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Do You Still Find Amateur Radio Interesting?
Marcos Eliziario asks: "Soon, I'll be taking the exams for a Brazilian, Class-D, Ham Radio license (Equivalent to an American Technician License) and, as I was reading about the subject, I wondered what today's geek thinks about amateur radio. In the past, Ham Radio was very popular among nerds, however with the Internet boom it seems that interest on radio, among the younger generations, is becoming dimmer each day. A lot of cool things can be done with radio, like building your own equipment, digital modes (btw, few people know that Packet Radio was born on the amateur's rank), and long distance contacts. The gear is cool, there's a lot of things to be learned about propagation, and today's Hams even use satellites to talk. Do you think that we could see a renaissance of Ham Radio among 21st century techies?"
Yes I certainly do! It is still a sandbox for trying things out that will become either part of the common practice or a failed experiment to add to your experience! Right now hams are experimenting wioth new ways to communicate, satellites, digital modes, rig control, repeater stations and VoIP. there is lots of room for experimentation and in the upper levels of qualification you don;t have to buy type-approved equipment. You can experiment on the air without going through a commercial approval process, which can cost tens of thousands for a commefcial piece opf equipment. Amateur radio is the original open-source community, with a tradition of sharing techniques and technology dating back a century. With wireless becoming more important to the computer community, there is lots of room for people whpo pass the exams to do real and beneficial experimentation on the air, and maybe even invent something worthwile for humanity without a million-dollafr lab! Right now in Toronto we are working on a new generation of VHF/UHF repeater controller (search for TorontoRepeaterController on yahoo groups) which will be all open-source, hardware and software. It not only will congtrol repeaters, but link into VoIP nets, remote control rigs, and provide a gateway for analog radio users into the new digital voice modes. Even buying commercial off-the-shelf mobiles help the cause, because what is the use of developing stuff without intelligent users to test it! The next few years will see an multifold improvement in progagation as we reahc the peak of the sunspot cycle for those who just like to communicate. Two cycles ago I had no problem working Europe with ten watts from the mobile on 30MHz! Amateur radio is alive and well - but don;t tell too many people. We like to keep its wonders to ourselves! 73, Nigel, VE3ID and G4AJQ
Yes, amateur radio is still relevant. Where else do you get to play with satellites? Amateur radio is one of the few places (outside of NASA) where you can experiment with radio links through real satellites in orbit around the Earth. That's not something you can do over the Internet. The upcoming Phase 5A (P5A) launch will be a mission to Mars. You can't do *THAT* over the Internet. See http://www.go-mars.org/ (It's German. Use the fish!). More info on amateur radio and satellites is available at AMSAT's web site at http://www.amsat.org./
My friends and I use ham radio because our cell phones drop all the time. As long as we're a hundred miles or so from our local repeater we're good. The entry price wasn't too much for me. $180 for a 2-meter mobile and $170 for a dual-band ht.
Things are totally different now. Not only is the internet a free way to communicate (free as in zero dollars per minute), but you can actually communicate with people on the internet about -- get this -- anything you like! In other words, you're not just having these stilted, stylized conversations about what your rig is.
--KB6ZD
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One thing to keep in mind about geeks is that you can't pigeonhole them. Some like games and never bathe. Others like to program and stay up days consuming only Taco Bell and Mountain Dew. Others like to plug computers together and twiddle their fingers waiting for their kernels to finish compiling. Even others like to jack off to Sailor Moon and other Japanese cartoons.
On the outskirts of geekdom, you have people like yourself who are interested in ham radios or model trains or paper airplanes. These will pretty much always be niche geek markets because they just don't have the glamour that and visibility that the mainstream geek lifestyle provides.
Which is not to say that there aren't merits to these peripheral geek lifestyles. Ham radios, in particular, are very useful in times of crisis and crises rely on people with a sense of responsibility and social acuity. Typical geeks, if that is who you are trying to interest, are the exact opposite type of people to bring into the ham radio flock.
But be sure that what you are interested in is non-mainstream geekery. Just because something requires technical ability, it does not follow that it requires a geek to manage it. Somethings are just technically difficult and not geeky at all.
Ham radio is definitely geeky, though.
