[TenTec] tenTec merger, etc.

[Jim Allen]

Follow the money.  In many places, the government has money available to
buy stuff, radios, antenna, power supplies, computers, goodies, toys, etc.,
pay for internet hook ups or make available existing ones gratis.

73 de W6OGC  Jim Allen


On Wed, May 21, 2014 at 9:12 PM, John F. <k4avx1 at windstream.net> wrote:

> Very interesting re future plans of ARRL and HAMNET. After a couple years
> as a regional appointee in ARES, I got the feeling that the ARRL, FEMA, EM,
> etc., see hams, especially new ones, as an Auxiliary Communications Service
> for various government agencies.  That must be why ARRL  is pushing for
> wide digital operation in the CW portions of HF bands.
> Unlike when I was involved in ARES 20 years ago, the emphasis is on the
> governmental end, it doesn't matter what the operating skill of the Ham is.
>  Just my take - doesn't have much to do with topic at hand.
> John, K4AVX
>
> Date: Wed, 21 May 2014 15:46:47 -0500
> From: Stuart Rohre <rohre at arlut.utexas.edu>
> To: tentec at contesting.com
> Subject: Re: [TenTec] Merger
> Message-ID: <537D10B7.2080001 at arlut.utexas.edu>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
> I just heard a talk, post Dayton, by one of the ARRL vice Directors.
> ARRL is hopeful for this merger to work to the benefit of hams, and for
> CQ to emerge from its restructuring as a viable magazine.  CQ appeals to
> a segment of ham radio, (contests) that varies from the ARRL contest
> participants with some overlap.  But CQ magazine devotes more in their
> magazine to their sponsored contests and those of overseas sponsors.
>
> ARRL records show a steady growth in new hams, and League membership
> grows as new hams enter the hobby.  Recent and  younger ham retention is
> a big topic at the League, and stimulation of further interest in the
> hobby; especially among the young and middle age "Makers" is also a big
> topic.  The league has an active youth component at each large
> convention, with a special subset of their booth devoted to that.  It
> seemed to be well attended at Ham Com in greater Dallas, (Plano) last year.
>
> The league has furnished seed money to stimulate Broadband Ham Net (tm),
> the up and coming digital and microwaves revolution in ham emergency
> communications.  This is based on Mesh networking, where a spread out
> community of hams can provide multiple paths across a city that suffers
> phone outages, or overload.  Hamnet can simultaneously transmit the ARRL
> Handbook text in 2 minutes,  while supporting a VOIP phone system and
> live video from an incident scene.  In other words, it has more
> bandwidth,than packet like systems could ever dream of.
>
> That might be a technical area that no commercial manufacturer is
> directly serving.  Hams are presently cobbling together systems from
> other commercial wideband antenna hardware and network boxes such as
> Linksys surplus routers.  New work and software has appeared for off the
> shelf "at the antenna" routers such as the Bullet devices.  A vendor who
> can serve the ham's questions and package a turn key "Kit"
> would be offering something no other ham supplier has attempted.
>
> -Stuart Rohre
> K5KVH
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