[CQ-Contest] CW VS. PHONE

[Bob Wanderer]

CW is NOT a sub-band; phone is.  CW is allowed everywhere on
the ham bands below 30MHz; phone is restricted, usually
starting 100kHz up (and outside of the USA usually by
gentlemen's agreements [de facto] rather than de jure) and a
little more for the USA phone band (definitely de jure).
This was supposedly done in the early days of phone
operation to keep non-USA stations from being deluged by USA
stations looking for a DXCC marker as the USA had more
licensees than other countries and, allegedly, better
stations (i.e. beams and amplifiers).

It seems to me to be inevitable that the phone sub-bands
will be expanded by both de facto and de jure procedures.
Hopefully, as long as there are at least two CW stations on
the air, the phone sub-bands will not extend below 50~70kHz
above the bottom edge (allowing room too for the other
digital modes such as PSK and RTTY).

73
Bob AA0CY