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Re: [CQ-Contest] Observations of a young ham

To: Taylor Kelly <ve4xt@mymts.net>
Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] Observations of a young ham
From: W0MU Mike Fatchett <w0mu@w0mu.com>
Date: Sun, 18 Dec 2016 21:18:49 -0700
List-post: <cq-contest@contesting.com">mailto:cq-contest@contesting.com>
My comments below:

On 12/18/2016 8:24 PM, Taylor Kelly wrote:
On Dec 18, 2016, at 11:42 AM, 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.

Depends on what you mean by ‘win’. Win overall? From Montana? You’d need much more than the greatest 
station on Earth to win WW from Montana (just like from Manitoba!) With more realistic goals, ‘winning’ is indeed 
doable. You might not win overall, but you can win a region. Then there’s SS, where some elements of God’s gifts 
to stationdom work against you (really high top antennas, etc.).

Don’t forget that Bruce, now ZF2NT, once travelled to Panama and using wires and a 
stick in the mud from a run-down shack not only won ARRL DX, he set a record that stood for 
some time. So it’s certainly possible to trade investment in hardware for investment 
in plane fares for a fun factor. Take a package to northern Jamaica and run W/VE whilst 
sipping on Red Stripe overlooking the Caribbean Sea.

One doesn’t have to run like N6MJ to have fun.

Agreed. Hard sell in the Winning from XXX. Gaming is generally not setup that way. Some games have skill classes that you earn the right to move into by your results. I need to get him interested in a contest more than he is before I can suggest jetting off to play radio. He has seen me go a few times. Winning is not nearly as easy as it once was though from the Caribbean. I guess identifying what if anything in radio is fun would be the first step.
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.
Related to above.

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.

Can’t argue this point. The software we have is superb to our needs, but it’s 
hardly attractive.
Is making a fancy front end going to make things more interesting, if we could even define what that would be? Not sure.....I explained paper logging and big monster dupe sheets and how we used to try to dupe JA calls. He looked at me like I was nuts! I think we were. Underline JK, Circle JH, box JI and do it while logging the contact and working the next guy! We did this!


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.

Is there a better time to be chasing DX spots than during a DX contest?
I will have to get him over when he is out of school with some time on a major contest to sit down and have a go at it. It is all about time with him and his age. Our daughter does nothing, but never has time LOL. She would kill me if she saw this!

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.

We’ve been superseded by technology.

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
Catch 22. We want quick results, but we also want the work done by volunteers and some 
want superhuman effort to catch cheating. Something’s gotta give.
Yes.  We are lucky to have the people we do have!


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.

I think that could work with the right safeguards in place.
I wrote in another reply ....W0MU just got his sweep...........across everyone's screen or in a message box......Might get annoying. Have filters in place to get rid of some of it...Double mult for VE4XT, Might be interesting.

Thanks for the feedback.

W0MU



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