[RTTY] ARRL attack on current RTTY users

[Don Hill AA5AU]

Unfortunately this is NOT what the ARRL petition is about. These stations will be free to operate wherever they want in the
digital/CW portion of the bands. If they want to set up on 14085 kHz, they will be able to do that. And they won't give a damn who's
already occupying the frequency because they probably won't even be present at the radio.

Sure, it's a great idea. Allow these stations their own little segment of the band and let them send however many files they want
and they can handle emergency traffic during disasters and such. Great idea. Too bad the ARRL is not proposing that instead.

Don AA5AU

-----Original Message-----
From: RTTY [mailto:rtty-bounces at contesting.com] On Behalf Of N4BE_Jim
Sent: Saturday, November 23, 2013 1:10 PM
To: RTTY at contesting.com
Subject: Re: [RTTY] ARRL attack on current RTTY users

Not sure what ARRLs motivation is.  Maybe get more boat owners to become hams so they can use the mail boxes, maybe sell more ads
for special modem equipment or software,... But ham radio is (or at least was) intended to be for public service such as emergency
communications, message traffic, education, etc.  many of the contests, such as FD, are intended to stress people and equipment to
test readiness in emergencies.  The various contests do the same but use very short exchanges which may or may not be realistic in
an emergency when local entities need to pass larger messages or files.  The MARS emphasis on modes such as WINMOR (WL2K) and
interoperability are for local agency support in emergencies.  Mailbox stations exist for that purpose on dedicated frequencies.
The gov't is pushing for interoperability between MARS services as well as amateur, and using both internet and RF. The objective is
to provide some level of comms if the internet should go down.  So the FCC wou  ld probably be leaning toward this objective.
Collecting RTTY contest certificates helps ensure equipment, but can old school RTTY serve local agencies sending volumes of traffic
larger than typical RST and number?  

So with that as an objective, I could see defining a handful of specific frequency channels in the ham bands for wider bandwidth
comms, much like MARS uses fixed frequencies.  You couldn't deviate from those specific frequencies much.  Mailbox stations would be
assigned to these channels based on geographic location for example.  Propagation prediction software would select bands and
channels based on time and solar conditions (WINMOR already does this).  And to make things more convenient, the frequencies chosen
could be those that are accessible by entry level licensees, which might move them further up the bands.  So there wouldn't
necessarily be point to point "chat" QSOs on 3khz modes at any arbitrary frequency.  Enforcing frequency usage to only allocated
channels could be a challenge however, but it is doable.

My 2 cents worth.

Jim N4BE. NNN0PIJ

Sent from my iPad
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