Thursday, May 29, 2014

We're Hams, We Can't Be This Lame

WARNING! MATT IS STEPPING ONTO HIS SOAPBOX


Okay, I apologize. I don't get it. We're Amateur Radio Operators. Right? We spend countless hours and dollars in the hope of communicating with others. Right? Is Yahoo Groups really the only online service we can find to share ideas? At the risk of being dogmatic. Yahoo Groups STINK!

I just spent twenty minutes. TWENTY MINUTES! trying to connect to a Yahoo Group. Are you kidding me? Then, when I got there, the search function didn't work, the header was the same as every other group I've ever seen, and the threads were so confusingly nested that I ended up tying the noose--I had hoped to use to put myself out of Yahoo Groups misery with--backwards! How, in this day and age, can we possibly stand such pathetic forms of community sharing. There has to be a better way.

WE NOW RETURN TO OUR NORMAL VOLUME.


One of the things I love about Hams is our ability to persevere. We will pound out CW on gear built before we were born, we will hold massive structures together with zip-ties and duct-tape, we will rush toward hurricanes and tornadoes to help others.

One of the things that drives me nuts about Hams, is our ability to persevere. We will use electrical tape instead of shrink wrap, we will install filters to deal with AC hum rather than properly ground our rig, we will insist on communicating through Yahoo Groups when there are a million better/faster/simpler/more effective ways to do so.

Want to share information? Blog about it. Or start a forum, they're way easier than you think. Want to share files? Dropbox and Google Drive are WAY better. Want to share photos? Backspace a few words and click those links. The point is: if we want to continue to be relevant, we need to embrace technology that works and especially web technology that works. Newcomers to our hobby will be turned away by our continued clinging to outdated and inefficient virtual hangouts. Youth won't stand for it. They'll find a group that "gets" technology. And who "gets" technology better than Hams? Nobody.

Sorry for the rant, but...

73

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