[CQ-Contest] CQ WW CW 2014 Results IK4WMH type of assistance

[Mike Smith VE9AA]

To Steve/IK4WMH and everyone else who thinks partial assistance is not
assistance, 

 

I shouldn’t be, but I *AM* constantly surprised how people can twist the
rules in their mind so as to justify their actions (to themselves or their
peers).

Being assisted means assisted.  Even if you know when you have been spotted,
it’s still assistance !

 

Let’s say you get spotted (normally) every 30 minutes (and your software
tells you this).  If in the course of the contest you find that you now are
only getting spotted once per 60 minutes, you may decide to change bands.
(that knowledge influences your decision
ie: assistance)
presumably you can
also tell WHO spotted you. (Ie: a  W4 or a JA4) so you now also know what
bands are open to where.  Maybe there is a comment you can see, too, from
this spotter, like “really weak” or “super loud”
all assistance.  Maybe you
were just about to change bands and had your finger on the band button, but
you see a spot come through
..I’d wager you will stay on that band longer.
Again, assistance.

 

If you see the WWV #’s change drastically, you may decide to work a
different band sooner (or later than it normally would occur)

 

Even watching WARC band spots is assistance as you know what bands are open
to where on 10, 18 and 24MHz.

 

It boggles my mind.

 

Next thing I’ll see a post from someone saying the cluster was only using
size 3 font, so you really couldn’t read a lot of the spots so it’s not
assistance, or their 3½ yr old was reading the spots and telling them to
Daddy but got a lot of them wrong or mixed up, so because it wasn’t you
watching the spots, so it was OK.

 

Whatever helps you sleep at night I guess.

 

In my mind, the organizers would be much better off telling people that
their computers in the shack cannot be connected to the outside world in any
way (no wifi, no modem, no Ethernet, no external input of any
kind(mouse/keyboard/keyer/mic and run radio excepted)), nor run any software
other than the software used to log the contacts. (N1MM, Writelog, XYZ
logger, CT, etc.)

No email, no internet, no nuttin! (that would also eliminate local skimmers)

 

I don’t think we need a 40 page legal document on what constitutes
assistance just to educate the small minority of people who would twist the
INTENT of assistance.  Even if it doesn’t spell it out word for word, we all
KNOW what it means.

 

Mike VE9AA

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mike, Coreen & Corey

Keswick Ridge, NB