Vol 9, No 4

April 2011

IN THIS EDITION:

Looking for Field Day Info?

HR-607

Did you know? Writing tip

Following Twitter feeds yet?

a News’ News Release

College Amateur Radio Club information

The Great Central US Shakeout

Who takes PR-101 ?

The Last Word

Looking for Field Day Information?

http://www.arrl.org/files/file/Field-Day/2011/2011_FD_PR_info.pdf

Also, don’t forget that you can oder FD posters to put around town at

http://www.arrl.org/shop/Field-Day-Supplies/

HR-607

Obviously one of the major activities here at ARRL HQ in the past weeks is the opposition to HR 607 as it is currently written. While we have no argument with giving the “D-block” frequencies (some of the old UHF TV frequencies not being used) to emergency responders, we DO have strong objections to another part of the bill, section 207, where it proposes taking away our use of 420-440 MHz and selling it off to the highest bidder for commercial use. NPSTC, APCO and others involved in emergency responses have agreed with ARRL that section 207 of the bill needs to be changed.

ARRL has created a video about HR-607. You can see it at http://www.arrl.org/hr-607 and at the bottom of the page is a low resolution .wmv file you can download if desired. The full, high resolution files are available by sending me an email – but note that they are just over 1 gigabyte in size. You’ll be downloading for a while :-)

...And it has also been posted at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsW5AjS65U0

Major thanks go to Al Petrunti, KA1TCH, who volunteered to work with us in creation of the video.

Meanwhile, Richard Haltermon, KD4PYR, created a website that makes it very easy to develop a letter for your Congressional representative regarding HR-607. This is as easy as it gets folks! Just enter your callsign and it does the rest. It was given a major test at the North Carolina hamfest and SM Bill Morine, N2COP, writes:

“...we used http://www.kd4pyr.net/hamletter.htm to generate HR607 letters this past weekend at the Charlotte Hamfest, and it worked wonderfully.”

Please get this info out to clubs and groups.

http://www.kd4pyr.net/hamletter.htm

Send the signed letters to:
John Chwat
Chwat & Co.
625 Slaters Lane
Suite 103
Alexandria, VA 22314

Why send them to Chwat & Co.? - Because since the anthrax mail scare of 2001, all mail to Congress goes through security checks that can delay it for weeks. But John will see that it gets hand delivered in time.

Did you know?

Most people understand frequencies (1 in 10) better than percentages (10%). So try to report numbers in ratios rather than percentages.

Following Twitter feeds yet?

http://www.twitter.com/reporterconxn is a place to follow. Reporters needing “experts” to provide information for various stories post requests there – and you might be able to help them.

Also sign up for http://www.twitter.com/ARRL_PR to get major breaking PR info from ARRL HQ.

What does News’ News Release look like?

Well, here’s one sent from the very people you would love to attract with your release! It is not often that news leaders send out their own releases, but when they do it’s worthy to note how they do it. It’s 470 words on one page. Unfortunately the variations in computer browsers make it impossible for me to guarantee all the formatting will stay the same, but it will be close. Note the main elements needed in a release and how they worked them.

Tap in to College Amateur Radio Club information

We all wonder about the 16-26 year old demographic sector and their view of Amateur Radio. While ham radio has never been a “mainstream” activity, technically-minded students are not nearly as rare as some folks would claim and they still are very interested in the opportunities for experimentation that Amateur Radio holds. To see what they are up to in the 21st century, take a look at the College Amateur Radio Club’s Website and Facebook pages. Hosted by Brenton and Bryce Salmi, KB1LQD and LB1LQC, it has student members from many schools and it looks like they are doing very well.

http://www.facebook.com/collegearc

http://www.collegearc.com/

The Great Central US Shakeout

This is a major drill happening throughout the central states simulating an earthquake scenario. While rare, the last time this region had an earthquake (in the 1800’s) it was a whopper, and they did not have the buildings of populations we do now.

IL, IN, MO, KY, TN. OK, MS. AL, GA, and SC ARES units are asked to join in and register their participation. Check with your SEC or SM to see what they have planned. You can see who has already signed up at http://www.shakeout.org/centralus/communication/ .

The drill is set for April 28th – except for Indiana who will play the game April 19. (Then again, until recently Indiana also had some unusual time zones too, so I guess this just fits for them :-)

Register now for the 2011 ShakeOut on April 28 at 10:15 a.m.!

Participate in the Great Central U.S. ShakeOut to practice how to protect yourself during earthquakes, and to get prepared.

Learn how to participate at http://www.shakeout.org/centralus/

There will be many organizations participating in this event and this is an excellent opportunity to call on other groups and work together in gaining media coverage as a coordinated group.

Who Takes PR-101?

Some of the best PIOs in the country have taken the PR-101 course. Even the professionals know that they don’t know everything and are always looking for new ideas and ways to increase their skills. How about you?

PR-101 is not available as a free download at http://www.arrl.org/pr-courses

Here are some of the folks who have taken it and are already using it.

