Leo Laporte to get his ham license?

According to some friends of mine on Twitter, Leo Laporte is shooting for his ham ticket. He told Bob Heil during the HamNation broadcast on Tuesday.

Leo has often reported on ham radio news and when TWIAR was active we featured Leo's TWiT segments on the podcast.

I've always liked Leo since the days of ZDTV and the Screen Savers. Back then, that was the place to go for real geek news.

Hopefully he'll be active on the radio and not just have it for a resume enhancement.

TWIAR's web site redesigned

Some of you know I'm the "web designer" for the program This Week in Amateur Radio, or TWIAR. I'm admittedly behind the times when it comes to web design, and I'm thinking of going to school to learn more.

Over the summer, TWIAR took a bit of a hiatus as George Bowen, W2XBS (Executive Producer) was working odd hours at his employer, and he was committing himself to being better fit. When I visited him in August, he was definitely working out!

Being the worldwide media conglomerate that TWIAR is, we nickel & dime our way through bringing the service to the ham community. We aren't backed with big bucks like other services, but we've definitely been more innovative. We were the first ham radio service to bring our program via podcast. What a moment that was...

George called me up once day and said "we need to do a podcast". I responded "Great!! What the hell's a podcast?" Over the next 2-3 weeks I got a crash course in this new thing called "podcasting", and saw the potential.

At the time, the iPod craze was in full swing and podcasting was a way to provide news, opinions, etc, via RSS/XML feeds. Former MTV "VJ" Adam Curry is credited with coming up with the concept of podcasting.

TWIAR was just the repeater service version back then was averaging a few dozen downloads a week. I was paying for hosting on a shared hosting service for a few bucks a month and we had a 10 Gigabyte limit on our bandwidth per month. In other words, I couldn't go over 10 GB of data transfer pre month. This was no problem, as we were averaging about 4-5 Gigs of bandwidth.

After I set up RSS feeds for the podcast I posted an email, and sent links to a few podcasting sites that were out there.

And then...here came the masses...

I checked the stats one day on a whim and they skyrocketed after the first 3 weeks. We went from 3-4 GB average to right at the limit for the month!

And then, the next week, the site was pulled. We exceeded bandwidth.

I scrambled and got more temporarily allocated (and paid a hefty sum for it) and we went to a new plan that allowed 40GB of bandwidth. So we were pretty good...for about 3 weeks.

The next month, I closely monitored the stats of the site, and they just kept climbing. And even though I got an additional 30GB of bandwidth, they were quickly eaten up by the podcasting.

I begged George to find any way possible to limit the file sizes of TWIAR. They were 20-30 Mb files and that times 100 was just eating away at our bandwidth allocation.

His response: "I'm starting another ham podcast called TWIAR International!"

I scrambled and we were blessed to find an outlet to provide storage for our audio files. Radio NewYork International was a group that offered to host the files for us. We had a few bumps in the road with them, but we didn't realize just how big we became. Their web guy contacted George to let him know we were now averaging 100 gigabytes a WEEK of bandwidth! And this was 3 months into the podcasting phenomenon.

Then one day the web site just died. The folks at RNYi just shut the doors and threw away the key, apparently. The web site is gone but a blogger account exists for "Johnny Lightning", who I assume is keeping their dream alive.

We once again scrambled and Fred Moses stepped in to offer bandwidth, and we've been there to this day.

Other services quickly found out about the miracles of podcasting (either from our model or other means, I'm sure) and soon the internet was flooded with ham radio podcasts of all sorts, from the big names such as Amateur Radio Newsline to everyday hams just wanting to vent their frustrations, show off their new toys, or talk about whatever was on their mind. Even the ARRL finally got on board with their version.

I've redesigned the site several times over the years (one example is to the right), trying to at least LOOK like I know what I'm doing. We've expanded our reach to twitter, facebook, and continue to look for ways to send the service out to as many as possible, so that hams around the world know about TWIAR.

It's had its ups and downs, but despite the trials and tribulations, we've survived, sometimes barely.

Someday I might actually be able to do more than just the KISS method of web design. But then again, sometimes, that's what works the best. The last incarnation was okay, but not the best, and I never got to utilize what I wanted with it.

I finally found a template (after a search of several months) that I think will work best, and built TWIAR's site around the template being used (called "quatrain" or "quantrain", not sure which as it's spelled both ways). A small screengrab is at the top, but visit the site to get the full experience!

Hopefully it will be well received. We shall see.

TWIAR comrades: Together at last...

