Thank you, Rick and others, for helping to clarify my impression of this petition.
Yes, I agree that Winlink 2000 should not be the only form of emergency backup communication, but that said, it is very useful and fun to use when no other communication form is available and, when combined with other forms of backup communication, can augment an emergency situation. I.e., routine posts of GPS coordinates can assist in determining last known location. Especially when they are highly noise and low-signal tolerant and are among other forms of backup communications available. But I can say that I did not appreciate that the proposal sought only to make limitations on only the highest bandwidth forms of PACTOR 3 and some forms of automatic, unattended use. This is my fault for not fishing this out of the proposal and it appears from the posts I have read that many others seem to have this misinterpretation. I am not taking away from how well thought out and useful the petition is. And I'll need to go back and re-read it, but it should not take several translations of a proposal via e-mail for the vast majority of hams to get the gist. The abstract or foreword of this petition needs to be worded in such a way so non-technical individuals can come away with an accurate representation and be able to vote on it with good knowledge of what it means. Overall, I agree that we should tighten the noose a little so that these operations can be done responsibly, and to "encourage" more innovation, ie., software that can detect when a freq is in use. But if I am reading between the lines correctly, there is so much anger about these operations that the intention may be to try to chase them off the HF bands by making the restrictions overly untenable. For this, I am very opposed as being not in the spirit of ham radio. Michael _____ From: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Rick Sent: Wednesday, December 26, 2007 7:13 AM To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [digitalradio] FCC: "Petition to Kill Digital Advancement" Michael, I was initially licensed in 1963. There were many fewer hams here in the U.S. back then I can assure you. Many fewer. I would not take the position that we are going to have fewer hams worldwide either. So your claim may be misplaced. You are correct that CW has declined as a casual mode since almost no new hams will ever learn it. But some do and we can expect substantial use during contests (like most other modes other than ragchewing, DX, etc.) for decades to come because there are some new hams who want to do this and it only takes a few to pack the bands at those times. In some desperate emergencies, or special cases (backpackers, low powered rigs) may only have CW available. You can almost always make a CW contact on some band anytime from any location. This can not be said for digital modes which require far more specialized equipment and power requirements. Making an HF Winlink 2000 connection is also not always that easy. As a user of the now discontinued Aplink and Winlink systems, you had to work very hard, even from a fixed location with reasonably good antennas to acquire these systems. They might be out of propagation or busy with someone else. It is not Pactor modes that are necessarily invaluable for nautical hams, it is having access to a system that permits e-mail. There is extremely low cost SailMail, which operates on Marine frequencies and would be a much better lower QRM fit in an emergency. Realistically, Winlink 2000 is primarily a system for casual use. Only a fool (and I don't deny there are some) would build their security or emergency communications around Winlink 2000. But it is something you might consider as a back up in some limited cases. The problem is you can not design for everything so most of us want something that will actually work when we desperately need it. This nearly happened to us this summer during our area disaster and Winlink 2000 would have had minimal value. Based upon some of your comments, you seem to suggest that Mark, N5RFX's outstanding and well thought out petition is somehow prohibiting Winlink 2000. This is untrue and you may need to come to a truer understanding of what the petition really means. It only would prevent the widest Pactor 3 modes from operating. Pactor and Pactor 2 are not affected at all for human to human operation and can still be used for automatic operation within the limited areas that we should always have had. Remember that it was Aplink/Winlink who were able to get the FCC to change the rules to allow automatic operation many years ago. These are the same few (very few) hams who were able to get the nose of the camel under the tent. Some of us, myself included, supported this at the time as we thought that these operators would develop technology to prevent intentional interference. Ironically, they did! And I helped test this with the SCAMP mode three years ago for Winlink 2000's sound card mode. This was not only completely abandoned, but the busy frequency detection software was not used for Winlink 2000 either. The HFLink/HFLinkNet group (made up of just a very few hams even though they claim huge numbers), has also said that they do not support busy frequency detection. These groups are anathema to what amateur radio is all about. It is time for thoughtful and reasonable balance for a change. My hope is that those who are clearly in the super majority view, will write their comments to Mark's superbly correct proposal which can fix the harm that these modes have done without hurting technological advancements. Remember that the wide modes still operate in the voice/fax/image portions of the bands and can be quite wide unless the FCC forces us to move to to the 2700 Hz bandwidth band plan of IARU in Region 2 and other parts of the world. 73, Rick, KV9U Michael Hatzakis Jr MD wrote: > > For what it is worth, this is what I typed in my response to this > proceeding. We should be focusing on finding ways to encourage more > use of this spectrum, lest we lose it. With the elimination in the > licensing requirement for CW, how crowded do we really think the > bottom ends of the band will really be in 50 years with CW operators? > > > > I oppose this proceeding and a step backward in innovation for > > ham radio. > > I strongly oppose limiting digital automatic transmission on > > the HF bands. > > I strongly suggest leaving the bands as they are unchanged for > > the following reason: > > 1.) With the number of hams declining, and a decline in the use > > of CW modes, there really is no substantial risk of overcrowding > > in this spectrum. > > 2.) The automatic PACTOR II & III modes are an invaluable service > > to nautical hams in urgent situations when no other communication > > may be available, i.e., cell phone or available HF phone operators. > > This is an innovative method of safety of operation for nautical > > operators. > > 3.) If limitations in the use of automatic PACTOR use were really > > necessary, why not just band segregate their usage rather than > > completely ban them. > > 4.) The hobby of ham radio would be better suited to increase > > the number of available operating modes to encourage further > > hams use of HF spectrum. > > > > >
