Dick, Not to turn this into a debate, but I think I need to defend the work of the PSC committee, and myself here. "It appears that we have an activist PSC these days, and a particularly activist CAC Chairman. Contest changes have been made that come across as changes, not necessarily improvements." While not probably intended as so, I will take the former comment as a compliment. It means I and the PSC are doing our jobs, and are responsive to our member's needs. The vast majority of what the PSC works on is worked through the CAC, and is done to ensure our ARRL contest and FD rule sets keep up with disruptive changes in technology and the impacts caused by this phenomena called "social media". Things have advanced far in technology the last 30 years or so, and we really need to keep up with the times. Gone are manual dupe sheets and the Kenwood TS-850s in contests. Whatever new technology comes along, we (the PSC), need to be responsive to it and act accordingly to ensure fairness for all, and over the long haul. The recent removal of the digital FT-x modes from the ARRL RTTY Roundup is an positive example of this, as were many of the changes in contest rules related to how social media can and can't be used in contests. Most of what we do in PSC is try to fix problems and issues that members have brought to us, then wind up as action items in a PSC meeting. Remember that for positive evolution to happen, we need to try some new things out every now and again to "improve the breed". If it doesn't work out, we can always move things back to the status quo. That is what I fully expect will happen with this latest change to FD scoring. We tried to fix a problem noted by some members in a way that the CW crowd apparently didn't want it fixed. We'll change it back. 73; Mike W7VO
:
I've also received complaints against the Field Day scoring changes.
It appears that we have an activist PSC these days, and a particularly activist CAC Chairman. Contest changes have been made that come across as changes, not necessarily improvements.
I've tended to avoid making changes to contests unless really necessary. Changes make extra work for those behind the scenes who keep the contest scoring and reporting wheels turning.
As to whether Field Day is a contest or not, note that results are presented in score order. They are not presented in alphabetical club-name order or alphabetical callsign order. The scoring is incentive for participants to take the operation seriously and do their best.
I strongly hope that Field Day is not publicized as a "fun" event. Field Day has been promoted as an exercise to practice communicating in cases where power is unavailable and stations and antennas must be rapidly assembled and erected.
Amateur Radio gets significant good publicity in newspapers and on TV stations every year from the serious practice role.
I hope we do not promote this as a fun event, such as an excuse to eat hot dogs and drink beer. There are FD's where nobody operates the radio, and everybody has fun. Let's not make fun the objective or make rule changes where fun maximization overrides serious radio operation. .
73,
Dick, N6AA
On Monday, February 27, 2023 at 12:52:54 PM PST, Michael Ritz <w7vo@comcast.net> wrote:
Agreed. That said, we can certainly analyze the data all we want, then use that data to arrive at a conclusion, However, that analysis does not account for human emotions....
73; Mike W7VO
> > On 02/27/2023 12:17 PM David Norris <k5uz@icloud.com> wrote:
As I dig into the numbers, the HP SO data seems to be an anomaly as opposed the the rest of the categories. Why is that? Unknown. However, outside of that particular category, SSB rates are consistently higher than the CW rates and more so as we get into the lower power categories which would be more analogous to players on Field Day.
The power relationship goes opposite of conventional wisdom one would think. We have always thought CW does better than SSB on those low power situations but consider the universe of available stations to communicate with. Are there more SSB entrants than CW? Are we looking at apples to oranges here?
More to ponder…
73
David A. Norris, K5UZ Director, Delta Division
Sent from my iPhone
> > > On Feb 27, 2023, at 2:00 PM, Art Zygielbaum <k0aiz@arrl.org> wrote:
> >
> > >
Thanks, Mike. I am surprised that CW didn't do better and that it doesn't do quite as well for low power compared to SSB. I always thought CW was much better for low power stations. Or maybe I'm misinterpreting the data.
In any case, I am not against bolstering CW participation. It will be interesting to see if participation changes. If it goes down during FD with this rule change, I would agree with the others that we should revisit the topic.
Once again to quote Jim Pace, K7CEX, "The only humans who like change are babies and bus drivers."
73, Art
-- Arthur I. Zygielbaum, K0AIZ ARRL Midwest Division Director Member, Executive Committee Member, Programs and Services Committee Member, ARRL Foundation Board ARRL - The National Association for Amateur Radio®
On 2/27/2023 1:20 PM, Michael Ritz wrote:
> > > > Art:
Corroboration on best CW verses SSB QSO rates for CQWW WW "NA Only" entrants: https://www.cqww.com/rates/index.php
If the CWs ops complaining can't match those result numbers listed, maybe they just need to up their game! ;-)
73; Mike W7VO
> > > > > On 02/27/2023 11:03 AM Art Zygielbaum <k0aiz@arrl.org> mailto:k0aiz@arrl.org wrote:
Mike,
I agree with what you wrote. Someone said that we should try the change this year and see the impact on FD. We could then survey members to find out what the impact was on them and whether we should go back to extra points for CW. I do think it's true that a CW operator can get more contacts per unit time than other modes. Can anyone corroborate that?
