Amateur radio bloggers love to write about the demise of amateur radio. To wit, we have:
- K0NR’s Is the Internet destroying amateur radio?
- N0SSC’s Millennials are killing ham radio
- PE4BAS’ Is FT-8 damaging amateur radio?
- NZ0T’s Did Joe Taylor K1JT Destroy Amateur Radio?
Of course, none of these posts are really saying that the internet, millennials, or FT-8 has killed amateur radio. What they are saying is that all of these are changing amateur radio as we know it. Well, duh, the way we live our lives changes every day. Why should amateur radio be any different?
For example, Bob, K0NR, discusses how the operation of remote stations is changing the game of DX. Can you really claim that you worked a DX station if you rented time on a super station? I’ve written about that topic, too.
There have also been much written about how FT8 is changing the amateur radio game. One blog post, talking about the effect of FT8 on 160m operation, even goes so far to say that this is the “end of an era.” On DX World, the results of the poll, “FT8 – Damaging to Amateur Radio?” show more than half of the respondents think that FT8 is damaging amateur radio.
I specifically used the word “game” in the previous two paragraphs because that’s exactly what’s changing. The physics of amateur radio certainly isn’t changing. Our transmitters are still generating electromagnetic waves like they have been for decades, and on the HF bands, anyway, those radio waves are bouncing off the ionosphere just as they have been for more than the past 100 years.
What’s changing is the human component. By that I mean what’s changing is how we think people should participate in the hobby. The hams that are complaining that the internet or millennials or FT8 is killing amateur radio are really just complaining that people aren’t participating in amateur radio the way they want them to participate.
Here’s where we talk about millennials. In his blog post, Sterling, N0SSC, suggests that setting up remote stations is one way to engage young people. He writes, “I believe that remote operating, and other internet-assisted means of ham radio operation, are critical to youth engagement.”
He’s also big on an idea he calls “ham radio hackathons.” He writes,
A hackathon isn’t a coding competition. It’s explained well in this Medium article. It goes even further than that, not limited to coders and engineers, but open to thinkers, doers, philosophers, system engineers, math people, teachers, students, artists, stakeholders…anyone with an interest in solving a problem with technology.
I support both of these ideas, but I think that millennials (and, to be fair, it isn’t just millennials we’re talking about here, but any newcomers to the hobby) need to step up and get these things going. I don’t think it’s my job to try to get kids interested in amateur radio. I don’t even know if that’s really possible. What I can do, however, is be there to encourage and support kids (and anyone else that expresses a sincere interest in amateur radio).
For example, I’m not sure how fruitful it would be to set up my station to be remotely operable and then saying to some kids, “Hey, come and operate my station.” What I think would be more fruitful is to say to a kid, “Hey, come help me set up my remote control station, so that we both can use it.” Then, it turns into a learning situation, and we both gain from the exercise.
The same kind of thing has to happen with ham radio hackathons. The motivation has to come from the ground up, not the top down. I do hope that this idea gets off the ground, though, and I’m standing by, ready to support this effort however I can.
I think that millennials (I’m really getting tired of that term, by the way) need to grab the bull by the horns and take ham radio in the direction they want it to go. Feel free to kill ham radio as we know it. Make it better!
It seems that Betteridge’s law of headlines applies.
I’m 60+ and I run FT8 a lot. I had a CW QSO yesterday on 6m DX, but those are rare for me now. Time marches on, and it should. Odds are that 5 years from now — maybe less– something new will have supplanted FT8.
Freezing ham radio in place is the certain way to kill it. CW will never go away entirely. I still do an AM net every Monday.
Maybe more interestingly, an article linked from the previous:
http://sv5dkl.blogspot.nl/2018/04/sv5dkl-statement-regarding-ft8-amateur.html
13500 fully-automated-no-humans-in-the-loop QSOs, oh man.
No, I am enjoying this current round of evolution of ham radio. Still though, some of this needs a lot more thinking through.
There’s a lot to process in this post, Dan. I’m going to be thinking on this one for a while.
Please don’t spread that around. K1JT and the rest of the WSJT-X development team’s philosophy is that someone MUST be at the rig/computer to start the QSO and to LOG the QSO.
