[UK-CONTEST] Separate reflectors?

[Ray James]

Well put Andy,

73 Ray GM4CXM

--- On Tue, 30/10/12, Andy Cook, G4PIQ <g4piq at btinternet.com> wrote:

> I have to say that I'm sitting here
> quite bemused by this thread. To me,
> there is now great reason for common ground across HF and
> VHF contesting,
> both at the committee level, on the reflector, and (more
> widely than just
> contesting) - for a convention. 
> 
>  
> 
> There always used to be a strong divide between VHF and HF,
> largely driven
> by the fact that the former Class 'B' licensees didn't have
> access to HF.
> This led to a quite separate VHF-only community. That all
> changed many years
> ago when everyone gained access to HF. 
> 
>  
> 
> Likewise, it's purely down to the history of two separate
> contest committees
> that the 'Core' rules for VHF and HF contests are different.
> The major aim
> of a contest committee should be to drive increased
> participation in
> contests. A significant barrier to getting new folks
> involved is the
> complexity of the rules. How can we possibly justify having
> two separate
> committees devising two separate rule structures. Yes - of
> course there will
> be specific rules which need to be different (e.g. you don't
> exchange
> locator info on HF) - but the 'core' rules - log submission
> times, penalty
> structure, AFS distance rules etc. should all be
> common.  
> 
>  
> 
> On the subject of the reflector - I strongly support a
> single reflector to
> allow debate on the many common issues of contesting in the
> UK. Contesting
> is not exactly over-represented in the UK amateur population
> - and we'd do
> well to avoid fragmenting it more. But there is a second
> powerful reason for
> a common reflector - supporting a bit of education. The
> DELETE key is a
> powerful one - if you're really not interested in a topic -
> then delete it.
> But equally - by reading posts which you're not initially
> interested in -
> you'll learn stuff. For example, died in the wool VHF-ers
> will learn
> something about the vaguries of dawn enhancements and
> occasional high-angle
> propagation on 160m at dawn, while 160m folks will learn
> about aircraft
> scatter at 1.3 GHz. We also see evidence of this
> cross-fertilization
> encouraging some VHF folks to try HF and some HF folks to
> try VHF - this is
> good. 
> 
>  
> 
> There will always be grumpy, ill thought out, even
> troll-like postings which
> irritate people. From my observations - these come from both
> communities -
> and again - just use the DELETE key.
> 
>  
> 
> Finally, on the subject of the convention. Again - I
> strongly support a
> joint convention covering both VHF and HF. Apart from the
> practical
> difficulties of organizing and funding two sets of
> conventions (there are
> fixed overheads - e.g. venue hire to fund at these events),
> if you aren't
> retired, or you have a young family, getting an extra two
> weekends a year to
> attend separate conventions just doesn't work for many of
> us. 
> 
>  
> 
> 73,
> 
>  
> 
> Andy, G4PIQ
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
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