[CQ-Contest] ARRL to allow self-spotting in contests

[MARK BAILEY]

Hi Randy:

Allowing self-spotting might not have had much of an impact.  Allowing chat rooms and other non-amateur radio platforms will have a huge impact.  Competitive assisted single operators and Multi-ops will have social media coordinators.  Unless a very carefully crafted rule is written, Single Operator Assisted operators can have additional people helping with social media.

Live streaming offers the ability to confirm QSOs in real-time.  The video/audio feeds will quickly be augmented by machine-readable data for that confirmation - and real-time QSLing!  This effectively eliminates the rules against confirming QSOs during contests by non-amateur radio means.

Many QSOs will now be arranged via social media or dedicated apps.  It will be interesting to see if stations still need to hold run frequencies in a few years when the scheduling apps can just access their current frequency in real-time and it becomes sort of like a sprint.  I hope so - otherwise, the single operators won't even be able to work the serious assisted/multi-op stations.

73,

Mark, KD4D

> On 02/16/2022 7:23 AM Randy Thompson <k5zd at outlook.com> wrote:
> 
>  
> From the ARRL Contest Update today:
> 
> "New Rules in effect for all ARRL HF Contests in June
> Starting with the ARRL International Digital Contest, in all categories that allow assistance (Unlimited), the use of online and other non-amateur radio platforms including but not limited to social media, live video streaming, and internet chat rooms will be allowed. In all Unlimited and Multioperator categories, the prohibition of self-spotting, and asking another station to spot you, will also be removed."
> 
> Wow.  It was one thing for the VHF contests to allow use of chat rooms and telephone calls, now this is extended to all HF contests. It should be interesting to see what unintended consequences result from allowing multi-ops and assisted competitors to spot themselves. You could spot yourself with every CQ if you wanted to. Or you can call people on the phone and ask them to get on the air. Or send out email reminders to work you during the contest.
> 
> It is likely to have the most impact on SSB to produce spotting equal to what the RBN does for CW and RTTY.
> 
> For an organization that has always been so timid and conservative on rule changes, the ARRL seems to have sprung this one without much consultation with the contest community.  I assume it is in reaction to the W2RE incident several years ago in ARRL DX where he used live streaming on Facebook during the contest.
> 
> 
> Randy K5ZD
> 
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