You want automatic QSOs, take a look at SIM31.
Neil, KN3ILZ
That may be their philosophy, but the cat is out of the bag.
I use SIM31 occasionally, especially during poor band conditions to see if i can make contacts. I do not use the automatic logging / unattended mode. I like the chat mode to interact with a person. I passed the 16 wpm morse barrier after 6 months of agony learning it to get my General license and have used almost all modes over my ham career. Some say i’m stupid and cant use morse. To me cw is like fingernails scratching across a blackboard, ergo, i dont use it. FT is kind of a curiosity…. its a way to see when there is openings to other areas, but thats all. 2 mtr Fm is always fun to talk to local friends and all keyboard digital modes are fun. Ham radio was and hopefully will always be a great way to make friends and chat and enjoy. Having lived in 3 foreign countries and having received licenses there has been a great privilege for me. Its all been fun, informative and a wonderful way to make lifelong friends.
Quote: “What I think would be more fruitful is to say to a kid, “Hey, come help me set up my remote control station, so that we both can use it.” Then, it turns into a learning situation, and we both gain from the exercise.”
This is spot-on. The real problem is that the AR is less and less a community. There were times when we built equipment, exchanged ideas, helped each other to get things going. We were a group of friends.
I was licensed in 1976. At the time, commercial equipment started to make ground. This was one of the undermining forces. Technical developments will add to erosion of this fundamental “requirement”.
Nowadays, just like so many things in life, focus has shifted to pampering egos, based on the illusion that equipment, standings on honour rolls and s on will gain recognition.
The only sound argument in favour of competition is that it drives to improve and to move limits. But as soon as competition leads to dividing people, it will be the nail in the coffin for social cohesion. Unfortunately, this is exactly what is happening.
It is not about FT8, Joe Taylor, commercial manufacturers, but about ourselves.
Thank you for this article, which hopefully helps to understand the fundamental problem. Once understood, it can be solved.
Best 73, Henk PA2S
Good read. Use the HOBBY and way you see fit, as long as you stay within the law. Develop your own golf swing, but hit the ball and replace your divots. Enjoy it! Be Happy!
Chris O’Donnell KD2OBV
People generally do what makes them happy. Ham radio operators are no exception.
The more tools, the higher odds that everyone find something to their liking, and their individual operating conditions.
And that’s the way it should be.
Personally, I don’t think millennials or digital protocols are killing or will be the death of amateur radio. I do think the focus the 2m crowd has on emergency communications isn’t helping and here’s why.
Radio’s draw, for me, is the technical challenge of communications at QRP levels, not the CB-like use of 100W radios, which is boring; you’re going to have a hard time getting people excited about radio when instant international communication is in their pocket. Yeah, I’ve heard the arguments of “what about when the net goes down” or “how about when the power is out” but those ring hollow to the uninitiated.
Kids like “cool” things and bouncing a signal off a satellite or the moon is cool. Talking with the space station is cool. Downloading SSTV images from a satellite while it passes overhead is cool. Talking with your buddy halfway around the world on 5W with a length of speaker wire hung in a tree is cool.
Chatting it up with some emcom guy is not.
I think the AARL is on target with the changes they’ve made over the years and offering up a little more HF to newly minted techs for low power digital modes will be another step in the right direction. It’s up to us to show people what you can do with it though. Let’s get out of our basements and go portable. Ramp up the visibility. I don’t get to operate as much as I’d like but when I go to the park or camping, someone always stops and talks with me. Be approachable and interesting because that’s the key to getting new people into the hobby.
Give it six months and the new digimode will replace FT8. Remember when PSK-31 was going to supplant CW in the late 90’s?
There’s too many digimodes IMO, but that’s a topic for another day.
I’m old enough to remember my days as a teenage ham, when homebrewers griped about “appliance operators” and AM diehards complained about SSB. The more things change…
I do think U.S. amateur radio needs to figure out what is an appropriate age range for new hams. Back in the 1960s, Novices in grades 7-8-9 were common. Now, newly minted hams seem to consist of some twentysomething college students, but more people in their thirties and forties. Teens seem to be fairly rare. Nostalgia aside, this is not necessarily a bad thing, but the ARRL and local clubs need to send clearer messages about how and when to get into the hobby.
