[CQ-Contest] Callsigns and licenses

[Kenneth E. Harker]

On Wed, Oct 22, 2003 at 10:57:17PM -0700, Michael Tope W4EF wrote:
> 
> As far as the FCC rules go, the commission appears to be
> silent on the all too common practice of people using there
> callsigns at other peoples stations...
>                       ...If I go to location X and set up my
> rig, I would of course sign W4EF. If location X happens to
> be the address of record for say W6UE, am I now obligated
> to sign W6UE, or can I sign W4EF if I so desire? I suspect
> the latter is the case.

The latter is the case.  You can use either callsign, as your 
and the station owner's preferences dictate.

In years past, the FCC would issue to Radio Amateurs both 
"station licenses" (to which a callsign was assigned) and 
"operator licenses."  In the 1940's, if you went to your 
buddy's house to operate, your operator license would give 
you permission to transmit, but your buddy's station license
would dictate the callsign used.  Today, the FCC no longer 
distinguishes between an operator license and a station
license.  With mobile and handheld radios being as pervasive 
as they are, maintaining the distinction is too much hassle.
So, your modern Amateur Radio license is _both_ a station and
an operator license, and your callsign can be associated 
with any operation made from your station or any operation
made by you (or where you are a control operator.)

One practice that I've never been quite sure of myself is 
something that I think is only really done in WPX contests.
I know of several WPX contest efforts that have "borrowed"
callsigns of friends who happen to have more WPX-desirable 
callsigns.  For example, W5xxx operates from his home 
station but uses the callsign of AJ5yyy (not a club callsign,) 
who is never anywhere near the operation of W5xxx all weekend 
long.  The callsign AJ5xxx is being used by an operation that 
is neither at the AJ5xxx station, nor does it involve AJ5xxx 
personally.  This seems to be done often enough, and I've never 
heard of the FCC or a contest sponsor complaining about it, but 
it's never really seemed satisfactory to me.  Perhapos I am the 
only one who feels that way.

-- 
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Kenneth E. Harker      "Vox Clamantis in Deserto"      kharker at cs.utexas.edu
University of Texas at Austin                   Amateur Radio Callsign: WM5R
Department of the Computer Sciences          Central Texas DX & Contest Club
Taylor Hall TAY 2.124                         Maintainer of Linux on Laptops
Austin, TX 78712-1188 USA            http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/kharker/
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