[CQ-Contest] Top 25 Things Vanishing From America

[Dave/KA1NCN]

The actual article:

http://www.walletpop.com/2008/07/17/top-25-things-vanishing-from-america-16-ham-radio/

does not seem to come to any specific conclusions about the number of licensees.  

Instead it makes a more political statement that "As cell phones and the Internet siphon off much of what once attracted people to amateur radio, the nation's ham radio population is graying rapidly. Given the cash value of the radio bands allocated to amateur radio, there will be relentless pressure on the government to take back those bands so they can be sold. All these elements speak to a long, slow diminishment of a pastime that began with Marconi."

Let's take the statement one sentence at a time:

>>As cell phones and the Internet siphon off much of what once attracted people to amateur radio, the nation's ham radio population is graying rapidly. 

Maybe cellphones and the internet siphon what attracted the baby-boomers to radio.  But the people entering radio now are probably not looking to replace their cellphones.  Usually they are interested in intellectual and technical challenges, emergency communication, competition, etc.

>>Given the cash value of the radio bands allocated to amateur radio, there will be relentless pressure on the government to take back those bands so they can be sold.

There have *always* been interests that wanted to take away our bands. This is what makes such "pressure" relentless.  Nevertheless, the league and others have always stood up for our allocations.  So, by the same token, our "support" of radio has been relentless, too.  In fact, since hams support radio for the love of the game, rather than for the money that comes from it, our support does not waiver with economic conditions (i.e. changing "cash value") or political fortunes.  

>>All these elements speak to a long, slow diminishment of a pastime that began with Marconi.

This is a very vague statement.  At some level, we can all agree with each other that the world is slowing down and at some point in the future the world will end.  So what?  Does that mean that the world is vanishing from the universe?

73, 
Dave/KA1NCN
dave at KA1N.CN