[VHFcontesting] Fwd: VHF Contests Rules Discussion and Proposal

[Ed Kucharski]

Keith,

I've been considering a very, similar, if not the same, scenario. I support your proposal. I haven't publicly suggested it because I was concerned about the backlash of suggesting a contest without the digital modes. My thoughts: a June Legacy VHF+ Contest (with or without legacy digital modes for MS/EME). No FT8/FT4 for all the reasons you made in the your email.

I'd also like to suggest changes to the January and September contests: 
I generally agree with a 3 category proposal - Digital, PH/CW and Mixed. It is one that I have been thinking a lot about. Kinda similar to the ARRL 10m contest. However, after reading more posts and thinking in more detail, my biggest concern is; how to shift the casual contester or digital operator from "digital only" to operate on PH/CW and/or Mixed? I'm concerned that with the 3 category model that the digital operators (many of them may have been casual PH/CW ops before digital or as you referred to as the "masses") may not have an incentive to switch from digital over to PH/CW during the contest. Those ops may not have an interest in participating in the Mixed category (or any category) and therefore result in little or no increase in PH/CW participation.This may leave the more serious vhf+ contesters on PH/CW or Mixed but the number of participants on PH/CW may still be low. The potential for another unintended consequence? Thoughts?

One thought I had is to design a well thought out Survey Monkey (or equivalent - surely some on this list has experience with) and send out, over many reflectors (vhf+, contests, contest clubs, etc.) and other on-line mechanisms, to gauge operators likelihood of participating on PH/CW and what would incentivize contest operators to operate PH/CW in vhf+ contests (January and September).  

73,
Ed K3DNE 

(Now in SC - EM94ae with equipment in storage for 50 - 3456MHz just waiting for this issue to play-out before planning hilltop, mountaintop, coastal portable contest operations. I really don't have an interest in operating digital) 



> On March 17, 2020 at 5:15 PM Jay RM <  w9rm at calmesapartners.com mailto:w9rm at calmesapartners.com > wrote:
> 
>     I started out answering a private email, but then thought this might be
>     better 'out there'.
> 
>     FT modes are "out of the barn", loose in the wild and have wide acceptance,
>     so you can't look the other way or ban them - that would not reflect well
>     on the contest community. Education will not work, as the people who need
>     the education on how to contest (..just run the rate !) don't care - they
>     are just there for the Q's, not the score. Contesters mostly know they are
>     hurting their score by having to work everyone on FT8, but they need to get
>     the Qs, even if it's much slower than "the old days". The individual
>     contester need to decide whether he/she wants to.
> 
>     I don't know what would work to bring people back to faster rate modes.
>     Personally, I think the days of 200+/hour on 6M E are over. I have a
>     single suggestion that I havent put a lot of thought into, but it might
>     lead somewhere.
> 
>     SInce the FT8 boom has two main effects, one, lowering Q totals and run
>     rate on 6 and, two, depopulating the bands above 2M, let's either shunt FT8
>     modes off to a separate contest or category for JUNE ONLY. June is where
>     all the Qs on 6 are made AND June is arguably where you see the least
>     activity above 2M, since it's likely everybody is busy on 6 to a greater
>     degree than in January or September. If we need to kill off digital meteor
>     scatter in June by simply saying NO digital, fine. BTW, I'm a HUGE user of
>     digital meteor scatter and have been since the very first FSK441 version of
>     WSJT. But, I would accept not having it if it brought back SSB/CW ops.
> 
>     January and September can remain status quo. FT8/4 was ready made for 6M
>     with weak signals (I.E. little or no sporadic E) and the need for digital
>     meteor scatter is much greater for the same reason.
> 
>     If the activity in June dries up because of the proposed change, we can
>     still call it a successful experiment, go back to allowing ALL modes and
>     acknowledging the death of SSB/CW on VHF.
> 
>     -W9RM
> 
>     Keith J Morehouse
>     Managing Partner
>     Calmesa Partners G.P.
>     Olathe, CO
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