Sterling, I think conceptually you are correct, but the idea of just pulling
the scab off, let it bleed and expect that it will heel stronger in the end,
was very dismissive of the majority of the current community. As I said in
another email, there is no future without the present, and to put not too fine
a point on it, those of us with heavy time, financial, and emotional
investments in the hobby, also have the ability to pull our support. Anybody
who is taking this seriously probably has a pretty big ego. Big ego's and
being told rather than asked are a bad mix.There was a way to do this. Yes, it
would have taken longer and no doubt talked to death, but building consensus
matters. As I said, conceptually, the idea is valid, and in my own social
media, I've made it clear for awhile, that this was the necessary direction to
go, for long term growth. I'm also reasonably technically astute as far as I.T
(I make a living with it) and an accommodate most things. If I want to
Stream, I can as an example.Thing is, I don't. I support it all. I own a M/M
contest station which is as competitive as possible in a tough environment.
My fun is getting a group of ops together, to have a blast, in person. I don't
even care much for remoting, though I'm fully supportive of it. It makes
contesting possible for so many people who couldn't otherwise. For us,
streaming would change our "vibe". Enough to have me get out, probably not.
If in person M/M becomes devalued overall though, then yes I would. I'm only
one guy and the world doesn't begin or end with me, but the contesting world
would lose the KL mult on a lot of bands. There would be others as well, and
until a fully integrated Internet gaming/RF community achieves critical mass,
we'll either be a part of the process, or we'll take our toys and find some
other way to piss off the SO's, the neighbors, and local governments. 73Steve
KL7SB Chief FiduciaryNorth Pole Contest Group KL7RA
-------- Original message --------From: Sterling Mann <kawfey@gmail.com> Date:
2/16/22 11:42 AM (GMT-09:00) To: "CQ-Contest@contesting.com"
<cq-contest@contesting.com> Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] ARRL to allow
self-spotting in contests I, for one, welcome our new insect...erm...contesting
rules. This change isgood for the face of our hobby!This might be the rule
change to open the floodgates of a new paradigm ofcontesting and a new
generation of contesters. The ARRL is answering themail on getting ham radio
into more peoples' eyeballs - that is throughcontent. The self-spotting rule is
a barrier to that which makes streamershave to obscure frequencies and operate
under an ethical gray area if theywant to be competitive and not have to submit
as a check-log because,despite intent, more people may seek to work a streamer
than anyone elseand that could be perceived as a solicitation of QSOs.This also
opens the floodgates to a new type of QRM that we know very wellin the
esports/video gaming world - stream sniping. Popular operators willcertainly
draw trolls (but honestly, we already see that today, so what'sthe
difference?). It'll also be interesting to see how self-spotting playsinto
contesting strategy. Does a spot hold any weight on "this frequency isin use!"
argument when your run freq gets trampled? How much differentwould a S&P's
operator's score be if everyone self-spotted over the currentsystem? Does
search and pounce even make sense now that it's a little
morepoint-and-shoot...click-and-transmit :) Or will the band window look
anydifferent at allAnd remember, there is always a category that YOU can CHOOSE
to compete in.But if you choose to compete unlimited, multiop, or otherwise
assisted,then you might be in a new echelon. You might want to buy a webcam
andlearn how to livestream and hold an audience (yes, people watch thisstuff!).
You might want to self-spot (assuming you weren't already).I think this rule
change levels the playing field amongst those who aretruly top-10 competitive,
fixes the RBN gap, eliminates self-spotting as asource of cheating (which is
already wildly rampant and basically invisiblewithout a lot of manual pattern
matching), and most importantly, opens abig door towards modernizing the
hobby.I don't think the ARRL/CAC/whomever conferred with the contesting
community(as far as you know) because they already knew the answer
wouldoverwhelmingly be NO, and the alternatives (like a livestreamer
category,or ultra-Unlimited categories) are too little. I'm happy the ARRL is
makingsuch a sea-change. I'm sure they will enjoy reading the comments on it
(andI hope they stick to their guns on this) but at the end of the day,
theyneed to bring more hams into the hobby, more contesters on the air,
moreactivity on the bands, and more members into the ARRL, and by
promotinghigher scores, greater competition, and weaving this into the
attentioneconomy of the internet through content creation, that goes a LONG way
toinvesting in the future at the expense of the status quo.--Sterling
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