[TowerTalk] Antenna Switching - Complexity for its own sake?

[Jim Lux]

At 12:13 PM 9/23/2005, K8RI on Tower talk wrote:




> > --- Pete Smith <n4zr at contesting.com> wrote:
> >> As the author of that "harsh" criticism, I stand by it.  If the guy wants
> >> to implement a "universal" automatic antenna switch as a learning
> >> exercise,
> >> that's fine, but should QST really spend 8 pages on a design that is ...
> >>
> >
> > Given that QST, like most hobby magazines has no significant paid writing
>
>Most of the other hobby mags with which I am familiar such as aviation,
>photography, and even Amateur radio do pay although not enough to get rich.
>So I guess, no significant writing is not all that far off.

Ahem.. most professional journals CHARGE YOU to have a paper published, 
called a Page Charge (somewhere between $50/pg and a few hundred/page would 
be common).  This is after you've gone through a fairly rigorous review 
process to a) have your paper even accepted and b) make the changes the 
reviewers asked for or write the equivalent of a whole another paper to 
explain why you shouldn't change.  Granted, your employer may pay the page 
charge, or you can plead poverty and get them waived, maybe.




> > staff, most technical articles are contributed by people who have decided
> > to write about something they've done.  QST will pay a few dollars, but
>
>When did QST start paying?  It used to be any article printed was for the
>*prestige* <:-))  Been there.  OTOH CQ magazine paid a whopping $35 for two
>pages.  (This was a while back<G>)

QST is somewhere in the middle between technical journals (where prestige 
is ALL you get, and you pay for the privilege too!) and mass market 
periodicals (think People Mag or Time) where the authors get paid enough to 
make a living doing the writing.  QST is advertiser supported, which 
nominally supports the cost of publication.  I suspect the author fee from 
QST is more a "honorarium" or something to support the copyright assignment 
in a contractual sense (needs to be an exchange of something of value, aka 
"consideration".. the proverbial $1 your employer gives you to assign the 
patent)





> > nobody could make a living writing articles for QST etc.  Even the paid
> > staff
> > doesn't earn what engineers make.
> >
>
>
>Engineering is not the highest paid profession either<:-))  Having been a
>project manager it's been my experience a *typical* engineer turned loose
>goes way overboard and designs a $5,000 controller to do the job of a $2.00
>variable resistor.  Maybe that's why the Navy had those expensive toilet
>seats and hammers?

Nope.. that's the procurement people making sure that the paperwork is in 
order so the taxpayer isn't ripped off. $500 per item for the paperwork is 
in the noise when buying airplanes, but a significant cost when buying 
hammers, but the FARs and DARs don't really differentiate.