I decided to re-enlist (heh) in the #ARRL. There are small but positive signs of progress there, and I figure that they probably dismiss complaints/observations from non-members out of hand... My hope is that they step up and show some actual leadership with regard to politics, diversity, hate speech, etc. It's a ridiculously low bar but it would be a further step in the right direction. #hamradio
@croyle I'm a Lifer so sort of stuck. :) DEI aside, they don't do well w/their existing programs, #LOTW being the most poorly managed, followed by their awards programs. WAY too much manual intervention for the latter, poor vision for the former.
AFAIK, the ARRL Forklift is still running around the ARRL Book Warehouse as if it's 1984.
They are failing on many fronts, sadly.
One good thing they did before the recent ball-dropping was to allow members access to all 4 periodicals.
@VE2UWY I wonder if book hardcopy sales are still popular and profitable? Given the ARRL's demographic, I wouldn't be surprised either way. I recently purchased a couple of books from them that were on sale... I don't deal with LotW much, but that could change in the future. I know that it attracts a lot of complaints that seem justified.
@croyle#LOTW is great when it works. When it broke badly in '11, members stepped up. K1MU redid the digital pen used to sign logs (TQSL) & improved it greatly. Their fee structure is broken as it is & could be fixed in a revenue-neutral (maybe even R+!) but they won't hear of it because no one currently at #HQ actually knows how LOTW works so they are reluctant to change anything.
They are a "tech club" w/a lot of guys (almost all white guys) running it that don't understand modern tech.
@VE2UWY@croyle I agree, LOTW is a terrible implementation of a hamradio activity (award chasing) that they tried monetizing on.
They should have gamified it. It's a perfect candidate for it. But no, they made it into a boring laborious product that soon no one will care about, if they're not careful.
QRZ.com seems to understand this. You log a Q, can check immediately if qualifies for an award. If it does, bam, another badge on your profile. It's all about badges these days, baby. 😄
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