[CQ-Contest] Reverse Beacon Network Reaches Milestones

[David Gilbert]

I've suggested this before to Alex and gotten no response, but it seems 
to me that the Reverse Beacon Network would be more effective if it was 
able to identify callsigns sending some other string besides 'CQ".  
Every time I've tried to use it to check my signal into Europe people 
keep trying to answer my CQ ;)   I always end up truncating my tests so 
that I don't mislead people.

I think it would be more straightforward if CW Skimmer also recognized, 
for example, something like "RBN de AB7E".

73,
Dave   AB7E

 

Pete Smith wrote:
> I thought contesters would be interested in recent developments at the 
> Reverse Beacon Network (http://www.reversebeacon.net)
>
> *  We now at least 20 reverse beacons (active Skimmers) on four 
> continents running at any one time, listening for YOUR signals.  Many of 
> them are listening on multiple bands.  To find out if your signal has 
> been heard recently, go to the main page, click on "search spot by 
> callsign" on the left side below the map and enter your callsign - 
> that's all it takes.
>
> *  People have now logged on from over 100 DXCC entities, and we're now 
> getting nearly 400 visits a day.
>
> One of the most interesting features of the Reverse Beacon Network is 
> the ability to compare your signal with others.  Under DX Spots on the 
> top menu of the home page, click on Compare Spots and follow the 
> instructions to specify a day, a band, the reverse beacon, and the 
> stations you want to compare with.  The RBN delves into its database, 
> looks for the times when your signal and those of your competitors were 
> received at close to the same time, and reports your comparative signal 
> to noise ratios.  This works particularly well on major CW contest 
> weekends, of course.  CQWW CW was 11-28 and 11-29-2009 -- if you were 
> active give it a try.  Compare your signal with W3LPL, or K3LR, or 
> KC1XX.  It may not be extra pleasant to do that (hi), but it *is* 
> educational.
>
>