Apparently repeater discourtesy is a greater problem many places than it is
here in central Maine.  One local repeater was known for that, but it has
gone under.  The operator of that defunct repeater now occasionally uses
our club repeater to state his political views and ideas of protocol.  His
best friends consider him a bully on the air.  He is the only one I have
ever spoken to on the air about his behavior and his attitude, and that was
a very mild statement -- "Hey, can we save the political statements for
other media? (He had just stated an opinion I sort of agreed with, by the
way.)"  On the subject of money, he has never paid a penny of dues to
support the repeater.

My comment was a bit much for him, though.  There are some humorous stories
that came out of that confrontation -- and are still coming.

If I had a problem with people using jargon to -- possibly -- exclude other
repeater users from their conversations, I might talk to them off the air
-- if it seemed called for.  But among friends on a limited use repeater,
who cares?  I just can't participate if  subtleties get beyond my hearing
capacities.  For widespread communication, use the standards. No one on CW
would think of sending 'Tee hee' rather than 'Hi hi', though the former
uses fewer dits and dahs.  I think 'hi hi' is drastically overused, but it
is understood.

If somebody announced on the air that my club was interested only in money,
he or she just might get chewed out -- on the air.  So far it hasn't
happened.  We are a diverse group and should respect our diversity.

Anybody want to talk about courtesy in contests?

And did anyone note the ham operator on the DXpedition who has been about
the only link with the outside world from part of the disaster area?

73 or whatever

Don KD1XU

At 01:39 PM 1/3/2005 -0500, you wrote:
>Hi;
>I too can't resist.  We have lots of repeaters here locally with less and
>less activity each year.  It would be nice if radio clubs and repeater
>owners encouraged new operators rather than making them wonder why they
>bothered.
>Rich