Like I've said, technology moves forward. Should we disallow speech processors because they might give an extra advantage? Don't think so.
My vote, is let's give the new point system a try and then do a reassessment.
73, Art
-- Arthur I. Zygielbaum, K0AIZ ARRL Midwest Division Director Member, Executive Committee Member, Programs and Services Committee Member, ARRL Foundation Board ARRL - The National Association for Amateur Radio®
On 2/27/2023 12:54 PM, Michael Ritz wrote:
> > > > > > I'm sure many have seen the rants from the guys on MyARRLVoice, and have received letters from the CW Ops guys about the recent PSC recommendation to level the score playing field for all modes in FD. Below is my comment to one such complaint, and provides some background on the issue.
These are my opinions, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of ARRL staff or the the PSC.
"First of all, know that I'm pretty much ambivalent in this, and don't really have a dog in the fight. I operate SSB, CW and RTTY pretty much equally, but am not on FT-8 at all. I'm too busy tending to e-mails and my other Board work to even get on the air except the big contest weekends! I've received a few e-mails that are saying what the PSC are doing here is OK and maybe even needed action, and a few that are espousing that equalizing mode scores in ARRL FD is going to destroy amateur radio as we know it.
This question was hotly debated in the PSC meeting over the last few months. We received a lot of complaints last year about the intrusion of FT-8 and FT-4 into Field Day, to the detriment of the other modes, just as is happening with just about the entire rest of amateur radio. That is borne out somewhat with in the attached graph. You will also notice in the graph that CW contacts in FD now outnumber SSB contacts. Why is that? It's probably because CW has had a recent resurgence because of groups like CW ops, and that's a good thing.
Has the elimination of CW as a license requirement in 2004 killed off CW as an amateur mode and destroyed amateur radio, as predicted? No. Again, refer to the graph. Will CW die in FD because the points are now the same for all modes? I don't know, but I would bet against it.
Now a question: Is the main reason new hams are learning CW is that they know that CW operators are able to get twice the points of the phone guys for the same number of Qs in FD? FD is technically not a contest, and in fact, no logs are even submitted. I don't think that's the reason at all. It's because they want to learn something new, and find they enjoy it.
The hardcore CW guys love CW, and for the most part, despise phone. I know quite a few elite contesting hams that refuse to even own microphone, and I'm sure you know some too. It's somewhat an elitist attitude, and I'm sure that's one of the reasons the CW guys want their point advantage. They believe they are better than everybody else because they "know code", and I don't think they would deny that thought. "I learned CW, so I'm smarter than you"! The opening remark about the "ARRL dumbing down amateur radio" by leveling the FD playing field on the recent MyARRLVoice Facebook topic on the subject pretty much says it all.
One of the arguments I've seen also is that FD is supposed to be an Emcomm event, and "when all else fails, CW gets through in an emergency." That said, the newer digital modes are actually better than CW for this, and there is no CW mode that I know of used within Winlink, something very often used in EmComm activity.
We, (the PSC),thought of reducing the points for digital to match SSB as an incentive to get off FT-8, leaving CW alone at the top, but that would end up reducing points for those attempting to use traditional digital modes, such as RTTY, or the other non-FT-x modes in FD. So, we decided that maybe just letting market forces take over and equalize the points between all three modes was the best strategy. People will use then mode they are most comfortable with, and everybody has fun. No advantage for anybody.
OK, now the question: Why should CW Qs have a 2:1 point advantage over other modes in FD? Is it because one can make more Qs per hour with phone over CW? No, that's not the case. If one researches the CQWW contest rates over the last few years, one will see that they are pretty much equal now, with the edge now to CW ops.
I haven't heard a real and valid reason yet provided by the CW guys for the point advantage not being eliminated in FD, other than what I've heard above, and the fact that the incentive "has been in place since 1974, so why change it"?
That said, the CW guys are all crying foul loudly, and we will listen to them. I plan on holding a special PSC meeting to discuss the change, and may propose that we change it back to what it was before, then have ARRL Staff set up a survey of ALL ARRL members, and get everybody's input on this, not just hearing from the loud and proud CW guys."
I hope this helps the discussion. I don't appreciate the bullying attitude being taken by some on social media, and the PSC is just trying to make sure that FD stays a "fun factor" operating event/contest for all. Field Day is what you want to make it.
Thanks for listening.
73; Mike W7VO
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