Jeremy Lemieux wrote: >>Amateur (packet) radio... has its limitations. >The insular quality of the Ham community is one thing that's >always kept me from really "getting into" it. I've had the >knowledge base to get my license for quite some time, and radio >in general is an interest, but ... I've met some pretty obnoxious >hams in my short lifetime, and the general attitude puts me off. The ethos is (realistically, which some will see as cynically) "service to FEMA, OES, and law enforcement." Even tho those agencies don't really need amateur radio. Wishful thinking on the part of the radio community. This thinking has its historical roots; in the world wars, ham radio was banned, and it had to really try to make itself useful to authority between and after the wars to be permitted to exist. As late as the 1950s, if you were planning to put (bulky) ham gear in the trunk of your car and "go mobile" across country, you were required by law to file an itinerary with the FCC saying where you'd be and when. Radio could be a threat to national security. Now, everybody has access to radio technology, "hammy" or not, but hams are to some extent still acting as if they are the holders of great wonderful restricted technology and have to justify themselves to be allowed to exist. >And you're definitely right about this nearly superstitious >fear of the internet. I seem to recall gigantic threads on >Usenet a while back with people vehemently opposing internet >gateways. Seems to me that one way to increase interest in >packet would be to _encourage_ it as a wireless alternative. When part of the message path is on the internet, local ham radio gurus lose control of the content of your message. >Hell, that's the only reason I want to use packet ... Without >internet gateways (telnet is all i need), it simply has nothing >to offer me. I'm certain that this is in violation of the Esteemed >Ham Ethos, but oh well. The local amateur radio people here near Monterey-Salinas-Santa Cruz CA still cling to their unreliable "radio-only" packet BBSs, and some of them even got ampr.org IP addresses but no one has ever used them. I do; i run a gateway and i had one user for a while then he got a real internet account. The die-hards will not even consider trying to rejuvenate their antiquated BBSs with an internet connection. It goes against the grain. I see my gateway setup as more of a learning experience for myself than anything else. However, if you're in Monterey Bay, i'm currently on slow 1200 packet on 144.97 and 145.75. One goal of mine is to eventually get up to 56K access on radio. More equipment. Use it around the house or across town for my own personal portable access. I personally wouldn't spend much time hoping that internet access via amateur radio is ever going to be easily available for the technomad. The best i hope for is to provide my own access and then use it around town. Orrin
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