ARLA/CLUSTER: Foundations of Amateur Radio: New Entrants are Everywhere

[João Costa > CT1FBF]

 The hobby of amateur radio has been around for a long time. It was
here before I was born and it will be here after I become a silent
key.
The same is true for you. While there is a recurring discussion about
the death of the hobby, the reality is that our community changes
continually. People come and go all the time. Reasons for change are
as varied as the number of people you care to look at, from interest
through to family, from money through to time, from boredom through to
excitement, from life through to death.

As our community fluctuates, our skill level varies. We see new people
come into the hobby, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, ready for a new
adventure, at the same time we have people who are experienced, or
jaded, or both, participating in the community and finding themselves
answering the same questions over and over again.

What radio should I get? Is this radio better? How do I do HF? How do
I get my license? Where is everyone? How do you participate in a net?
Which antenna should I buy? What is a QSO or a QTH? How come this and
why that? At some point I was that person and I have no doubt that at
some point you were, or are that person.

The challenge in maintaining a semblance of community coherence is to
balance the needs for new and aspiring amateurs with the expectations
of those already in the community. How do you answer the same
questions while staying fresh and encouraging, when all you really
want to do is ignore the noise and get on with the hobby?

The answer is simple.

You need to recognise that the change in the hobby is fundamental. New
people coming in, new technologies, new hardware, new modes, new
rules, new customs, all of it is in flux all the time. It shouldn't be
seen as a threat, but as par for the course, something that is part of
our community and part of why and how we exist.

To draw an analogy with something else, cooking. We've been doing that
for a while, some suggest as far back as 2 million years ago. Every
day new people learn to cook, new people invent or reinvent recipes,
cooking classes abound, television shows with competitive cooking, new
ingredients, new tools, new techniques and relearned old methods,
there's celebrity chefs, awards and the more you look at cooking, the
more you understand how it changes and continues to change. In many
ways cooking and amateur radio are the same.

The idea of teaching your child, or a friend, or a person on social
media how to cook something is accepted as how it is and how cooking
evolves.

In amateur radio we can do the same.

It's easy to dismiss silly questions, or to give snide answers, or to
ignore new arrivals, but that's not something that grows our
community, strengthens it, or broadens it.

Of course, how much you participate in this is the real yardstick of
how much of an amateur you really are. Said in another way, if an
amateur calls CQ into a dummy load, does anyone care?

One of the challenges as a new entrant into the community is to figure
out where to go and how to learn more. It's never been easier than it
is today, even if you think that it's hard. In a bygone era you had to
go to a library, or to find another amateur, or go to a club to even
know that our hobby existed, these days the access to our community is
within reach for any person on the planet.

We have endless resources, in the form of web-sites, books, both
electronic and paper, clubs, virtual and physical, social media,
podcasts and articles such as this, video channels, and an endlessly
growing and evolving community that cannot help but document its
adventures and exploits.

Amateur radio today is as close as the nearest search engine and as
far as you want to take it.

Never be afraid of asking a question and consider it a right of
passage if a grumpy bugger tells you off for asking a stupid one.

The worst question is the one you never asked.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

________________________________

• This article is the transcript of the weekly 'Foundations of Amateur
Radio' podcast, produced by Onno Benschop, VK6FLAB who was licensed as
radio amateur in Perth, Western Australia in 2010. For other episodes,
visit http://vk6flab.com/. Feel free to get in touch directly via
email: cq  vk6flab.com

• If you'd like to join a weekly radio net for new and returning
amateurs, check out the details at http://ftroop.vk6flab.com/, the net
runs every week on Saturday, from 00:00 to 01:00 UTC on Echolink,
IRLP, AllStar Link, Brandmeister and 2m FM via various repeaters, all
are welcome.