I just wanted to announce a brief update on the Radio Hackers YSF Reflector. I’m shutting it down for due to a lack of interest on my part, declining use by others, and for financial reasons. It only cost me a few bucks a month to keep the server running in AWS. But with it and my other side projects the cost does add up each month. It is possible one day I might bring it back online, but I’m not committing to that at this time.
I decided to create a new YouTube channel. It’s nothing extraordinary, just a place to some videos of the things I find interesting about ham radio. I have no asperations of becoming a YouTuber, therefore don’t expect weekly videos or reviews of the latest Baofeng radio. This is the first video I’ve recorded and posted. It’s a demonstration of some radio frequency interference I found with my laptop while troubleshooting some connectivity issues I was having with my MMDVM hotspot.
Do you know what happens when you voice your opinion about the state of ham radio and it’s featured on Hackaday? You piss off a ton of curmudgeons; more importantly you uncover many likeminded people. I’ve been overcome with people contacting me over the last few days expressing their appreciation for my recent blog post. I’m not going to name drop anyone, but I will say I’ve had some fascinating people contact me.
An Open Letter To All Ham Radio Operators “Ham Radio is dying!” A phrase all to often uttered that it’s become cliché, but it’s partly true. You can’t deny a considerable section of the ham radio operators in the world are in the latter part of their lives.They won’t be around forever so naturally new people must assume their place. The good news is amateur radio licenses are on the rise.
About three months ago I unconsciously or perhaps consciously lost interest in ham radio. This isn’t the first time this has happened to me, in fact this was what lead me to allow my license to lapse the first time in 2016. If it weren’t for a new coworker of mine showing interest in ham radio again after a twenty-five year absent; I presumably wouldn’t be writing this post now.