[VHFcontesting] VHF Contest Rules Revisions

[kevin kaufhold]

Part II – Implications drawn from regulatory and
technological impacts.  

As a result of the regulatory and technological items
cited in my first post on the topic, the reduced log
activity that we now find ourselves in may be the
“normal” state of VHF contesting, and the higher
amount of log entries that we crave may be more
related to an “elevated” state corresponding to
regulatory and technological impacts upon VHF activity
in general, and VHF contesting in particular.

This type of demographic / popularity effect does not
only occur within the small confines of ham radio. It
regularly occurs in other widely disparate and
divergent areas. For example, chess in the early
1970’s became famously popular overnight when the
charismatic and reclusive Bobby Fischer charged onto
the scene. Membership in the US national chess
federation initially mushroomed as a result of
Fischer’s sheer brilliancies on the professional chess
circuit, but then sharply declined thereafter. For
another more recent example, the National Association
of Investment Clubs (NAIC) saw their membership roles
balloon in the late 1990’s only have to the number of
clubs and members fall dramatically after the crash of
the tech drive market bubble in 2000.  In both of
these instances, the non-profit central sponsoring
organization felt that they were doing a great job on
the way up, but initially couldn’t understand what
they were doing wrong on the way down. (Both
organizations suspected the cause from the start
however). The tremendous ups and downs of
participation had nothing to do with them. It was the
popularity / demographic boom that was in play.  

Similarly, I suggest that the ARRL is doing nothing
innately wrong with their VHF contest format. In fact,
the contest’s sheer longevity while others (such as CQ
VHF WW / WPX) have floundered over the same time
periods is a testament to the League’s overall success
at VHF contesting sponsorship over very long time
frames.

If I am right as to demographics and technology issues
being the root cause of the log submission rise and
decline, then at most, tinkering with the rules will
not get to the real problem. It may just marginally
improve log entries to correct for some obvious
problems. Contest rules changes however may also have
negative unintended side effects that cannot be
anticipated ahead of time. Further, many contesters
may be too closely involved in the process to begin
with. They may truly feel that they are lobbying for a
rules change designed to enhance log entries.  But
they may be actually motivated more by perceived
inequities to the current rules that they have
struggled under in past contests, and which may have
little or nothing to do with the number of log
submissions in general. 

This general line of reasoning generates an obvious
conclusion: changing the rules will not by and of
itself generate a corresponding increase in log
submissions.  I suggest that an understanding of the
underlying changes to the FCC regulatory structure and
impacts from technological innovations be more
carefully examined before we start making wholesale
changes to a 65+ year old contest system that has
generally served us well.

In my next post, I will provide some of my comments as
to some of the proposals currently floating about.  

Kevin Kaufhold 
W9GKA




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