I've been affiliated with TWIAR (This Week in Amateur Radio) for about 15 years now (my God, has it really been that long?) and what started out as a site for posting an audio file or two has turned into a big-time partnership with George Bowen (W2XBS) and a plethora of other folks over the years who have come and gone, or stuck around in some fashion or another.

Last year while visiting Iowa, I took a day and went to the Council Bluffs / Pacific Junction area and hooked up with Dale Sargent for the day. Back around 1998 I think, I met up with a former anchor of TWIAR (who I just found out moved to middle Tennessee this year), and the only other person I had yet to hook up with was George.

That changed last week.

He called up about three months ago to tell me he might be coming to the Chattanooga area to attend a wedding and was passing through town on the way. I decided to take the opportunity to look up some repeaters and send him as much info so that we could hook up on the radio while he was here. We also made plans to get together at least one day while he was in the area.

As luck would have it, he was able to make it down and so we finally met last Monday and it was our first "eyeball QSO" of (hopefully) many.

We spent the day swimming in the pool at their hotel, talking about the past, present, and future of TWIAR, and just shooting the breeze about life, the Universe, and everything.

As I guessed, my elder daughter hooked up with his, my younger one with his younger one, and the wives went off into their own world. One thing about my daughter Amber, she will have never met you before, grab you by the hand, and say "CMON!!" and take you wherever she thinks they need to go...

We were there until 11ish, just lost in time talking about everything possible. We had an enjoyable time at a Cracker Barrel and just enjoyed getting to know each other after all these years. When all was said and done we trekked back to Knoxville, and he headed home on Wednesday.

We've already made plans to hook up again should they make their way down or we make our way to the New York area.

In the meantime, we're talking about a revamp of TWIAR. Not sure what we want to go with or what theme would work best, but we'll basically have to start from scratch for most of the content when it does occur (and time is not always a luxury).

Speaking of the kids, Lauren's trying to get on the radio a bit more but everything else just gets in the way. Hopefully there will be more kids getting on the air that she can talk to.

Speaking of kids...do I have a yarn to spin (making it a separate post) about adults talking to kids on the radio...stay tuned.

Congrats to George's daughter

TWIAR's producer George Bowen, W2XBS left the following on TWIAR's web site:

My apologies for not having TWIAR edition #860 available on the web site. This weekend, my daughter and Bill Barans son Zachary successfully passed their technician exams and should have their call signs this week. This endeavor to have yet another ham in my family has taken up considerable time, which resulted in edition 860 not being available. Please look for a brand new This Week in Amateur Radio and TWIARhn (Edition #861) this coming weekend October 10th. This weeks Edition #245 of TWIARi International is now up and available.
73 George - Executive Producer

This Week in Amateur Radio

Looks like George has a decent excuse this week.

I've been trying to get my daughter Lauren (age 9) motivated into getting her ticket before next June, when the question pool will change. We got started late in the summer, and she was very motivated. But, as time went on, she started to get distracted with her friends, TV, etc. My quagmire is that I will not push her because I don't want her to get licensed because I want her to, but because she wants to get her license.

It's tough to keep her motivated and not seem pushy. She hasn't looked at the book for a couple of weeks now. But, my other daughter Amber (who turned 8 last Sunday) has now expressed an interest in ham radio as well. Perhaps a little competition is good for motivating them. They tend to be competitive in many things (as sisters tend to be) so maybe I need to light a fire under Lauren by teaching Amber.

I also can try to find an all-day class where they spend about 8 hours learning the question pool, and then they take the exam the following day. Problem is, where to find one around here?

I took my sister-in-law to one of these classes when she was 13 and very much interested in getting a license. Unfortunately she didn't pass the exam (missed by 3 questions) but she kept at it and got her license about a month later. She ended up letting her license expire, but she spoke to me recently about wanting to get it again.

Maybe I ought to conduct my own session with all three of them. Although my patience threshold would be equivalent to that of Lewis Black.

Thanks but no. I'd better find someone else to lead the classes.

Two new hams in my family?

On the way home from visiting family, I talked to my daughters (ages 8 and 6) and asked them "so, would you like to learn how to be a ham operator?" and enthusiastically, both answered "yes" repeatedly until I told them I got it.

It made me feel good to know they were both interested. Already, I'm thinking about those applications to the ARRL for scholarships in 10 years...better keep my membership current!!!

It's not too terribly surprising, really, at least for the older of the two. Lauren's been listening to me talk on the radio during Field Day (the above picture was taken when she was two), launch balloons, and even read off a weather warning during a recent SKYWARN net.

I'm glad this is one thing that runs in the family. Not just my wife and I, but my wife's youngest sister also had her license at age 13. Supposedly my father-in-law had one but he was more into CB than ham radio, mainly because he didn't like power limitations...

