Topband: The DXpedition FT8 quandary

[Wes]

A ham friend, participant on many, many big DXpeditions, and a terrific CW/RTTY 
op, presented to our DX club a while back.  During  the presentation he asked 
for a show of hands of those who actually have audio on when operating digital 
modes.  I raised my hand, since on RTTY I feel that hearing the pileup is 
beneficial.  He shook his head and stated more-or-less that he loved FT-8 
because he didn't have to listen to it for hours.  Draw your own conclusions of 
where this might be headed.  I've worked about 80 countries just fooling around 
with FT-8 but I don't claim them for DXCC credit, and in fact, none are new ones.

Re: financial support.  Personally, I contribute to NCDXF, INDEXA and individual 
expeditions I feel deserve it.  My DX club also supports NCDXF.  That said, 
after contributing a substantial amount to the snake oil salesman who organized 
a major expedition,  but made promises that he had no intention of keeping, I no 
longer contribute ahead of time.  If I judge an expedition to be worthy after 
the fact, I'll still contribute.

Wes  N7WS

On 4/12/2019 7:20 PM, Steve Ireland wrote:
> G'day
>
> FT-8 is so much less labour and operator skill-intensive than CW/SSB that it has a fatal attraction for DXpeditions - more people can be worked more easily and more quickly.
>
> Added to this, "He who holds the gold makes the rules" and DXpeditions mostly hold the gold as we want to work them.
>
> So if increasing numbers of DXpeditions are intending to use FT-8 on 160m what can we CW/SSB ops do about it to turn this around?
>
> To start with, we can stop using FT-8 at all in our day-to-day 160m operation. The less stations there are on FT-8 on 160m the less temptation/likelihood there is of a DXpedition using FT-8 it - particularly if all the 160m stations with good transmit and receive antennas aren’t using it.
>
> Perhaps even more important – and we come back to the gold metaphor - when you make a DXpedition donation – and please do so - clearly state you are interested in 160m CW/SSB and do not use FT-8.
>
> Vy 73
>
> Steve, VK6VZ
>
>> They ain't gonna work me.? I'm with you.? Did the FT-8 last summer for around 400 Qs...that was quite enough.? If I don't make 200, 300 countries because I don't FT-8, so what?
> KH7XS
>
>
>
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