[RFI] Today's Wall Stree Journal front page article on hams & BPL

[Jim Brown]

On Fri, 26 Mar 2004 21:56:13 +0000, Tom Horton wrote:

>Frankly, I think that a very large majority of the DXers and Contesters DO
>provide services in situations where communication skills are needed.

Yes, I think that contesting skills, especially "old school"
contesting, can do a lot to  build good the skills needed for operation
in emergencies. So does running nets and handling traffic (remember
that?). 

But it's hard to justify the vast majority of what happens on our ham
bands as cutting edge or even the training of a pool of qualified
operators, and that has been true for all of the 49 years I've had a
ham ticket. In the 50's, I ran both phone and CW traffic nets regularly
and made BPL a bunch of times, and never from originations. 

Jim Brown K9YC (ex-W9NEC, W8FNI)