The AC-130 is my favorite plane.
The AC-130 is my favorite plane.
Your definition of emergency communication is way off. Sure you can use some app for training for that situation, however it’s the least reliable way to get communications out in an actual emergency where others are actually going to hear and respond to it.
The best communications in an emergency, are those that are the most widely used. Which would be voice first, CW second. Having to carry around a phone, to use some app that someone else has to be actively listening to using another phone that is held up to a handheld, is not how I would want to be doing things in an actual emergency.
I also wouldn’t rely on vara during an actual emergency. Sure a it’s fun to play like using vara or a ht held up to a phone is going to help in any way during an emergency, but if you are relying on them, you are doing it wrong. I certainly wouldn’t want my life to depend on them.
seems awesome for recreational and emergency communication
In an emergency, using voice or CW will be heard by a lot more people, and understood by them a lot easier, more reliably, and better than having to have an app on both ends.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s cool tech (after I figured out what it actually is), but it should not be presented as useful in an emergency. In an actual emergency, the last thing that should be done is flaffing around with an app on the phone, and making sure someone on the other end happens to have the app installed as well.
And those are the types of excuse that keep them from even trying. “Well you didn’t pay us enough, so we aren’t going to even try. By the way, your cost of membership are going up, because membership numbers are plummeting. Totally not our fault though.”
People (like me) are pretty fed up with the hands constantly being shoved asking for more, while getting less and less for what we give.
As long as corporations view it as a way to make more cash, it will never be safe. I’m really hoping the ARRL does what amateurs are paying it to do, and fight this tooth and nail. Sadly their track record doesn’t give me hope at all.
The day they announced their rebrand was the last day I bought anything from them. I refuse to give them any more money on principle. If they can shell out nearly a half billion on a rebrand, they can drop some of their prices.