[CQ-Contest] "?" not equal to "QRL?"

[Barry]

Nick,
I agree with you.  In a contest like CQWW CW, 30 seconds is an eternity 
and an unreasonable amount of time to listen to a freq.  Do that, and 
you'll hear someone else grab it first. 

I always listen first.  Then, if I don't hear anything, send my 
"dididadadidit," just in case someone is listening for that slow, weak 
station.

There are always stations too weak to copy and one has to make a 
decision to give up on them sometimes (even if it's a JT.)  Funny how 
the /QRP guys always fade at the beginning of their callsign and peak 
when they sign /QRP...
73,
Barry

Nick Fedoseev wrote:
> Hello Jim,
>
> It's a pity that you lost JT, but just imagine, what if that W3XXX, who
> do not hear JT due to propagation and do not hear you as you are
> listening, that W3XXX sends fat "QRL?" instead of fast "?". Isn't it
> worse?
>
> There's no time in contests to listen. There's almost no place for CQ.
> So, if you listen too long time, somebody else will start with ?/QRL?/CQ
> on the frequency.
>
> Simple "AS" or "AGN" time to time may keep the frequency clean. But sometimes
> that does not help. For example, a year or two ago I started CQWPX on
> 40m with CQ, the frequency was very nice for me, I made a few QSOs
> without any QRM. But my luck was too short. My next CQ was answered by
> weak W station in parallel with booming "CQ de ZF2xx". What to do?
> ZF2 makes a show that he does not hear me... By the way, full
> sized 3 el beam at 37m with a KW is here, not QRP at all. No offset,
> no "QRL?", no "?", no excuse, just CQ over my frequency followed
> by pileup to Europe.
>
> It's not an occasional event with JT, but a impertinent demonstration of
> the force.
>
> Any prescription against such events?
>
> Friday, August 11, 2006, you wrote:
>
> Jim> I'm at ZD8Z running Eastern Europe, and get a call from a weak JT in Zone
> Jim> 23.   I really want to hear and copy the JT.  Just as I'm about to have a
> Jim> clear shot at his callsign, your W3XXX - who has a S9 signal into ZD8 - and
> Jim> who doesn't (1) know that I've been running the frequency for hours, as for
> Jim> a few seconds I'm not transmitting, and only now trying to hear the JT, and
> Jim> (2)  W3XXX cannot begin to hear the JT, because of propagation, or  has his
> Jim> beam towards South America, or whatever.
>
>   

-- 

Barry Kutner, W2UP             
Newtown, PA