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Author Topic: The Problem With Some Clubs  (Read 4838 times)

K3UIM

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #30 on: March 26, 2020, 06:44:31 PM »

"They aren't generally doing it with discrete transistors and resistors any more"
Nor with tubes and condensers. … sigh …
LOL, Charlie
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Charlie. K3UIM
Where you are: I was!
Where I am: You will be!
So be nice to us old fogies!!

K3UIM

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #31 on: April 08, 2020, 04:24:22 PM »

7R: "Check out Adruinos, Raspberry Pis, and the "maker" community."
The "maker" community?? Can you elaborate? Sounds interesting!
Charlie
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Charlie. K3UIM
Where you are: I was!
Where I am: You will be!
So be nice to us old fogies!!

KB8VUL

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #32 on: April 11, 2020, 08:55:10 PM »

I believe that the guy had it right with the 90 / 10 rule of clubs.
There is the 10% that run the club and the 90% that let them.

But this has two bad sides to it.
And I don't know that it's apparent how it's a problem
The first thing I saw with it being a problem is that the president of a club I was part of who was also the EC was a badge carrying wacker, that actually drove a used K-9 dog car, with a all red lightbar.  Now he could so that because he was a volunteer fireman.  BUT he has Amateur Radio Emergency Services done both sides of the car in blue reflective vinyl.  The county sheriff finally set him straight and he quite the club, quit ares and actually changed his ham call.  Problem was that NO ONE in club told him to knock it off and behave or tried to remove him as club president.  So they enabled it, and they of course were the 90%. 

Second problem, with club repeaters.  And we all know that clubs have repeaters, and repeaters have clubs.  Some folks on the repeaters can be a bit grating on the nerves.  Now when some fool gets on the radio and asks the same dumb question to twenty people of the course of two days and then after being told the same thing 20 times, goes and does something different and then asks why it didn't work.  And this is followed by another equally odd question, ask the same way to at least as many people.  The people leave the repeater and go somewhere else.  And literally they were on the UHF repeater saying thank god so and so only has a VHF radio, we can carry on a conversation over here and not deal with him.  Until he bought a UHF radio.  Then they vacated that repeater too.  Finally two of the repeater trustees went to the kids house and had a talk with his parents, but not before he had run everyone off both the clubs high profile repeaters.  And folks just never came back. 

We as hams try to be helpful at all times.  Or at least that is what others seem to expect.  And telling someone on a repeater that they need to think about what they are asking and why they are asking over and over the same dumb crap, and told, not ask to cut it out is another 90% letting someone else do the hard stuff. 

And here's why this will bite us in the butt.
Those two repeater trustee's are also the top people in the repeater club.  And they are getting older.  When they have had enough, I honestly don't know what the club will do.  The one guy has been in that position since the 70's and until about 5 years ago his call was on the repeater. 
They learned a valuable lesson when the other clubs main line repeater was shut down because the trustee with his call on it passed away and it had to be until the club could get a club call and put it on the repeater.  And that repeater hasn't been the same since.  And they refuse any assistance form anyone to maintain the repeater, including from people that maintain repeaters for a living. 
So as these folks get bored, or pass on, the people running the clubs will no linger be running the clubs, and I don't know that they will even survive if some part of the 90% don't step up. 
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N9LCD

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #33 on: April 12, 2020, 03:15:28 PM »

KB8VUL:

Quote
... I don't know that they will even survive if some part of the 90% don't step up. 

If some part of the 90 percent doesn't step up, then LET THE ORGANIZATION FOLD!!

Otherwise, it's NOT an organization, it's the10 percent running it!!!!
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AC2EU

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #34 on: April 12, 2020, 04:17:07 PM »

KB8VUL:

Quote
... I don't know that they will even survive if some part of the 90% don't step up. 

If some part of the 90 percent doesn't step up, then LET THE ORGANIZATION FOLD!!

Otherwise, it's NOT an organization, it's the10 percent running it!!!!

The 90/10 problem isn't just ham clubs. You can find Lions, Rotary, etc, all  suffering the same malady.
Just ask how long so and so has been president or how many TIMES he's been president. If it's a lot, don't join. There is also a 'musical chairs syndrome, too.

There are two reasons this happens, IMO.