Last Name	First	Call
Abbott	Andrew	K7ADA
Abraham	Ron	KC5IMJ
Allen	George	N1NBQ
Bagdas	Tomas	NU2I
Bagdasarian	Douglas	W4DBM
Bigley	John	N7UR
Borgman	Dana	KA1WPM
Burchfield	Jon	KJ2N
Bybee	William	KI6OBV
Carline	Michael	KD5ZCA
Carpenter	Forrest	KF5FLU
Connolly	Joseph	KG4CWS
Cox	Glenn	ke4bmy
Duram	James	K8COP
Dutkewych	Alexander	N2PIG
Dutkewych	Debra	K2PIG
Eaton	Lawrence	NT2B
Fanning	Joe	N6RRJ
Fontenot	Jody	KB5RXZ
Franklin	Geof	KE4IGD
Gadus	Joe	KD5KTX
Gadus	Joseph	KE5BVQ
Garvin	Larry	KB1QQM
George	Robert	KB8QYJ
Gillis	Ben	K5TBN
Goldy	Richard	K5GOL
Goran	John	K1JJS
Grayson	Stephen	KE5BPL
Hall	Melissa L	W4RXG
Harpham	Allen	KBØASQ
Harris	Bruce	N4PDX
Hoettels	Janice	KA9VVQ
Holstein	Jeff	K8JMH
Hutchison	Harvey	NK0S
Jacobs	Jack	WD4OIN
Jensen	Kenneth	KI4RUI
Johnson	Kathryn	KA0BDL
Johnson	James	KI4TAT
Klein	Stanley	W0CHF
Koechel	Martin	K9AMG
Krupa	Joe	N1ESB
LoCicero	John	K4TUG
Mahaney	Kirk	N5WKM
Manshack	Michael	AD5OG
Mayernik	Anthony	K7AKM
McBride	Bennett	KE5VDC
McCraw	Gordon	WX7EM
McDonald	Jim	KB9LEI
McGlothin	Daniel	KB3MUN
Morine	Bill	N2COP
Mullet	Pat	KC8RTW
O'Dell	Kevin	N0IRW
O'Shea	Tim	KY7Y
Palmer	Walt	W4ALT
Partridge	Del	W5QQ
Pitts	Allen	W1AGP
Pituch	Steven	W2MY
Polunsky	Steven	W5SMP
Pope	Jim	N5JCP
Rabold	John	KS6M
Redoutey	Robert	N5KF
Reid	Robert	N0BHC
Roberts	Paul	K5HHM
Ross	Randy	KI4ZJI
Roth	Gary	KE7IAT
Samuelson	Harry	KB9ZR
Sanders	Steve	KE7JSS
Santana-Díaz	Ángel Luis	WP3GW
Schulz	Michael	W9MJS
Schuylar	Crist	KE5VIP
Stewart	Terry	N4EWW
Stohrer	Peter A	K1PJS
Summers	Peter A	KL2GY
Taylor	Mark D.	N8MDT
Urich	Mike	KA5CVH
Valega	James L	WB5LSH
Vines	Dennis	K5GBT
Weathersby	Ann	KE5TEZ
Wells	Emily	KC8RAL
Wentzel	Dave	KD4ITI
Wilcox	Martin	W9OV
Woodward	Raymond	K3VSA
Zawrotny	Stanley	K4SBZ

The Last Word

Sit back and take a deep breath, this may not exactly be all Amateur Radio related information. It’s just me personally, but I think it is important.

In the past, there have been many examples of Amateur Radio operators getting messages out to the world from some very dangerous places. Most of us can remember the tale of the “Last Voice out of Kuwait” in the 1990’s. Almost as long as there have been hams, they have used their skills in getting messages out, in both disasters and around government blackouts of news and situational reports.

To say “the world is changing” is a trite understatement. But technology is changing, not people. There are still some really nasty people out there – always have been. So the role of the ham operator in letting the world know what is happening remains needed, but different only in the implementation and means.

This is why I took unusual interest in an article this past month in the magazine The Economist. The March 17th issue had an article titled “Signaling Dissent” and you can see it at http://www.economist.com/node/18386151. The critical line is in paragraph six.

Conventional radio of this sort cannot, unfortunately, transmit video or web pages. But a group called Access, based in New York, is trying to overcome that. To help democracy movements in the Middle East and North Africa get online, it is equipping a network of ham-radio operators with special modems that convert digital computer data into analogue radio signals that their equipment can cope with. These signals are then broadcast from operator to operator until they reach a network member in an area where the internet functions. This operator reconverts the signal into computer-readable data and then e-mails or posts the information online.

Hmmm... Turning digital data stream into analog so it can be relayed out with very basic radios, then back into digital where it can be seen or heard. Neat trick!

It took a bit of work to find out who “Access” was. (Never try to Google the word “access” without being ready for a gazillion options.) William Hatfield, W3QX, happily provided me the answer and it’s obvious from their website, www.accessnow.org , that this is a ham-heavy group. They also have a lot of other really good and useful ideas on their website.

I know there are folks who believe in a conspiracy theory that our government will one day pull the Internet and communications plug on us all in some way. I don’t subscribe to that. But I definitely do champion maintaining the ability of an individual to freely communicate without dependence on the whims of Mother Nature or of politics. That is critical in any disaster, natural or artificial. And if the work of Access and groups like it allows people to talk, reason, understand and work things out instead of shooting at each other or being mere serfs, then “good on ya!” It’s one of the best roles for ham radio know-how that I can think of.

- Allen w1agp