I haven’t gotten the full minutes yet from the recent ARRL board meeting, but there’s a news story about the meeting on the ARRL website. Some interesting things were discussed:
- ARRL to spend big bucks on Logbook of the World. The board voted to spend $75,000 on outside professional services to improve LoTW’s database. The Board also okayed the hiring of a full-time Headquarters staff member with “strong IT development and architectural skills” to address LoTW improvements. That seems like an awful lot of money to me.
- ARRL will petition FCC to get rid of symbol rate references. Instead of specifying symbol rates in Part 97. 307(f) , the petition would ask the FCC “to apply to all amateur data emissions below 29.7 MHz the existing bandwidth limit, per §97.303(h), of 2.8 kHz.” I like this idea a lot. It will give hams the incentive to experiment with new digital modes.
- New training materials. The article notes that the Board “directed Headquarters staff to investigate the feasibility, benefits and costs of preparing license training materials designed for shorter course sessions.” Uhhhh, I’ve had those materials for many years now. Not only that, the PDF version is FREE!