Some friends of ours from Bristol, TN have a son who go his ticket about a year or so ago. He's active in their SKYWARN group and likes it thus far.

So now I have at least one who's looking to get ticketed soon, my other one, Amber, I'm not so sure of, at least not yet. Granted, if she got her license it would be big news around here since she's 6 (7 in a couple of weeks) and to have both of them licensed might turn a few heads. Question is, how do I teach them, and how will they administer the exam?

I'll probably start online and look over the sample questions, then talk with them about what this means, or what that indicates, or how something works, etc. Then we'll see if they're still interested. Between Brownie Scouts, school and the possibility I may become a soccer mom before too long, I don't know if I'll keep their attention long enough to get their ham tickets.

I know that the VEs can administer an oral exam, which they'll have to do for Amber since she's not reading at that level yet, and probably give one to Lauren. Even though she's an excellent reader, she sometimes has issues with the comprehension, and I don't want her to just memorize the questions and answers, I want them to understand why something works this way or that.

Like all things around here, time will tell if I succeed or not. If I do, George will have the exclusive on that story...

Bad English in Newspaper headlines

We at TWIAR pride ourselves on reliable information and smart news stories and headlines.

Unfortunately we don't receive any money for it.

If pride were a commodity, TWIAR would be the New York Times of journalism.

However, those newspapers that DO get paid to report the news occasionally overlook the obvious.

I received this email earlier today. It reminds us that the media occasionally gets it wrong.

TWIAR now on TWITTER

I've just set up a Twitter feed for TWIAR.
http://www.twitter.com/twiar

If you have a Twitter page, please start following us.

You can take the RSS feed from the page and add it to your site, you can set it up to send the updates to your mobile phone, and you can get the latest in amateur radio news, from TWIAR, the ARRL, or any publication featuring amateur radio from around the world.

The Twitter page will be updated with the latest news in amateur radio, and if there's any info on TWIAR itself (new editions posted, problems with audio uploads, etc) and messages of interest to our TWIAR listeners.

San Diego bust and Houston, we have a problem...

I returned home from San Diego last night. It was definitely a trip I won't forget anytime soon, especially since it looks like I'll be making another trip out here about a week from now.

I tried in vain to chat on any of the San Diego repeaters I could hear. I listened to the nightly net and participated in spite of my lack of warm reception. I didn't bother emailing the answers in, as I was not in the mood to be snubbed.

I plan to go a little more prepared next time. I'll try to research the area's repeaters a bit before I head out. I also plan to keep my repeater directory in my carry-on bags. While returning home from San Diego, we had a 2-hour layover in Houston which turned into almost 5 hours because of mechanical issues disguised as "fallout from Hurricane Dolly" when I asked the counter agents. While in Houston, I passed the time with my FT-530 and tried to bring up something...ANYTHING in Houston, and could not key up a single repeater on 2m or 440. I didn't know if there was a tone on any repeaters, so I tried a few. I scanned around with my Radio Shack scanner and got nothing on 6m, 2m, 220, and 440. It was DEAD for a Friday night...in Houston??? I ended up passing the time scanning the Bush Intercontinental Airport frequencies and listening to air traffic.

A trip to San Diego might be a dream for some, and I did have a good time while out there. But it's definitely not something I look forward to returning to in a week's time. Mainly it's the job I'm doing, but also the fact that I'm gone for two weeks straight. It stretches my wits to no end to be out for so long. Not to mention the fact that school is starting up in about two weeks for my girls, and I look to be missing that while I'm away.

This is an opportunity for me to improve myself where I work, so I have to go. I just hope I can keep from snapping and ending up live on San Diego TV in a high-speed chase that ends up on TruTV sometime in the near future...

Hopefully my repeater hunt will be better next time. I'll be a little further north in a place called Del Mar, and I'll have some co-workers with me as well. I hope I can complete at least one while I'm on the road.

Dale, our trusty TWIAR file uploader and audio guru and bandwidth hog, is out of town this weekend and unable to upload, so I'm doing that right now as I type this. I don't have the pipelines like what he has out there, so it takes more time to upload. They should be good to go com Sunday morning.

I'm getting nostalgic

TWIAR contributor Philip Neidlinger got put on the ARRL site this week, and they talk about his forte, discussing Dead Electrical Dudes. He's been getting more popular with his segments, and it seems like historical discussion of ham radio (namely Bill Continelli's Ancient Amateur Archives) is gaining popularity. I myself was very captivated at Bill's discussion of the "very first broadcast" on what was considered broadcast radio in the 1920s during TWIAR International 176. You need to check it out if you haven't already.

