Yes, it is confusing because there are differing views about how to contest.
Across all contest participants there are different interests and goals.
On one extreme are the serious contesters who are trying to maximize their
score by balancing QSO count, multiplier count and error rate. For them,
every second saved is worthwhile. The Friend file sort of works against
their goals.
At the other extreme, though, are those who just use the contest activity to
operate their stations. They may be searching for new contacts for awards
or they may simply be enjoying making some QSOs. They may even have an
interest in chatting and getting to know the person operating the other
station.
The majority of contest participants are more toward the second extreme.
Ironically, these casual participants comprise the majority of QSOs in the
logs of the serious contesters.
So, it is in everyone's interest to coexist effectively. When I'm in
"serious contester" mode I sometimes roll my eyes when I get a brag tape
response. Other times, though, I smile when someone throws in my name,
despite the time it takes away from my rate. Those instances remind me that
one thing we all have in common is enjoying ourselves in this mutual hobby.
Ed W0YK
______________________________________________________________________
Scott N0IU wrote:
I am a little confused....
Wasn't it just a few weeks ago that there was a rather spirited discussion
about paring down our contest macros to the absolute barest minimum
information by omitting unnecessary superfluous data? It seemed that there
were some here who would have a major meltdown whenever they saw someone
send their state or section three times instead of just two or repeating the
signal report when they were asked AGN? by the other station?
I used the friend.ini back when WF1B was "the" RTTY contest software and I
am sure that is where this file has its origins but I stopped using it long
ago because so many people were so absolutely outraged that I was sending
much more than was needed for the exchange.
I guess what I am saying is that some of us may be unnecessarily agonizing
over shaving milliseconds off of our macros when it really does not make
that much of a difference. Who knows... maybe after 20 years, I will put the
friend.ini macros back into my exchanges!
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