Yes,
This makes radio-sport very different but that never came up with my
son. I agree with you though.
What I have seen that might be defense would be not helping others
improve their stations or skills but that is no during the actual
competition.
W0MU
On 12/18/2016 5:24 PM, Jim Stahl wrote:
I suspect there is one factor missing from radiosport that kids and many others unfamiliar
with it miss: defense. In nearly every other sport or game I can think of (golf and track are
a few exceptions) you are not just trying to win, but trying to beat your opponent or
opponents. And no, “defending” your frequency from somebody trying to use it is
not defense. Defense is doing something to prevent your opponent(s) from scoring.
I don’t want anybody trying to stop me from scoring in Radiosport. But without
it, the competition will seem pretty tame to the uninitiated.
73 - Jim K8MR
On Dec 18, 2016, at 12:42 PM, W0MU Mike Fatchett <w0mu@w0mu.com> wrote:
I had the opportunity to talk to my son in more detail and ask him why
contesting does not interest him. Here is what we discussed.
1. Cost to get in the game and have a chance to win is prohibitive. You need
a great station, land, etc to really win or compete. The playing field is so
unbalanced that it becomes a show stopper. For him he has no costs when at
home. I consider my station modest with a 70 ft tower and land to put up Inv
L's and full sized 80m verticals and some receiving antennas. I could do more
but we have horses and they need to roam and are hell on things in the pasture.
2. You have to invest a lot of time to get good. If he can not have a really
good station then why invest the time to get good if you are not going to be
able to really compete.
2. The tools we use to contest, logging software, packet look like old dos
programs. He called them ugly and boring. He is used to amazing graphics in
games. I found this observation interesting. I feel that the tools we have
are pretty good and give me what I want to see readily available. I was not
expecting this answer.
3. He is far more interested in using packet where he can immediately chase
things. Packet essentially gives him a list of things to do or goals. It is
more visual so more interesting. He thought that more automated systems would
be interesting. Young people and even us older folk expect things to happen
much faster. They are the generation of instant satisfaction and some of that
even rubs off on us older folk.
4. Talking to someone over the airwaves is still pretty cool. You can
instantly talk around the world if the right condx exist, but we can talk all
over the world with our phones so it is not as amazing as it once was.
5. CW is interesting but he was surprised that we don't have better code
readers. While he would like to learn the code time is once again the factor.
They have so many other outlets for entertainment that it is hard to find time
for all of them.
6. Results take far too long to come out
7. He proposed that all participants use a scoreboard type system. Many of us
have said this was something we need to do but have instead met with amazing
resistance and a ton of excuses why people refuse to use it. A system where
everyone can check it out and see what is going in in the contest. We are back
to visuals.
6. Playing radio in the car driving is fun because there is not much else to do
but drive.
7. He has his general license but he does not have the technical skills or
electronic knowledge to build a shack or decent station. I am not a great
teacher especially to my own kids so I take some of the blame for this but it
is hard to teach people things when they don't want to devote much time to it.
I feel a reluctance to even try to do something without having the proper
knowledge. A far cry from when I was young and tried all sorts of silly
antennas and projects that mostly failed miserably but boy did I learn from
those mistakes.
That pretty much summed up our hour long conversation and I am no closer to
figuring out how to sell ham radio and contesting to them. I hope some will
find this information helpful and interesting.
W0MU
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