[CQ-Contest] About Remote Contesting

[Paul O'Kane]

On 27/02/2011 06:33, K6VVA - Rick wrote:

> With all the technological advances (like Remoterig) making hands-on (vs.
> software) remote contesting possible, as many aging contesters get closer to
> the days of QSY'ing to Assisted Living facilities or moving in with adult
> children in antenna-restricted tract homes locations, going remote will be
> the only hope many of our fellow contesters have of still staying in the
> game to some degree.


This is the "I'm special" argument all over again.
I'm poor, I'm old, I'm sick, I can't learn morse,
my QTH is too small, therefore I deserve to be
treated differently from other contesters.


> We are ALL going to die someday, which is why it is important to look for
> new ways and new technologies to continue enjoying some of the things
> important to us for as long as we can before the finality of going SK.

We could apply the same argument to participants
in any competitive activity and it would be just
as irrelevant.  New technologies are appropriate
only when they do not change the activity to the
extent that its name should change.

Aging marathon runners might take a ride for part
of the course.  The only problem is they would no
longer be marathon runners.

My objection to remote control in contesting is that
it introduces something other than amateur-band RF
(corresponding to the modes and frequencies of entry)
in the signal path between the operators concerned.
For some part of the path, some other communications
mode or communications technology must be used,
otherwise no QSO could take place.  I'd like to
emphasise that I'm referring only to what happens
between station boundaries - within the station
boundary (the 500-metre rule), anything goes.

Now, some may insist that it is still amateur radio,
but I know better :-)   It can only be described as
some form of hybrid communications.  You may say it
doesn't matter what I think.  However, if you're
using the internet (most likely) to make QSOs, and
could not possibly have those QSOs without the
internet, then you're doing something fundamentally
different from me and most other contesters.

73,
Paul EI5DI