[RTTY] Self spotting

[John GW4SKA]

It seems that we have many opinions about the validity of spotting and use of the clusters. Does it really make much difference?

The top contesters are not wasting time with tricks like self-spotting ... they have no spare time while running two or more radios, looking for mults, moving stations to other bands etc.

The rare DX stations don't need to self-spot as plenty of others will do it for them.

The small stations will not benefit as they will not hear, or will not be heard, by most of the DX that might try them.

The average stations are the ones who have tried this method so far. Analysis of a few logs from this type of station who 'may' have arranged to be spotted shows no significant increase in rates. There is no incentive for other stations to break the operating rhythm and chase one extra contact in Europe or North America (unless it is rare DX .. see above). 

In any RTTY contest about a third of the participants send a log to the manager and many of those contain low numbers of contacts. In a big contest maybe 200 or 300 entrants could be called 'competitive' in some way, even if they are just trying to beat a neighbour. Many more or less unethical approaches are used at some time by competitors; self-spotting, using beacon frequencies, ignoring bandplans, making that last contact a bit late and changing the time in the log. None of them will produce a winning contester .. that comes from experience, equipment, location and luck.

Self-spotting ... stay cool, don't worry about it. Think about improving your score .. forget about the rest.

Cheers

John GW4SKA