I am a pre-programmed macro on the keyboard of a shy non conversationalist ham. I like to get pushed regularly during a digital contact. My biggest pre-typed feature is giving a 59 to every station we are in QSO with even if their signal stinks. My master is working on automating our functions so that my key wont be pushed anymore. I am afraid that I will end up in my master's junk box along with all the microphones, and other obsolete technologies in his shack. As a matter of fact my master is setting up his computer/radio to operate completely automated so he doesn't even have to do anything. He seems to get off reading the contact log when he returns to the shack running through the scores of other automated stations the computer has contacted. My master spends all the time that he is not tending the station sitting on the couch in the living room watching reality TV and eating potato chips.
Priceless! Let those who want to use FT8 majority or not, no one will tell you not to. Yes, it can operate in weaker SNR than even CW. But when conditions are normal, CW is faster, way more flexible, and approaches full duplex QSK, something none of the digital modes do. PSK31 at least is practical for real communication and I used to like Pactor. But CW overall, can never be beaten. Yep, old things from way back last longer than new things. FT8 will be dead when some other mode replaces it in years to come, but CW will still be here when the last person in this forum has passed away. Sobering but realistic thought. When I look around my house, I also see that the oldest things that still work and will work long after I'm gone, as Morse Keys made almost 100 years ago. Nothing else in the house will work nearly as long.
