them for life, they stay in the database forever.

It is only the 40m band that is inconvenient with the current splits but the
first steps to correct the situation have already taken place. Last
summer's international treaty changes have directed broadcasters to move out
of 7.1 to 7.2 and it will be allocated exclusively to amateurs world wide.
I forget the implementation date though. However, perhaps eventually ITU
regions 1 and 3 will eventually enjoy the extended 40m privileges that we
have here in region 2 as amateurs continue to work on this issue.

Dee D. Flint, N8UZE

"N2EY" wrote in message
om...

Oddly enough, in the years following "incentive licensing", the number
of US hams grew like mad after having been flat through most of the
1960s.

Go figure - they upped the requirements and ham radio grew...

73 de Jim, N2EY

The why is actually quite simple. The potential ham viewed it as being able
to take the trip into ham radio in small, manageable, bitesize chunks
instead of having to swallow the entire steak in one gulp. That perception
is what caused the growth whether or not it represented reality.

Dee D. Flint, N8UZE

"Daniel J. Morlan" wrote in message
om...
(Art Harris) wrote in message
. com...
"Chuck...K1KW" wrote:

What really amazes me is you folks don't know what the real test is
for
getting on HF!!!! You have to do it!!! That means really figuring
out how
to put up the appropriate antenna, tuning it, tuning and running your
rig
properly, ect.

It can't be that hard; after all, hundreds of thousands of CBers
managed to get on 11 meters. Modern rigs don't require much "tuning"
and most newbies tend to buy pre-assembled dipoles or multiband
verticals. The rigs are plug and play with microphones included.

We had a pretty good license structure in the mid '60s. Most folks
started with a (non-renewable) Novice ticket with very limited
privileges to get their feet wet. Then they upgraded to General with
full amateur privileges.

That wasn't good enough for ARRL. They insisted we needed more license
classes and more exams (incentive licensing). FCC bought into it, and
we all had to upgrade or lose privileges. Now, ARRL is cheapening the
value of those higher class licenses they insisted we get.

I figure that in about five years we'll have only one license class,
and that it will require only a single simple multiple-choice exam.
Will that re-energize ham radio? I doubt it.

Art Harris N2AH


I hope that I am not particularly out of line here, but I just passed
my technician exam by mostly memorizing the question pool. I happen
to learn best by doing, and while I've been studying morse code, and
can send okay, I cannot receive very well. How much more of a "lazy,
bum, low-brow idiot" can I be if I learn to receive and send code at a
decent speed? (5WPM is so slow, it hurts my ears, by the way. I hate
it. I like 10WPM most, in terms of copy.)

The technician license really isn't a big deal at all. I'm seeing
this SOLELY as an opportunity to get my feet wet, and if I wan't more,
I'll GET more. It only took me three days of reading the first half
of that ARRL book, and memorizing the test pool questions (though I
did miss two). I'm anxiously awaiting my license, and looking forward
to chatting with some folks on a repeater (I have an Icomv8000) And I
*EXPECT* to learn more and more about this hobby by association.

As soon as I get my callsign, I'm going to join the ARRL, and I'm
STILL going to learn morse code, even if they drop it. I happen to
think that it has practical use OUTSIDE of radio, to be honest...
(Lights, etc...) and it's demise *IS* a tragedy. I jumped into this
hobby at age 30, LATE in the game. The three days I've spent studying
to take the test are a testament to my ability to MEMORIZE certain
concepts, and while I'm proud to get to be a ham, I'm not particularly
proud of the means. I will therefore conduct myself in the best
manner possible at all times, and through my sincere intellectual
pursuits in this regard, I will make my license mean more. Not
necessarily YOUR way, I'm sure, but it's MY way.

I made a promise to myself that if I wanted an upgrade to my license,
that I would fully understand all of these critical concepts before
proceeding forward with this hobby. I wanted to get to know the
community, learn by doing, and go from there. I figured I'd find out
sooner rather than later what I wanted out of this hobby. I apologize
for my digression, but I sincerely believe that there are many such as
myself who are interested in learning more about ham radio, AND
putting that knowledge to use. For someone to do any serious DXing,
they will need some kind of help making antennas, and knowing what to
do to make them work the way you want them to. You cannot help but
learn a thing or two when doing this. It's not all for naught.

