Brad, KB7FQR -- You gave me some food for thought when you made your point that as we get older we don't necessarily have to lose any of life's privileges, as applied to ham radio.
As the group in Newington tries to force the development of digital communications, we can legitimately question change for the sake of change. My Comment that I shall be filing this weekend in Opposition to the Petition RM-11306 will mention the flawed approach of using the regulatory structure to promote something that is not, today, becoming popular on its own. Indeed, there is great concern about bringing email from the internet over ham radio that this proposal from the ARRL would try to achieve. I believe there's room to encourage the development of the category of digital communications, but feel that the operators implementing new, controversial modes should earn a place on the bands just like the rest of us have seen the value of so doing. Those who have assured the place of AM on the ham bands over the years can take a bow, because our record of compliance is very strong at the FCC. In fact, based on what we know from the enforcement file, the AM Community, as an identifyable group, is among the most observant of the Rules today. That should and MUST count when there are regulatory proposals that penalize us with rules not really matched with what we do. The imposition of a 4500 hz audio bandpass would create problems by taking away from us the responsible, self-determined use of spectrum we have demonstrated, and would also hand a tool to those who wish to file bogus complaints against us using a phantom bandwidth standard. We who are fighting the Petition from the ARRL hope to wrap up a compilation of Comments opposed by Sunday night so that they can be submitted to the FCC on the final business day of the Comment period, Monday, Feb. 6th. If you haven't spent a few moments expressing yourself, please do so? [EMAIL PROTECTED] Brad, I hope you'll consider making your posting here part of your Comment to the FCC, if you haven't already. Turns out you can file more than one Comment, by the way, so no one should feel they get only one chance by the deadline. Paul/VJB ---------- Why do we have to change now? Just because there are a few new modes comming on board, why reduce the rights of the founding fathers of radio. We are being attacked, we need to stand WITH ONE VOICE, leave the founders of radio alone. Just because our grandparents are older, does not mean there privileges in life should be reduce by others. Brad KB7FQR __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
