From: terry@red.uucp (Terrence R. Redding)
Newsgroups: rec.radio.amateur.misc
Subject: Re: ARRL technical literature
Date: Fri, 11 Dec 1992 19:50:38 -0500
Reply-To: terry%red@lawton.lonestar.org
Organization: R & R Advantage.  Education and Marketing.  SDL spoken here!
X-Software: HERMES GUS 1.03 Rev. Apr 14 1992

In <1992Dec9.101543.4437@ke4zv.uucp>, Gary Coffman writes:
>In article <1992Dec8.152844.10567@news.acns.nwu.edu> rdewan@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (Rajiv Dewan) writes:
>>In article <9212071839.aa01491@ingate.microsoft.COM> a-kevinp@microsoft.COM (Kevin Purcell, Rho) writes:
>>>
>>>I suppose thats why the League's digital commitee made its infamous 
>>>decision about forwarding (which was at least part correct) and 
>>
>>This was pusuant to a survey sent to EVERY member of the organization in
>>its organ QST.  Overwhelingly, the response was negative.  What would
>>you have liked ARRL to do?  Ignore its members' responses?
>
>I would have liked them to apply scientific survey principles. This 
>type of survey is noted for it's extreme negative bias and is never
>trusted as a valid way to do opinion research by legitimate survey
>organizations. If the League doesn't understand how to properly do
>an opinion survey, they should refrain from depending on techniques
>with known flaws for their policy decisions. 
>
>Gary KE4ZV

Gary you are right of course.  But more importantly, planning for the future or
adopting new technology can never been done by popular consensus.  The majority 
will always vote for for status quo and always oppose change.  This is most 
true when things appear to be going well.  In amateur radio, going well can be 
described as during periods of growth.

The majority can accept change and adopt, but normally that occurs when things 
are not going well and the majority perceives itself to be threaten by status
quo.

Leadership requires vision and a sense of history and a willingness to act,
even when it is not the "popular" thing to do in order to continue to be 
successful.  This is especially true when providing leadership to volunteer
organizations.

Change is never popular.  It was unpopular to move from sparkgap to tuned 
circuits.  It was unpopular to allocate band width to voice when AM first 
started to compete with CW for the spectrum.  FM and SSB were both unpopular
when they first appeared.  Many today can still remember the AM vs SSB band 
wars.  Digital modes compete with each other for resources and with all 
other modes for frequency.  Since each digital mode has its own small and 
limited following it is not rational to think that the majority is going 
to favor allocating limited frequencies to any particular digital mode.

Doing things that the majority is in favor of may get one re-elected, but it 
cannot demonstrate vision or leadership.  Regards, Terry.  
-- 
DOMAIN: terry%red@lawton.lonestar.org (Terrence R. Redding)
UUCP:   . . . !rwsys!lawton!red!terry (Terrence R. Redding)
PACKET:  WB5LMJ @ WB5MJS.OK.USA.NA
Voice 405 536-8822, Ben's Place (Benjamin Franklin) BBS 536-6988 9p to 6a
PhD candidate, University of Oklahoma in Adult and Higher Education
Educational Advisor, American Radio Relay League
221 SW Crystal Hills Drive, Lawton, Oklahoma 73505