It's neither hard nor expensive to get started. Just get your license and go on the air with a handy-talky. I bought my first one for less than $200. No big antennas or investmens are necessary.
This assumes you live close enough to a population center with folks to talk to, but that isn't a big deal in most areas. From there you can decide if you want to branch out into longer-distance communications.
If you look up last Sunday's Fox Trot comic strip, you'll see Jason tap dancing. In the last panel he is telling his friend Marcus that he didn't get into the talent show because one of the judges knew morse code. It was so cool for me to be able to figure out what the message was ("Some day I will rule you all") without having to go to a translator program on the internet.
Lots of people know Spanish, or French, or other such things. Morse code is a true geek language.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Wow, that sounds a lot like everyone's experience with Linux.
I hoping that gnuradio gets some more momentum. Think of all the possibilities! I think things could get very interesting with experimental digital modulation. I haven't played around much with gnuradio since I don't have a USRP. It seems to me that the software is a little hard to use. I keep my eye on the project hoping that things will continue to move along and get easier to use.
Once things move along it would be nice to have a portable gnuradio hardware that could interface to a PDA for HT uses.
As a lot of people have mentioned (some more politely than others), ham radio's appeal as a general-purpose communications service is pretty limited these days due to the sheer number of alternatives. It's still unbeatable in emergencies, but if emergency support isn't your thing, you may be left wondering what the point is.
:-P
That's a shame, because there is still some really-interesting stuff happening on the fringes. For the technically inclined, eBay has made it possible to obtain equipment and components for Amateur "homebrewing" that major military/commercial labs were damned lucky to have in the 70s and 80s. It is hard to overemphasize how cool that is. Even most hams don't realize that they can own better RF equipment and components than NASA had when they launched Voyager and Pioneer.
Ham radio gives you a great framework for engagement with every technology from software-defined radio to microwave communications to precision timekeeping. Build that DC-to-daylight receiver you've always wanted... the one the Feds won't let you buy off the shelf. Run your own "Amateur Deep Space Network" receiver site, or communicate with other people all over the world by bouncing your signal off the Moon. There is still more cool stuff to learn and do in Amateur Radio than you will ever have time to tackle... if you don't fall into the trap of thinking it's all a bunch of old farts carrying walkie-talkies around for no good reason. Like lawyers, 98% of hams give the rest a bad name.
There are a few links on my site (in the comment header) to various homebrew/experimental projects, but most of them are broken at the moment due to a hosting move that's taking way longer than it was supposed to. Anyone interested in the technical side of things is welcome to email me for advice and indoctrination.
In short: some parts of ham radio have benefitted tremendously from the advent of the Internet; but yeah, it's also true that many of the other aspects are less relevant than ever. You get out of the hobby what you're willing to put into it.
Dahlmann tightly grips the knife, which he may have no idea how to use, and steps out into the plain.
Of course, with an amateur licence, you can use an unholy EIRP on 2.4GHz - technically 2.4GHz wifi is in the ISM band *but* since that is slap bang in the middle of the UK 2.4GHz band, it's ok. You can use AO-40 antennas to seriously improve your wifi. That's a good thing, 'cos you sure as hell can't hear Oscar over the noise of all the cordless phones, baby alarms and misconfigured wifi networks any more...
The way I see it, there are five classes of individuals who have historically been interested in ham radio. These four classes are not mutually exclusive, and I am in all five of them.
First, there are folks who want to meet people and chat. These folks now have the internet, and have gradually withdrawn from ham radio.
Second, there are folks who want to be able to make phone calls away from a landline. Traditionally, this has been done via a phone patch. Cell phones are now dirt cheap, so these folks have gradually withdrawn from ham radio. As a result, there are also fewer phone patches than there used to be.
Third, there are folks who want some form of intra-family communications. These folks would get their entire household licenced historically. Now these folks either get cell phones, or FRS or GMRS radios, or in some rare cases, MURS or CB radios, and so these folks have (need I say it?) gradually withdrawn from ham radio.
Fourth, there are folks who generally love radio. These folks will never leave ham radio because playing with radios is fun (which is the real answer to your question).
Fifth and finally, there are the ever-prepared crowd. These folks will do whatever they feel they need to in order to make themselves stable and useful in the event that social order breaks down for some reason or other.
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