In recent years there has been a shift to digital communications using modes like FT8. Whereas in the past, radio amateurs focused on speaking to people across the world, there is far less of this now. People may make "rubber stamp" brief contacts, but there is far less chatting. Most of us can enjoy video chats across the planet for free on the internet. Speaking across the world is no longer magic. What "turns on" younger people is not the same as in the 1950s or 1960s. We have to find out what this is and forget what attracted us.
Southgate News has a link to an interesting piece in IEEE Spectrum talking about the issue in the USA. I think this is mirrored across the planet. The main issue is amateurs globally are getting older and there are fewer youngsters coming into the hobby. In 20 years' time the hobby we love could just fizzle out.
See http://www.southgatearc.org/news/2020/july/the-uncertain-future-of-ham-radio.htm#.Xwxp2ojYq00
But again, the hobby has been changed. And that IEEE article reflects it, a hobby of talking.
ReplyDeleteFifty years ago most "old hams" had gotten their licenses when young. I would have tried the test that year at ten, but in Canada you had to be 15 or over. That changed in April of 1972, and I passed the test in June. I fit the traditional demographics, being an old ham who started early.
But somewhere in those fifty years it was decided numbers counted more than quality. Entry was too hard, people didn't want all that technical stuff just to talk. So over time the testing was lessened. This was great for older people, who were set in their ways. They came to the hobby and and started remaking it in their view of the hobby. Enough time has elapsed that they've taken leadership roles, Any articles, even in otherwise technical places, overlook the technical aspect.
And then leadership doesn't know how to attract the young, because they didn't experience it themselves, and see the hobby as talking, which of course can't compete with the user technology of these days.
The local ham clubs don't get announcements in public places about events like fleamarkets. It's been a long time since I saw mention of the hobby in the local paper. We've lost many of the hobby magazines that traditionally lured people into the hobby. Are we getting articles into magazines aimed at children?
We need to drop "we can't compete" and figure out what makes the hobby distinctive. We need to realize that a hobby isn't for everyone. And drop the notion that we need numbers over quantity.
Then maybe real work can proceed on how to lure the young in.