Dave,
According to current medical science, W5FG’s
88 years statistically puts him in only the middle 60’s of about 20 years
ago! I don’t know his specific mental condition, but he
statistically falls within a population of fully or nearly-fully functional
people.
Jim Weaver, K8JE,
Director
ARRL
E-mail: k8je@arrl.org; Tel.: 513-459-0142
ARRL -
The Reason Amateur Radio Is!
Members -
The Reason ARRL Is!
From: Sumner, Dave,
K1ZZ [mailto:dsumner@arrl.org]
Sent: Thursday, May 08, 2008 5:51
PM
To: arrl-odv
Subject: [arrl-odv:16735] W5FG
Jack
Najork, W5FG has made a considerable investment in postage stamps to share his
views on the importance of accurate signal reports.
His
most recent letter dated April 28 quotes me selectively, so I thought I should
share the complete text of my earlier response to him on Joel's behalf.
Obviously,
he is making a mountain out of a molehill but bear in mind that he's 88 years
old.
Dave
K1ZZ
April 21,
2008
Jack
Najork, W5FG
2517 Hiwy
31
Dear
Jack:
President
Harrison has asked me to acknowledge your letter of March 31. Thanks for
sharing your thoughts about accurate signal reports.
Swapping
“59” or “599” does seem a bit silly. The essential
piece of information being exchanged in a DX contact is the callsign of each
station, but there is a longstanding convention that an additional element of
information also must be exchanged in order for a contact to have taken place.
For ARRL awards this additional element does not have to be a signal report.
It’s
debatable whether sending a standard signal report that may or may not be
accurate rises to the level of a moral or ethical issue. One also might argue
that when there are many stations wanting to make a contact, the objective should
be to complete each contact as quickly as possible in order to maximize the
rate. When pulling callsigns out of a big pileup it is often impossible to
gauge the strength of each individual signal.
When the
pace isn’t as frantic there is less excuse for rubber-stamp signal
reports. Perhaps your experience is different, but mine is that except for
pileups and contests most operators do make an attempt to send an honest
report.
Thanks
again for giving the ARRL officers and directors the benefit of your thoughts.
Sincere
73,
David
Sumner, K1ZZ
Chief
Executive Officer