Dick, You should let a sleeping dog sleep. Strangely enough, I have not hear anything from Steve on this blast. Since you stirred him maybe be I should e-mail him. Notice, I said e-mail and not call him on the telephone (smile). 73, Henry - WD4Q ----- Original Message ----- From: "Richard J. Norton" <richardjnorton@gmail.com> To: "arrl-odv" <arrl-odv@reflector.arrl.org> Sent: Thursday, April 05, 2007 9:06 PM Subject: [arrl-odv:15388] They Think We Gave In to Negative Comments to ARRL
A fairly significant misunderstanding exists regarding the ARRL's position on the scaled back version of RM-11306. Some of those who strongly supported the original Allocation-by -Bandwidth submission believe an avalanche of negative comments directed to the ARRL, not to the FCC, convinced the League that it was in the League's best interest, as far as retaining membership, to eliminate asking for frequency allocation by bandwidth below 28 MHz.
I toss out the possibility of correcting this perception.
Details
Yesterday, I telephoned Steve Waterman, K4CJX, to ask a few questions about Winlink, and in particular Pactor-III. I have talked with Steve a number of times in the past, and use what I've learned from him to help my responses to members complaining about "evil Winlink robots taking over the ham bands." I expected to be on the phone less than five minutes.
I ended up on the phone for well over two hours, essentially defending the ARRL. I told him the League had come to the determination that what was submitted, about regulation by bandwidth, would not fly with the FCC. I'm not certain that he believes me.
Somewhere in the conversation, I pointed out that it seemed that there were very few responses to the FCC supporting the League's proposal. He said that ARRL people told him that letters of support from his group were not needed. I replied that I certainly don't know if and why that would be true, and didn't know if it would have changed anything, but intuitively thought it couldn't have hurt.
Steve was overly negative about essentially, "the League asking them to set up an Emcomm system, and then letting them down." He said something like, "We might as well close Winlink down, and do something else."
What I basically said was, although things are not as perfect as you would like them to be, you guys still have a significant system that has done a lot of good. There are many of us in the ARRL that support your work.
As essentially a CW contester, I am the natural enemy of Winlink. I forwarded Steve a couple of E-mail responses that I sent to contesters, responding to E-mail reflector postings prompted by Skip Teller, KH6TY. I basically defend Winlink. Steve asked permission to forward them to his community to show them that part of the ARRL is on their side.
I suspect a lot more of the ARRL is on their side than just me.
If someone who knows Steve better than I do were to also tell them that the League didn't cave in to Teller-prompted comments, but simply succumbed to the reality of the moment, we might regain what I perceive is an important good friend.
73,
Dick Norton, N6AA
PS: For those that may not remember, I voted against the "Regulation by Bandwidth" motion. I favored the same governmental mode regulation that Canadians and amateurs in almost every other country in the world enjoy.