[CQ-Contest] ARROGANCE AND GOING SPLIT

[Jim Neiger]

I  sincerely appreciate  my friend Pete N4ZR's advice on how to attract the 
casual Skimmer ops come Sundays.  Recently Pete called me "arrogant", which, 
by any reasonable standards, I probably am.  But still it was probably the 
nicest name anyone called me that day.

 A couple of quick comments, if I may:

(1) As I sometimes say, "you need to get out more".  I do NOT always end 
each QSO with my callsign.  I have three F-keys programmed:  CALL     TU 
dit-dit, and I use them all.   By the way, I don't use the last nearly 
enough, but when I do, it's really effective and amazing how the sharp ops 
in the pile-up pick it up.  Expect to hear more of it from 9Y4W this 
November.  As to my sometimes rolling with just the CALL, I learned that 
from my idol KH6IJ, and I can probably come-up with a few worst standards to 
emulate.    It does three things:  (1) acknowledge the QSO, (2) 
identification, and (3) QRZ?   And in these days of too many going too long 
without ID, I'd  much rather have the reputation of being "pile-up 
friendly".  Another thing I've learned, the more frequent I ID, the bigger 
the pile-up.  It's an amazing dynamic.

(2) At this stage of my contesting career, spanning I guess 57 years now, I 
am definitely realizing my best years are in my rear-view mirror.  But hey, 
at the (trust me, advanced)  age of 73, I was still able to break the world 
record in last February's ARRL DX CW, but regrettably came in No. 2 to my 
good friend at FY5KE.  The arrogant side of me says:  "if you can do that, 
then please go out on the DX-end and show us what you got".  And send me a 
post-card.  I've won more than my share, and lost even many more than my 
share.  At this age, I seriously couldn't care less if I ever win again, but 
thanks for thinking of me,  Pete.

(3) I don't know, in this world of instant gratification, everyone's got an 
opinion.  It needs to be polite.  It needs to be politically correct.  It 
needs to be tightly controlled.  If we're not employing the latest 
technology, we're dinosaurs.  People do little to promote what made DXing 
and contesting great in the first place:  OPERATOR SKILLS.  Remember them? 
How to find DX.  How to copy SSB and CW in the most rigorous of 
communication environments.  How to to know where to find whom and when. 
How to know who you can move to another band, and when to ask.  How to beat 
the other guy out in a pile-up.  How to listen, listen, listen.  What set us 
to be the Best in the World communicators.

  Did you watch the 1500M races in the Olympics?  You think these 
(real-world) athletes are worrying about playing nice as they're elbowed and 
jostled going around the track?  Uh, keep your elbows in?  Give me room. 
Don't go "split"??  NOPE.  And these are real athletes, we're just amateurs.

In my opinion, if you want to play patty-cake, get your wife to take you to 
her Saturday afternoon tea party.  If you want to contest: man-up.  This is 
serious stuff.  Dog eat dog.  Go split.  Be arrogant.

Vy 73,

Jim Neiger   N6TJ

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Pete Smith N4ZR" <n4zr at contesting.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 28, 2012 2:11 PM
To: "Ward Silver" <hwardsil at gmail.com>; "CQ Contest" 
<cq-contest at contesting.com>
Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] Split operation in CQ WW CW

> Hey Doc, that's fine if you take other measures to avoid being spotted
> by a Skimmer, but if you're in fact being spotted on the RBN, doing that
> will simply cause you to be re-spotted much more often than Skimmer's
> normal 10-minute limit.  Talk about unintended consequences!
>
> N6TJ needn't worry - all he has to do is do what he's always done, end
> each QSO just with his callsign.  Of course, he may miss a lot of casual
> ops that way, but nothing's free in the Magic Kingdom. Perhaps, dare I
> suggest, he will want to start sending Skimmer's key words on Sunday,
> when things slow down.
>
> 73, Pete N4ZR
> The World Contest Station Database, at www.conteststations.com
> The Reverse Beacon Network at http://reversebeacon.net, blog at 
> reversebeacon.blogspot.com,
> spots at telnet.reversebeacon.net, port 7000 and
> arcluster.reversebeacon.net, port 7000
>
> On 8/28/2012 4:30 PM, Ward Silver wrote:
>> Dither your transmitting frequency, as well - move it back and forth a
>> couple hundred hertz with each QSO.  Not so much that the pileup moves 
>> with
>> you but enough to spread out your spot signature.  Program it into a 
>> macro
>> key or something.
>
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