[CQ-Contest] spotting statistics

[jljarvis]

The problem with data...any data...is understanding it.  NS3T's doesn't
take into account the TOTAL NUMBER OF SPOTS FROM EACH STATION.  It may
be that what is reported represents only a small percentage of total spots
for any given station, and is not only not material statistically, it might 
not be memorable during the heat of a contest.  

Take an extreme case....Suppose a m/m has a mult hunting/spotting position.
All it's doing is feeding the station network with mults for band S&P follow-up,  
and dumping spots on the net.  It might spot...10-15 an hour, for 48 hours.  
That's 480 to 720 spots in a contest.  Suppose there are different ops in that 
chair.  What is the chance they'll  randomly spot HC8N 4 times on 10 meters?  
When 10 is hot, I'd say pretty fair.  Chances of 10-12 spots happening are
high, in fact.

What does it mean?  Absolutely nothing, statistically. 

Let's take the top poster on Jamie's list....IR3P.   He spotted FM5GU 30 times,
half of which were on 20 meters.  Is there something wrong with that?  Suppose
IR3P has buddies who NEED FM, and he was making sure they knew where he was.
We don't know whether that was 100% of IR3P's total spots, or 1%; but
it was probably in the minority.  It averages less than one an hour...and less
than one every TWO hours on 20 meters.  Is that a lot?  Doesn't seem so.

Here's another factor:
Most EU spots tend to go to DXSummit, and are visible worldwide.  Some US clubs
still close their network to outside spots...and vice versa....so you might have 
more aggressive spotting within a club than is visible globally.  Where's the
fairness factor there?  

Again, I urge caution in reaching judgement on this issue.  If you stipulate 
that self-spotting is a proscribed behavior, then the only remaining question
is "what's excessive spotting of other guys?".  

My response would be, "Who cares?".  Why discourage spotting at all?  The more
you spot, the more you drain resource that could be producing Q's for your own
station.  If you overdo it, the packet bandwidth starts to backlog.  It's a 
self-limiting behavior, both ways.

Let's talk about something else.

Jim Jarvis, N2EA