HRN 376, BS#10: Holiday Bull Session

/

David and Gary meander around several topics and eventually land on the proposal by ARRL Hudson Director Mike Lisenco N2YBB to confer voting privileges in board meetings on the League President and three Vice Presidents. We're told that Mike will submit the proposal as a motion at the January ARRL Board Meeting.

If you want to get right to that ARRL discussion, here's the direct link to that spot on YouTube: https://youtu.be/gwE5X66WCek?t=47m

And there are cats.

Radio Rating: A. You won't miss anything except the cats, and David's UFO. [The Radio Rating measures our guess about how well you can 'get' the program from the audio podcast, without the video.]

HRN 375: Ham Radio - The Best 1000 Hobbies - 2017 DCC Banquet

/

From the title, you might expect 2017 DCC Banquet speaker Tom McDermott N5EG to just list all the specialties that make up ham Radio, from ATV to DX, Repeaters to QRP. But that's not the direction he takes. Tom's looking at the leading edge of technology as it applies now, and will apply in the near future, to ham radio. 

And that makes this talk depart from the usually non-technical DCC banquet presentations. He probably left some spouses behind, but even if you're a non-so-technical ham, eventually you'll catch up.

Radio Rating: C. You might need some of Tom's slides to help you keep up. Many of them are just headline text, but there are enough pictures and charts, and a few comics, that you'll miss the context here and there. As usual, if listening leaves too many blanks, watch the video. (The radio rating does not measure the quality of the talk. It is for the audio audience, indicating our estimate of their ability to understand the talk without being able to see all the graphics.) 

And this completes our series from the 2017 ARRL & TAPR Digital Communications Conference, held September 15-17 in St. Louis, MO.

HRN 374 / EmComm Extra #19: (Chicago) Marathon Man

/

The New York Marathon. World's biggest, right? And Ham Radio is huge there.

The Boston Marathon. Ham Radio is big there, too. And it's, what, #2? 

Nope. Worldwide, it's not even close. In the USA, it's #3 (as of 2015, anyway, the last year a quick web search had stats).

So who's #2. The Marine Corps Marathon in DC? Nope. (But ham radio is big there, too).

#2 is Chicago. The perpetual Second City (even though Los Angeles took that USA title a few decades ago). And yes, even though you've never heard of it, nearly 150 hams pitch in to help it run smoothly.

Rob Orr K9RST has been the lead ham for the Chicago Marathon for the past decade, recruiting from a coalition of radio clubs and individual hams to provide communications for the medical side of the event (similar to the ham's mission at Boston). And as you'll hear, he really has a handle on it all.

Host David Goldenberg w0DHG leads this chat, as Gary KN4AQ hides behind the scenes (mostly). And note that this is the usual in-depth interview, but the show really runs about 95 minutes, and the rest is the 'post-show party' (aka The Best Part of the Show).

Radio Rating: A+. Rob provided some stills that give you a flavor of the event, but you'll get the complete story from the audio.