[CQ-Contest] CQ-Contest Digest, Vol 63, Issue 37

[Steve Harrisonusa]

> On 3/14/08, K1DG wrote:
>
>It was nearly by accident that it was discovered that the
>dots and dashes could be copied by ear and translated in
>real time, saving the visual translation step and defining
>a whole new skill. And like most skills, competitions arose
>to see who was best at it.
>
>Copying voice by ear ought to be easy, but I still make
>mistakes copying some callsigns.

CW-copying being nearly as easy as reading printed tomes, I keep wondering
when some smartash will invent a machine to copy voice and transcribe it
to CW so I can finally understand voice modes. I figure that outta be
easier to do than building a machine to transcribe voice first to CW, then
to the printed word. If such a machine should be available, I might even
be persuaded to give this new-fangled voice mode a try in a small contest
or two, sometime.

8-)

>I won't try to copy RTTY by ear though.

There were guys reputed to be able to do that in the '50s/'60s. And in
fact, considering how easy it is to copy CW at 90+ wpm, it's clear it
should only take practice to be able to copy ratty bare-ear.

Imagine that: copying ratty without any intervening machines at all.

Steve, K0XP