{"id":78,"date":"2021-02-08T06:58:05","date_gmt":"2021-02-08T06:58:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/?p=78"},"modified":"2021-02-08T06:58:07","modified_gmt":"2021-02-08T06:58:07","slug":"ft8-hate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/?p=78","title":{"rendered":"FT8 Hate"},"content":{"rendered":"
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There are a lot of “new” things in ham radio since I was last active on the air in the late 1990s. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are a lot more digital modes and the new rigs have USB ports for directly interfacing with a computer to use software for RTTY, CW, and many other digital modes like FT4 and FT8.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My first reaction to FT8 was “okay, it’s boring”. After watching a few youtube videos I was still unimpressed. Even after a few months of actually making FT8 contacts, I’m still wondering why it’s so limiting. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, god forbid you mention to a ‘real’ ham that you’re making FT8 contacts, they will literally shit all over you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s amazing how close-minded and dismissive some of these people can be. They turn into outright assholes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This attitude reminds me of why I dumped ham radio 20 years ago – I just didn’t like a lot of the people I was talking to – and that’s kind of the point of amateur radio, isn’t it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I joined a 10 meter group on Facebook and I’ve mentioned a couple of times how I use FT8 to gauge when there may be an opening on 10m here in Omaha. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since I am not an 80 year old retiree, I have to work during the day. I can take a break now and then and work a couple of FT8 QSOs without a lot of distraction. I mean, aside from the first ‘click’ of the mouse, the entire FT8 qso can be completely automatic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is a boring mode and it is not very compelling. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, over time, I’ve decided that I find it very useful, particularly when you can aggregate the data on a site like PSK reporter (see map)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Today’s 10m FT8 activity<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I love to kick off WSJT-X and send some CQs out on 10m FT8 and then check the site to see if anyone is seeing me (I activated the feature that reports what I see to the site). This can be helpful for knowing when to get on 28.400 and call CQ (or listen for activity).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What FT8 has shown me is that my antenna is working and my signals are getting out. I’ve hit 23+ countries on FT8 in just a short while.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It may not be captivating and informative QSOs but you can send short (I mean VERY short) text messages as well. I arranged a VHF QSO with a local guy the other day by sending him a “QSY 146.48” message.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I wish the software was a little more flexible with respect to messaging, it can be done, but it’s not exactly as smooth as I would like.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, I don’t get the hate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I know some folks have never worked a single CW contact in their entire ham career – I don’t shit on them for being fake ‘no code’ hams. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There’s so many ways to enjoy ham radio, I don’t understand why people can’t just let you do it. \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n\n\n\n

73 N8OVU<\/p>\n\n\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There are a lot of “new” things in ham radio since I was last active on the air in the late 1990s. There are a lot more digital modes and …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-78","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-uncategorized","anons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=78"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80,"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78\/revisions\/80"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=78"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=78"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/straightkey.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=78"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}