In My Opinion.... An editorial by Donald L. Stoner, W6TNS This may be your first exposure to "The Amateur Radio Communicator" and The National Amateur Radio Association. I certainly hope it won't be your last. In my first editorial, I'd like to tell you about NARA, our plans for the future and what you can expect to see in this journal. Where Did NARA Come From? In November of 1988, the Federal Communications Commission slipped a bomb into our hamshacks and lit the fuse.. The FCC announced they were reallocating a portion of the 220 MHz band to a new communications service based on a petition submitted by United Parcel Service. Our national organization, The American Radio Relay League has tried to snuff out the fuse and get the decision reversed. But as far as I can tell, the 220- 222 MHz part of the band is a goner! How could this have happened? Well, for starters, we took the Amateur Radio Service and our fraternity for granted. It never occurred to us that the FCC might give some of "our" frequencies away just because we didn't use them. The FCC even warned us of their intention. In 1984 Robert Foosaner was Chief of the FCC Private Radio Bureau. He indicated in a CQ Magazine interview that the band was not being used adequately. Mr. Foosaner flatly stated it might be assigned to other services. Unfortunately we didn't believe him . I have a theory that the FCC confiscated these frequencies to send Amateurs a message. I believe the message is "shape up or ship out." Warm up the tar and start collecting feathers if you like, but in my opinion, the Commission did Amateurs an enormous favor. A two MHz slice of radio frequency spectrum is a small price to pay for awakening us from our long sleep. The Amateur Radio Service is coming back to life after 20 or more years of being totally oblivious to the changes taking place all around us. Amateurs are starting to ask how they can contribute to the fraternity. They want to improve themselves and they want to see the service revitalized. They want more young people to enjoy Amateur Radio. Teachers, particularly those who are Amateurs, are beginning to realize how the service can be used to educate our youngsters in a number of disciplines. This metamorphosis also happened to your humble editor in November of 1988. I've enjoyed Amateur Radio for almost 40 years. In the 50's and 60's I wrote a number of books and articles for Amateurs. I have also taken the Amateur Radio Service for granted. I'm as guilty as anyone. But that stopped when we lost part of the 220 MHz band. The National Amateur Radio Association became more than just a gleam in my eye. What Are The Goals of NARA? Broadly speaking, the goal of The National Amateur Radio Association is the promotion of ham radio. The organization has four specific goals within this broad framework. These are to a) publicize or market Amateur Radio to the general public, b) attract young people to the Amateur Radio Service, c) help existing Amateurs achieve the greatest benefit from the Amateur Radio Service and d) make Amateurs aware that our radio frequencies are in jeopardy from commercial interests. Here are some of my specific thoughts on these four areas: Marketing Amateur Radio To The Public Many people don't understand the significance of marketing and sales. The difference is very germane to this discussion. Let's say you go into a ham radio store and tell the person behind the counter you want to buy an ICOM IC-781. He or she takes your order along with your money and hands you a radio. In this instance the person is simply an order taker and not even a sales person. A sales person tries to convince you to buy a specific product but they are not marketeers. The people who publish the brochures, run the advertisements and create your desire to own the IC-781 are the marketeers. Marketing /i3 creates the desire to have something. For as long as I can remember, we hams have been order takers. We have not been salespersons and by no stretch of the imagination could be called marketeers of ham radio. If someone expressed their desire to be a ham, or an ex-CB'er convinced us they were a born-again communicator, we'd "take their order" and accept them into our ranks. Until recently, we never tried to be salespersons or marketeers for our hobby. Deep down inside the human brain, is a little grey glob that scientists label the "I've got mine" lobe. In this area of the Amateur's brain is stored the feeling that we really don't want any more hams than we already have. We'll never admit it, even to ourselves, but the feeling is there. More hams equal more QRM, more problems with the FCC and more drift away from the way things used to be in the "good ole days." More is not always better. More people with an Amateur Radio license may not have a positive or beneficial effect on the Amateur Service. We must mold and shape these people in the traditions that have guided us since the early part of the century. How we accomplish this will be the subject of articles in future issues of this journal. Attracting Young People When I was a kid, ham radio was a young peoples hobby. My best friend was a guy named Barry Windsor. Barry and I were fascinated by ham radio. We used to go over to Sid Dunn's house every Saturday morning. I never saw Sid without a cigar in his mouth. It was just another one of his appendages. When the end of his "stoggie" would get all goopy and slobbery, he'd line it up on the edge of the workbench, along with the other stubs, to dry out. Anyway, Sid used to take time each week to teach us about ham radio. He'd work somebody in Upper Slobovia on 20 meters and our eyes would stand out on six inch stems. Then Sid would tell us the reason he could do this was (insert lecture here) his three element beam and how it