GOTAhams General Meeting on Zoom Tuesday Sept. 8th 7:00 PM

Our GOTAhams monthly General membership meeting will be held this Tuesday September 8th at 7:00 PM on the Zoom video conferencing platform.

Members with registered email accounts on our club roster will receive an invitation by email. Please keep the meeting number/passcode and link to yourselves, do not forward the email or share the codes as we are trying to improve security on our Zoom meetings.

Anyone interested in attending the meeting can simply request an invitation by emailing kd6caf@gmail.com or gotahams@gmail.com, Please use your full name and a call sign if you have one which will allow us to verify your identity.

We will be utilizing a “waiting room” function in Zoom so please be patient when entering the meeting, this function allows us to remove and report any attendee that attempts any malicious activity.

Thank you all for bearing with us during our attempts at improving everyone’s experience with these “Virtual meetings” during the era of “Zoom Bombing” and world of virtual gatherings.

We have a new more polished meeting format along with the new security and Dave K6EV is looking forward to sharing his presentation (part 1) on portable power systems/batteries. we will conclude the meeting with questions about the presentation and open discussion on any topic concerning the Club and Amateur radio.

All of the GOTAhams board is looking forward to seeing all of your smiling faces Tuesday. ’73 Ken KC6WOK

New FCC filing fee schedule may be costly for Amateur Radio Licensees

ARRL News concerning “Proposed” FCC Reinstatement of Fees
FCC Amendment of the Schedule of Applications Fees

Personally I was curious, How much money the FCC stands to collect on a group as small as “Amateur Radio”? If each amateur had to pay $50.00 simply on a new license or renewal using the touted 700,000 actively licensed Hams, it would be $35,000,000.00 which does not take into account Vanity call sign applications that would require and additional $50.00 fee.

I do understand the increased fees for commercial broadcasters that are supported through advertisers but they also serve as “Emergency communicators” with the “Emergency Broadcast warning system” and “Megan’s Law” Emergency notification system.

My concern is recruiting new “Hams” will become far more challenging when beyond the $15.00 (or less) stipend for each testing session they will be required to pay $50.00 to the FCC prior to being assigned their Call letters. Sadly that new Baofeng UV-5R from Amazon will cost them less than half of what the Amateur Technician license would.

These are just my thoughts on the subject. I would like to hear from ALL of you on this topic, Just click on the following link: https://gotahams.com/forum/topic/what-is-your-opinion-on-fcc-reinstating-licensing-fees-for-amateurs/#postid-8258, feel free to voice any opinion! Say what you think, this forum is allowing you to vent, please respect other members opinions and show the same respect you would on the air. ’73 Ken KC6WOK

A new kind of Contest “Portable Operation Challenge”

This is the Contest for the little (non “Super Station”) operator, QRP gains ALL the advantages. This looks to be a game changer in the contest world scoring favors Low power, single transceiver, Portable. No advantages to multi transceiver, big power, big antennas, multi operator or even special power systems. the rules are a little tough to interpret but there is some good information/explanation on the recent “HamNation” episode of August 26 2020.

Portable Operation Challenge rules

In this Episode of Ham Nation, the information on “Portable Operation Challenge is well explained. Get quickly to the explanation by scrolling in to about the 45 minute mark. It is certainly worth watching to learn how this new contest favors the QRP portable operator and actually handicaps those “Super Station” contest veterans!