[CQ-Contest] Interesting Youth In Ham Radio (was Digest)

[Ward Silver]

> Clearly, our game is going to become more connected and real-time.  I see no reason, however, that this new world cannot co-exist with the traditional single operator categories (WRTC-like for instance).  What I would like to see considered is making sure that the new world doesn't require everyone to be connected and integrated - interoperate with a game where the "radio" people can play.
>
> I was particularly struck by, and disagree with, the following:
>
> "So everybody has to be
> connected - so what - make a new CWAC overlay to CQ WW called the
> Internet WW and run everybody's totals there.  If a QSO isn't validated
> because the station isn't online, give it one point or something."
>
> I think this new game, which is very rapidly taking over the Assisted and Multi-operator categories, can easily coexist with the traditional single operator game that some of us still enjoy playing!:-)
>
> Mark, KD4D
I am not sure we are communicating about what a "CWAC overlay" is - 
everything on the air is just the same and all contacts count 100% for 
the regular WW.  In addition to the regular WW, though, the contacts are 
also submitted (in real-time) to a server (possibly the same server as 
the real-time scoreboard) where they are validated against other 
submitted contacts and a parallel score is generated. In fact, the 
real-time scoreboard could show *two* scores for me - one claimed score 
as usual and one validated score for the Internet WW CWAC overlay.  At 
the end of the WW, I submit the usual log and the validation engine 
posts my score from the QSOs submitted in real-time.  So, in fact, the 
new and existing games can co-exist very well.  Someone listening in 
could not tell the difference.

What would the submitted QSO data look like?  A group of us developed an 
XML schema for QSO and score submission in the late-90s.  I'm sure there 
are better data formats today but just throwing this out there, why not 
use the QSO: line's regular Cabrillo format?  That certainly seems to 
suffice for after-contest log-checking.  Assuming I've pre-registered my 
category and header information with the validation server, there should 
be no difference between real-time and post-contest contact validation. 
To be sure, there is a lot more human oversight and intervention in 
post-contest log-checking. One challenge would be to create a set of 
validation policies that are a suitable compromise between real-time and 
post-contest log-checking.

73, Ward N0AX