[CQ-Contest] How unethical is this?

[Art Boyars]

It's against the rules to telephone somebody during the Contest to get
them on the air to work you.  Some people think that making skeds even
BEFORE the 'Test is unethical.  (I wonder if they also think it's
unethical to make the sked during a random radio QSO before the 'Test.
 If so, should we penalize the guys who say "CU in test this weekend"
while running before the 'Test?)

In my neghborhood are many hams, from slightly active to inactive.
There are three within 100 meters of my house, including the young man
next door with a Technician Class ticket.  (His antennas are fancier
than mine!)  Many of these neighborhood hams are co-congregants, and I
would be friends with them even outside ham radio.

During CQWW SSB I was fooling around; made a few tens of QSOs with the
Big Guns.  Concurrently, I had the Tech next door help me lower my
dipole to check it out for SS CW.  After we finished putting the
dipole back up, I took him into the shack so he could hear how an HF
contest sounded.  Of course, he was fired up.

During SS CW, when I took my Sunday morning break for worship
services, one of the inactive-but-still-interested hams was there
(he's a pathologist in the Air Force).  He knows the code -- used to
copy 30 WPM on a mill -- so I invited him to drop by to listed to SS
CW for a bit.  (Must have cost me three irreplacable QSOs to slow down
and explain to him what was going on.)  You could see the juices
flowing.  He wants to get back on the air.

Another co-congregant down the street has a tribander HF beam, an
inverted V, and a 6M yagi.  Every time I see him he describes
excitedly how he is working EU on 40 and 80 SSB every night, or the
magical QSOs on 6M.

So, what I am thinking to do is invite a lot of the neighborhood hams
to drop by during SS SSB on Sunday (probably a two-hour Open Shack),
and show them how it's done and how much fun it is.  And then
encourage them to get on the air and work some people that day.

So far, so good for the ethics -- I think.  But if I asked them to get
on, say 10M (to get the Tech), at some certain time and try working
each other, and I just happened to work them there, I think that would
be unethical, if not actually against the rules.

Could I suggest that they get on when I am likely to be on, and listen
for me?  How far do you think I could go, ethically, in getting them
to work me?

We're talking about maybe 5 QSOs in a log that will be lucky to get
300.  Of course, your opinion should NOT be influenced by the
closeness of the PVRC-NCCC SS competition going into the SSB weekend,
and any thought that I might give them a PVRC roster.  :>)

73, Art K3KU
Packet-free, skimmer-free, loudness-free.
Go PVRC!