[CQ-Contest] LoTW - Additional Thoughts....

["Dennis Ponsness" <wb0wao@hotmail.com>]

I saw the fee schedule and IMHO, it isn't really out of line.  I figure that 
90%+ of the participants will be US stations so more than likely the major 
use of credits will be for WAS/VUCC rather than DXCC (more on this later).  
I did a little math and came up with this - a basic "bureau type" card is 
around .05 to .10 each, first class postage is .37 each way.  I figure to 
get a card from another US op is around .80 which would include an 
"el-cheapo" card, SASE and the postage to get it there.  And we ALL know 
that there is no such thing as a 100% QSL return rate - but even if there 
was, that works out to $40 in cards and postage for a WAS and $80 for a 
6m/2m VUCC.  The same cost would be $11.25 for a WAS and $20 for a VUCC thru 
LoTW.  Now if I am wrong about DX using LoTW then the savings gets even 
better.  Figure $2 in the envelope, .60 postage and the cost of the card 
totals up to about $2.70 per entity.  Again, assuming a 100% return rate, 
that is $270 just to get the cards!  I would consider a 72% savings in 
postage for a WAS or a 93% savings for DXCC a pretty fair deal.

I do think that the ARRL may have to "rethink" their policy for DX stations 
to participate however.  I have about 40 Q's out of 3300+ "confirmed" and 
all but 2 of them are US stations (the 2 DX are from the same HA station).   
 Surely the vast majority of countries HAVE a database listing similar to 
the FCC data base, so why couldn't the same policy be used for them as well? 
 Send the postcard to the address on the official database just like they 
do for US stations.  I would like to see how many DX stations have uploaded 
to LoTW so far - I would bet that there is less than a hundred.

I also agree with the poster who said that DXpeditions will probably not use 
it - QSL "donations" are a good source of revenue to offset the costs of the 
operation.  If they do upload, I would bet that they would do so MUCH later 
on after the QSL requests have dried up.

73

Dennis - WB0WAO

EN84ij Iosco County, Michigan
Charter Member - Michigan DX Association
www.qsl.net/wb0wao
:=)

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