Ev, it can be that bleak. While total participation in the contests is a
measure of how popular a contest is, so is the number of logs submitted.
For almost all VHF/UHF contests the number of logs has been going down down
down. The only contest that breaks that mold is the 10 Ghz and above
cumulative contest which has been increasing.
It seems obvious to me that a lot of the contest participants are not
serious about the contest, and only operate it because it is there. I'm not
saying there is anything wrong with this, but certainly the number of logs
submitted goes more to show participation by people who care about the
contest than the count of all participants does. I am sure that there are
probably as many people who come on and make 10 or less contacts on a single
band as there are who submit logs. Counting those people would give a
distorted view of interest in the contests.
The ARRL has formed an ad-hoc committee with some very high level people and
with at least 5 well known serious VHF operators, for the purpose of seeing
what can be done to revitalize the contests. They are looking at ways to
make the contests more interesting and more varied so we don't have the same
boring format every time. They are looking for ways to make it easier for
participants to overcome the log submission hurdle. They are looking for
serious suggestions on ways to make VHF/UHF contesting more attractive to
the 50 to 100 thousand HF operators who have the new combined HF/VHF radios
but who never use the VHF SSB portion of them.
The best thing this group can do to help is to put on our thinking caps and
come up with some insightful suggestions to achieve these goals. This may
be our last best chance to save a large portion of our niche of the hobby.
73, Russ K2TXB
Ev Tupis (W2EV) wrote:
> Subject: With all due respect... [was:Increasing submitted logs]
>
> According to Steve Kerns (N3FTI) post to VHF@W6YZ...
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Have been following this thread for awhile...
>
> Gene Zimmerman ,W3ZZ (QST "World Above 50MHz" Editor) spoke last
> week at the Mt.
> Airy VHF Radio Club (the Packrats). The topic was the declining
> participation
> in VHF contests. According to Gene, the ARRL has been watching
> the numbers of
> VHF, UHF, and EME contest entries decline for the last few years.
> It is quite
> possible that the ARRL will think no one is interested and they
> should spend
> their time on better things! We need to generate more VHF
> contest entries (that
> is, if
> we think the contest are worth having!). The only indicator
> Newington has is
> the number of logs they get per contest. The ARRL has no idea
> how many people
> operate in each contest, they only data they gather is the number
> of logs they
> receive.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I've got to believe that something got lost in the translation in
> what Gene told
> the Mt. Airy VHF Group and the information shown above. Certainly he (of
> anyone) understands that this data is readily available for analysis.
>
> It took me 5-minutes and an excel spreadsheet to know how many people
> participated in a contest (and who they are)...based on what
> callsigns appeared
> in a few big logs vs. who actually submitted a log to the ARRL.
> I'm nobody
> special, but I figured it out. The ARRL is full of folks a lot
> smarter than me.
>
> Just a week or so of focused attention to the task will provide
> all of the data
> needed to not only reach a valid conclusion (which has yet to be
> reached), but
> start the ball rolling about finding a solution.
>
> I've got to believe that Gene was misunderstood. Things can't be
> as bleak as
> this makes them appear.
>
> Ev, W2EV
>
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