Lets face it guys – hams like me (age 76, licensed at age 14) learned and
used CW as an (almost) mandatory part of the hobby. Along came the NO-CW
licenses and there was a whole lot fewer new people on CW....Us old timers
are dying off and the CW mandate goes with us. Regardless of the rise of the
digital modes (oh, do remember, RTTY is a digital mode), the total number of
CW ops was destined to fall ! The new-comers (no cw requirement of course),
raised on bits and bites, naturally gravitated to the new Digital modes,
particularly during these sunspot doldrums. If it was 1980, they would all
be on 10m ssb working the world 24/7 !
Be patient, in 4-5 years condx will improve dramatically (we hope !) and
there will be a big shift back to SSB....but...don’t expect a similar
resurgence of CW...sadly, it’s a dying art...so us OT’s should enjoy it
while we can and learn to live with the new realities of HR.
73 jay NY2NY
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