1) the rank and file is too old or too lazy to step up.
2) The inner circle wants to do what they want to do , so they maintain control. ( musical chairs)
Serving on a committee with this kind of group is a waste of time, so nobody does.

KB8VUL

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #35 on: April 12, 2020, 09:18:04 PM »

Please understand that I am not claiming that this is somehow a ham club only sort of issue.
But I have also seen clubs (one specifically that I still am a member of to use their rifle and pistol range) that will create rules and bylaws that more or less prohibit anyone from getting into a position of power with the club.  They will do things like require a specific distance from the club, or minimum number of years as a member, or if you don't attend all but 2 meetings a year they will remove you.  Which of course means that you have to be retired so you are ALWAYS available, have no life outside the club, live next door to the club and been a member since the last guy was elected back in 1990.  Some folks WANT to be in power, and others that give consideration to it, quickly get bored with that sort of politics and just kick back and watch the show. 

On a side note to the club thing. I considered putting together a club that was loosely formed around old AT&T Microwave tower owners and tenants that were hams.  THe problems with this is it would almost need to be a national club as private ownership of these sites is very limited.  The owners are not all hams and many of the sites are NOT occupied by ham repeaters.  So while the concept seems cool.  I don't think it will take off.  And the costs involved, even if the group was to form a 501C3 and get sites donated under that status, the dues would need to be crazy to just pay the electric and taxes on the sites.  And with my luck we wouldn't be gifted one or two sites,   the major tower companies would drop 50 sites in our laps and we would be stranded under thousands of dollars a month in unfunded liabilities.
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N9LCD

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #36 on: April 13, 2020, 09:20:50 AM »

AC2EU & KB8VUL:

Be in CLUBS / ORGANIZATIONS or GOVERNMENT, people, once they get power, are reluctant to surrender it.

That's why we don't have term limits.  They don't want to surrender power!

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WO7R

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #37 on: April 16, 2020, 05:17:43 AM »

Quote
7R: "Check out Adruinos, Raspberry Pis, and the "maker" community."
The "maker" community?? Can you elaborate? Sounds interesting!
Charlie

Sorry, I missed this.  The "maker" community is all over the place.  It need not have anything to do with radio, but it can have a lot to do with radio if we wish it to.

It is a set of emerging technologies that allow one to do all sorts of things.  Basically, take anything you like and add a low cost circuit board to it.  That circuit board can, in turn, be whatever you need it to be.

Imagine what we could do back in the mid to late '70s when you could create a simple interface card and hook up any gear you liked to the personal computers of the era.

It is all of that and more.  It allows tinkering at all kind of levels and it allows even very simple computer programs to control all kinds of devices.

You want to have a Morse code keyer?  There's a four dollar Arduino out there which can, with only a little bit of code and a few discrete parts, becomes as good as any keyer there ever was.

Want to do remote operations?  Well, that's off the shelf these days, but one of the products, the MFJ one, uses a Raspberry Pi, which means in principle a "maker" could create the product themselves.  Because a lot of "maker" projects have a Raspberry Pi at the core of it.

You interested in automatic antenna switching or any other kinds of switching?  There are maker projects you could invent that do that sort of thing.

You interesting in robotics?  There's a metric ton of that stuff out there, waiting to be found.

See "Microcontrollers for Ham Radio" on this very site.
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AC7CW

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #38 on: April 16, 2020, 09:08:11 AM »

Some maker clubs are fantastic. The one in Goleta CA has 3D printers, soldering stations, a Ham rig, classes for all sorts of things and a lot of perticipants. It's funded by tech companies in the area.
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WO7R

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #39 on: April 23, 2020, 01:09:46 PM »

Quote
Be in CLUBS / ORGANIZATIONS or GOVERNMENT, people, once they get power, are reluctant to surrender it

Hmmm.  I have not had that experience in a half dozen civic organizations for which I have been on the board.

The more typical problem is getting anyone to volunteer for any of the jobs (even the most modest ones) to start with.  And, I'm talking about good, useful organizations here.

The 90/10 rule thing is about right.  Ten per cent run it and ninety percent allow it.

If you are part of a club where the ten per cent aggressively keep their power I suggest two things:

1.  Drop that club at once.  No good will come from an inbred organization like that.  I bet Coronavirus polishes off quite a few of them -- they are not built for stress or hard times.