The ham spirit can’t be affected by the new technologies or new trends. For real radio enthusiasts, Internet is only a tool and JT65 or FT8 a way to have some QSOs when propagation is very, very poor.
I join this fabulous community not only because I was attracted by the electronics, but mainly because of the idea to communicate in so various ways with people all around the world, despite the language or culture. More than that, going deeper in this hobby, I discovered how many ways to practice it are available: CW, SSB, SSTV or digital, in portable or in a contest, terrestrial APRS or via ISS, using a computer, a phone or a tablet. And all the time, finding a new way to rise and test a new antenna :-)
In my opinion, there are other two possible enemies which can kill the ham radio:
– the too excessive regulations of amateur radio domain only because some people or communities feel threatened by the presence of an antenna. Otherwise, these communities live day by day surrounded by GSM antennas and mobile phones on their ears;
– the too permissive radio regulations for a lot of trendy light sources or power supplies which practically invaded the radio spectrum.
The end of ham radio is not about modes, it’s about spectrum. Use it or lose it, it doesn’t matter how.
Rob, w0jrm –
I too wonder why there are so many modes based on Olivia and others. It seems to me an attempt at reinventing someone else’s wheel. I found a site that lists most if not all digital signal modes and includes sample audio of them as well. Whomever is the creator of this site really did their homework, the depth of the information on each mode reveals the basis from which the developer created it. The descriptive information is brief but it covers the basics. The site is https://www.sigidwiki.com/wiki/Signal_Identification_Guide
I know it is a wiki site – (many contributors’ submitted information is there), and it covers every known RF signal – including some submissions that are of unknown origin. Normally I would not cite a wiki source, however this one is so comprehensive and what I have checked of the content has been verifiable, which is in contrast to more well known wiki websites.
Your ham radio “hackathon” is interesting …. my group has had success with pulling young people in for contesting …. it’s usually a time limited event like a hackathon and there is the challenge of amassing the most points you can get.
A lot of clubs make a public display of field day …. they should do more public operating events tied to the more popular contests (CQ WW, International DX, etc.)
I think there are two problems that need solving.
First is the value of Internet communicated messages. We need to separate out the awards. If somebody does WAS by using 40 different stations, is their work invalidated by cheating? Does their work have the same value as the work somebody else did with a single station location? I propose we need to not invalidate the work but we definitely should record it as a separate competition or something. WAS-Internet?
Does the technology you are using require commercial or government networks in order to work? If so… then I think it needs its own classification.
I regret that FT8 doesn’t encourage simply talking ( ratcheting ) but it has meant I can get back into the hobby with a QRP small station and still have the fun of chasing long distances. I am just looking at trying out FT8CALL , which is non to be renamed and that seems to give the fun of extreme QRP vs Distance while along social chat.
I’d encourage you to try FT8Call, or whatever it is going to be called. I’ve enjoyed using it such as it is, and it’s only going to get better. In one of his latest messages to users, KN4CRD, the developer, notes that he’s been experimenting with text compression that could get text speeds up to 15 – 20 wpm.
It’s worth reminding people that older “Millenials” are nearing 35 to 40 years of age depending on your definition- and as one, I can tell you people have been blaming us for killing amateur radio for about 20 years now, or however long it’s been since the code requirement was dropped. Yet here we all are.
I recieved my tech rating at the age of 13 in 1995 and tech plus(5wpm code req ) two years later.. In 2000 I left for college and left amateur behind, just to come back to it in 2016 to a whole different landscape. Very little activity on previously busy repeaters and heading to the bottom of a horrible sunspot cycle.
Ft8 (and DMR on uhf) has been a godsend in keeping me interested in the hobby, so no,I don’t think is killing, only changing with the times. I can’t wait for the days when everyone decides that the bands aren’t dead if ya just throw out it answer a good ole’ CQ. We all,just need a little patience and it’ll come back around.
Went out and bought my first new HF radio today(the only hf gear I own younger than I am), and can’t wait to get it on the air and doing some ragchewing with it in every way and form I can.