I find that Bill is a great storyteller. One of my personal favorites is his personalized recount of using scanners and a portable radio to navigate out of New York City during 9/11. He was in another building south of WTC Tower 2 and heard the plane fly over as it slammed into the tower.

What is striking was that he only mentions the actual events he saw of the World Trade Center in one sentence, noting them as "horrifying", then proceeds to discuss how he evacuated Manhattan on the trains that were initially thought to have been shut down for longer than expected. It was somewhat refreshing, considering how desensitized most everyone is regarding 9/11. We know people jumped. We know the towers fell. We know that so many died that day. It was nice to know that this personal recollection didn't repeat the same story we've all seen replayed over and over time and again.

I highly recommend you give it a listen. It can be found here.

Followup to hamfest activity

Today was a good Father's day.

I got a new wallet and a tool belt from my girls. They knew I needed a new wallet, and the little one just knew that I needed a toolbelt to keep my tools organized.

We launched UX-24 yesterday. That's #24 in UTARC's balloon flight series. Nothing fancy, just a 10 meter transmitter on 28.215 LSB and a 350 gram latex balloon.

We lost GPS lock after about 27000 meters (nearly 89,000 feet) due to the limitations of the GPS onboard. We knew it burst when the balloon started warbling during a transmission soon thereafter. We pretty sure it made 90k feet.

We obtained lock after it dropped below its design limit, and the last transmission was near Newport, TN. Carl and I separately drove up to the area some 10 hours later and we never heard it. My friend Jason and I got to within .21 miles of the payload and got nothing.

Who knows, perhaps someone in the area will come across it and call. We may never see it again, but we didn't lose a lot with this one.

I got an antenna and mount like I wanted. But still not sure where I'm going to mount it or where I am going to put everything, and I'm still not sure if I'm going to put in my tribander, 742 Kenwood, but I have the antenna in case I ever decide to install it.

This wasn't a 100% perfect weekend, as TWIAR's mail server is wreaking havoc. It's sending upwards of 8-12 messages of the same thing. The medianews mailing list sent one of George Antunes' emails some 8 times. What I tried to do was to remove and then restart the mailing list. After I deleted it, I come to find I can't create a new mailing list!

It's doing the same for mail forwarding. I re-created everyone's mail forward and sent them all email asking how many msgs of the same email they got, if all the info is right, etc.

The reason for all this is that our host apparently had a tornado hit some equipment where the mail server was housed. He's taking care of his paid users first, so I'm not going to complain. There's things more important right now.

Dale, TWIAR's "file guy" had some damage to his internet connections and has some good connections and was able to get some connectivity to upload all the files. I can only do 256k max for upload (2meg down). He has upwards of 10 megs UP!!! I don't know how he pulls off such luck, but if I were to upload, it would take me 4-5 hours, and I'm on HIGH speed!!! Dale gets it done in less than 30 minutes! Domino's can't even deliver a pizza that fast anymore...

I need to get some sleep before I put in for a tough week at work. Until next time...

All that work for nothin'

Well, I spent about 90 mins late last night composing a post about my history with TWIAR, only to have my firefox browser lock up on me and everything went bye-bye...

Needless to say this is not the kind of start I want. But, I will plunder on.

George gave me the go-ahead to affiliate this with TWIAR, so it looks like I'm off and running.

Stay tuned.

Let the fun begin

Well, I'll take a shot at blogging for TWIAR (if George will allow it) and see how this goes.

Some things I want to accomplish with this:

• Discuss topics covered in the current week's version
• Discuss topics TWIAR may have missed
• Discuss issues and activities I'm involved with (ballooning, contesting, SKYWARN, etc.)
• Discuss my ham radio life, what there is of it
• Occasionally discuss off-radio subjects as I see fit

I'll get started later in the week as I get the blog page tweaked the way I want it.

A little bit about me:

• Living in Knoxville, Tennessee
  
• Extra class amateur operator, callsign K4HSM (Hot Spicy Mustard)
• Current webmaster to This Week in Amateur Radio's web site
• Webmaster to my area's SKYWARN page
• Involved with UTARC's attempts to send a balloon across the Atlantic this past winter
  
• Married with two daughters, one who might get her ham license
• Employed as a technician for an outsourcer in Oak Ridge, TN (no government work, though)
• Other activities I like include watching NASA stuff and "bird watching" or satellite spotting
• Proud to be Republican
• Big hockey fan, new season ticket holder for the SPHL champion Knoxville Ice Bears
• Addicted to FARK
• Although I haven't been active lately, I enjoy playing poker.

That's all for now. I also have a twitter page (though I don't actively use it except once/week) in case you're interested.

Thanks for stopping by.