worked, or the 304TL amplifier and how it worked, or radio propagation and how it worked. You get the idea. Barry and I and some of the other kids pecked away at keys rather unsuccessfully trying to learn the Morse code. I lost track of the others but finally made the grade when the FCC, in their infinite wisdom, created the Novice and Technician license. Somehow, someway, we must resurrect the magic aura that existed back in Sid's hamshack. Essentially, we must try to give something back to our fraternity in exchange for all the wonderful things it has given us. It's not going to be easy! Today kids have computers, Nintendo games, cars, the opposite sex and Madonna, MTV and a million other distractions. We've taken the first step to redress the problem of attracting young people by creating a new "code-free" license. What this license becomes, and whether it is successful in attracting newcomers is entirely up to us. If we don't tell anyone about the Amateur Radio Service and how easy it is to become a ham, the new Technician Class license will be a "dud." In short, we must all make an effort to /b1 market ham radio to the public. In marketing, you commonly give away a sample which gets the "hook in and set", to use a fishing metaphor. That's what the new Technician license can do that for our fraternity. It can be the "hook" that we use to attract people to Amateur Radio. But we must get out and hustle the service to young people. That's where NARA comes in. We intend to tell our members how to recruit youngsters. We intend to print stories about how others have done it successfully. We believe the place to recruit youngsters is in the schools as early as possible. Again, we are going to have a lot to say about our schools in future issues of "The Amateur Radio Communicator". Helping Existing Hams Like it or not, a lot of hams passed their written test simply by memorizing the questions and the correct answer. Why not? What's wrong with that? You memorize the code don't you? But these hams are not particularly proud of the fact they don't understand the answers or even the questions. They are curious about the technical aspects of the Amateur Radio Service. I have yet to meet a ham that does not want to improve him or herself. Some Volunteer Examiners have established classes to teach people how to become a ham. Who has a class to teach you how to upgrade from Novice/Technician to General? Very few, I suspect. Each issue of "The Amateur Radio Communicator" will have a theory article. Hopefully they will be as useful and interesting to existing hams as well as to newcomers. If you have specific questions that you would like to see answered in this publication, send them to "Editor- A Touch Of Class". Preservation Of "Our" Frequencies- I put the word "our" in quotes. We seem to think of the radio spectrum as "ours." A number of bands of frequencies are /i1 loaned for our use, by the Federal Communications Commission. We can continue to use them so long as it is in the national interest to do so. Make no mistake about it fellow hams. The FCC did not let us use parts of the radio spectrum because they think we are nice guys or gals. They do so because it is more in the national interest to loan these frequencies to the Amateur Radio Service than to someone else. If that equation changes, more frequencies will be lost to other activities which are perceived by the FCC to better advance the national interest. In November 1988, the FCC brought the point forcibly to our attention. They reminded us, once again, "If you don't use 'em, you're gonna lose 'em!" Some of our bands are barren waste-lands that we Amateurs seem to be saving for a "rainy day." Six meters is under utilized except for a few hardy souls in Southern California. The Commission knew the 220 MHz band was not adequately occupied. It won't be adequately occupied even when the FCC allocates the 220- 222 MHz portion for land mobile use. We have already lost the 902 MHz band and the fate of our satellite "S" band will be decided next year by the World Administrative Radio Conference (WARC) in Spain. The 1296 band is priceless. Do you know of anyone who operates this band? Does your ham store have any 1296 MHz equipment in stock or do they have to order it? Is there a 1296 MHz repeater in your town. I doubt it. If we maintain our "business as usual" approach, we are going to lose more frequencies. A lot more! NARA hopes to create an environment where confiscation of frequencies used by Amateurs would be unthinkable both politically and economically. But NARA cannot do it without your help and support. What Can You Do? I'd love to think that one Amateur can single handedly correct all the ills of the past few decades. My ego would get a tremendous boost to see bureaucrats quake at the sight of a NARA letterhead. The reality is that nothing is going to happen without your support. No one person can make the necessary changes. Even a group like NARA cannot do it without your help. Only you can make the Amateur Radio Service above reproach and criticism. You must become concerned about the growth of our fraternity and the education of our youth. You must do something about the status of radio spectrum used by Amateurs. You can show your support by joining the National Amateur Radio Association. If you sit down this evening and wrap a membership application around your check for $10.00 it /i1 will make a difference. Hopefully, I have been able to demonstrate the application of "Marketing 101" in this editorial. Have I been able to create a desire to join a young and aggressive organization that is concerned about our fraternity? Your graduation test will be found toward the back of this journal in the form of a membership application blank. 73, de Don, W6TNS