Things have gotten a little busy for me, so sorry about going dark on blog postings. I had several weeks of business travel, followed by a wonderful trip to the Caribbean. Unfortunately, no ham radio action on any of these trips.
As usual, K3NG has posted some interesting stuff on his blog. First, he commented on Amateur Radio Liberation Day, then he had a good post on The Problem of Closed Source and Proprietary Algorithm Modes.
The Fi-Ni report explained the mysterious reappearance of the 15 Meter band.
After pestering hams with announcements that the new ARRL web site is about to be turned on (drum roll please….), the League had to back off and announce that it just wasn’t quite ready yet. It would be a lot more effective to launch the web site, then promote it. That way, when people go to check it out, it is actually there.
The FCC decided that it would be a good idea to allow a remotely-controlled robot to use 430-448 MHz as a radio control link. These robots are intended to be used by law enforcement agencies to enter hazardous areas without endangering personnel. I guessed they missed the fact that the 70 cm ham band is home for thousands of FM repeaters in the U.S. This is yet another lame spectrum management decision by the commission. (See K3NG’s post on this topic.)
– 73, Bob K0NR