I would also like to add that until I bought my icom, I have NEVER
touched, or personally seen a ham radio. I do not have an elmer, I
have done every bit of this ALL BY MYSELF, with the help of only a few
books from the ARRL. (I have until July to try and get my General,
which I plan on doing, but... I digress)

I understand the sentiments of you vets out there. The instant
gratification crowd, you can just hear the boom boxes of that rotten
group of "kidz" who're gonna "rock da wavez"... I won't lie to you,
the disrespectful punks and riffraff that are bound to come on the air
and start messing things up for everybody, but they'll eventually get
bored of it. Ham radio *IS* dying as-is. It needs to be energized,
and while I have mixed EMOTIONAL feelings about the "dumbing down" of
the tests (which does cheapen the license much as our public education
system has cheapened the high school diploma, which DID mean something
before...) We'll still have people wanting to participate on field
day, actively mailing out QSLs, etc... And at first you may have a few
idiots get on HF (For God's sake, I've heard MANY an idiot on HF!)
God knows that there are plenty on 2 meters, but I digress.)

I will agree that the HF bands will be inundated, at least initially,
with those that can only be described as "low-brows". But they'll need
money, time, and patience setting up an HF rig, and if they have the
patience to do all that they will at least do one of two things:

a.) Get bored and quit.
b.) Reform themselves, and become good hams.

I guess a provisional c. would be that they'd become a lid, and make
everybody mad, but even a lid (and they're semi-rare, I think) doesn't
generally be a lid on purpose. lol

The worst trait you can see in a ham is one that I'll admit I possess:

Impatience.

I spent a full day setting up my small rig and antenna, learning what
to do, soldering for the first time in my entire life, and I haven't
DARED press that transmit button. It is *KILLING* me that I can't
transmit yet while I'm listening to some of these nets. There's a
vast expanse of information just waiting to be unleased, and a nice,
friendly community that I look very forward to joining. I look forward
to the adventure. I'll do it right from here on in, and while I'm
interested in morse code, I will agree that even 5WPM is a joke... It
*IS* an insult, mostly because it SOUNDS TERRIBLE at 5WPM! I don't
like it, in fact I hate it. 10WPM at LEAST, but I don't make the
rules. I see morse ONLY as a practical thing to know. Not
technologically necessary to ham radio.

We're left with the ultimate reality that this nation is being
inundated with instant gratification generation X, Y, Z, and that ham
radio is *DYING* in America. I wasn't even EXPOSED to ham radio until
I was 25 years old. (I wish I were exposed to it MUCH earlier! I'd
have loved it!). It's been exclusively a money issue that's kept me
from getting a rig set up, so when the money was there, I really
applied myself to pass the tech exam ASAP, and once I get my feet wet,
I've decided...

1.) I'll either go forward full force.
2.) I'll quit, and possibly sell my gear.

I'm pretty sure that I'll choose #1, and to THAT end...

My ultimate goal will be to build my own radio from scratch. Not from
a kit, but from parts that I will have to buy myself. From a
schematic that I will design myself. It's a worthy challenge, and one
that I'm really not afraid of, because the laws of electricity don't
change. All you have is what you have. If something doesn't work,
you have only yourself to blame. haha

Knowing this, though, at first, I will probably put together a kit
radio to start, but my ULTIMATE goal is a homebrewed HF rig. We'll
see how it goes, and I'm sure I'll be posting here from time to time.

I have a very sincere desire to learn, and I want to learn MY way.
I've taken advantage of the current situation, because the situation
is there, and it has enabled me that I CAN learn my way. I'll be the
proudest ham in the world when I achieve my first big goal of putting
my own rig together, and if, Lord willing, I can get in the shape to
do some serious hill climbing and DX'ing, I'll try to win me a field
day contest.

So the means to the end are how important in my case?

Am I wrong to be proud to be a ham now? It's still going to be a
close-knit fraternity. The idiots who will go on the air to jam, and
to make body cavity noises will still be there, but if continued
interest can be generated... I don't see this as a bad thing. (God,
I've only studied code a week, and can send A-Z, 0-9, and some basic
punctuation marks... And that's at 15 WPM, COPYING is another
story..)

Again I digress, and I blither... I hope to catch some of you on the
air someday, and I hope you understand my love and interest in this
hobby is sincere. The blood doesn't get much newer than this. I'm
still waiting for my callsign.

With all respect, and sincere admiration to you vets out there.

73

DJM

No, you are doing just fine. For what its worth I welcome you to the fold.

Dan/W4NTI