2.  As far as I can tell, bad clubs (and even some good ones) will go away over time.  Boomer mortality should ensure it.  I know of an fairly important civic organization back in my home town.  Runs the principal community theater.  The board reorganized the rules to entrench themselves in power.  And so, a Civic Theater that has run since the 1950s is teetering on the brink of ruin.  If they fail now, there is nobody in the community that will ride to their rescue.  They burned far too many bridges.  I don't live there now, so I only hear about this fracas second hand.  But, both contributions and volunteers are down.  The better amateur actors aren't showing up.  The board seems stubbornly interested in holding on.  There's no money in it, either.  Just some weird power trip.  Won't last.  Isn't lasting now.

I think we should all have a hard look at club governance and our contributions to them.  Most of them don't have power mad boards.  If someone tries, the whole damn thing would collapse because they already struggle to fill their posts.  As I said, let go of those.  The rest need your support lest they become the power mad sorts by default simply because decent people stopped taking the jobs.

But we definitely need to be grooming the next generation to take over.  Today.
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AC2EU

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #40 on: April 28, 2020, 08:14:31 AM »

The great irony of these entrenched leadership clubs is that they see themselves as the "life blood" of the club.

They ask for help, but when folks answer the call, they are not treated as part of the team. ( because they really aren't in the minds of the cadre) Then they wonder why they end up being "the only ones doing things".

The membership get frustrated with this behavior and either leaves or passively go with the "program".

W9WQA

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #41 on: April 28, 2020, 05:43:50 PM »

OEY: "Many of our current members do have other jobs and responsibilities but a good number as well are retired like me and have the ability to volunteer to help as I do when needed. As I am sure most are aware a radio club normally isn't rolling in money since the membership is usually smaller and the yearly dues are not going to maintain your repeater and so on. I just want to see the club do better since it seems that the membership is dwindling."

I joined the local radio club in 1962 and most of the members were either Novices or studying for the test. There were probably 30 members at the time and the sessions were usually pretty full of questions from the newbies at the ending of each session.

More often than not, they wanted to know why they were coming in on the neighbor's tv, or why they couldn't get the grid current right, or etc, etc. There was always either an answer or someone would check out their problem asap at the newbie's shack. The meetings really came to life at those times. LOL

Every Saturday morning the "big guns" would be at Warren Radio (electronics store) to answer questions, or look over the problems and even fix a few in the back room. The manager, John Woods, was a great guy and it very often involved sales of some sort (Often covered by the "elmer". hi)

Our club now-a-days seem to evolve around radio communication at local doings or involved the repeater operations. The interest is there for the majority of the group, but I'm afraid it couldn't keep mine up. I hate to admit it but I felt like a dinasour(sp?) and lost interest. It just wasn't the same. Instead of questions of a technical nature pertaining to their homebrewed project, or cw speed, it would be about their handy talkie or something seen on the drive to work, etc.

I love the way high tech has come to our hobby, but I remember the thrill of hearing "something" coming from the speaker of our newly completed home-brewed, 40 meter receiver. So pleased that it almost brought tears! Truly a moment to be remembered. I expect something similar is experienced by a newbie today when he powers up his new 2 meter hand-held.
… sigh … But somehow, it just doesn't seem the same. Hi.

Charlie

wow...warren radio. not heard in a while. great guys. i did business with many stores in ohio, ind, illinois, mich. knew kenny kasmeyer, pres.  miles hadden now gone was a super guy.
fond memories.   but no comments on clubs !!!
good old days when i sold sencor, now both gone...
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KF5LJW

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #42 on: December 29, 2020, 08:39:41 AM »

To even be noticed you have to be 'white' and blessed with non-radio assets. (I'm white..I think..even getting old) Clubs are very private. If you don't get the interest of the clique forget yourself..

Hams are a racist organization? What a concept. Being native American, I see that.
« Last Edit: December 29, 2020, 08:43:50 AM by KF5LJW »
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AC7CW

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #43 on: December 29, 2020, 02:31:04 PM »

To even be noticed you have to be 'white' and blessed with non-radio assets. (I'm white..I think..even getting old) Clubs are very private. If you don't get the interest of the clique forget yourself..

Hams are a racist organization? What a concept. Being native American, I see that.

I knew a woman that lived on a reservation and became a CW expert, it was their best option for gabbing with privacy...
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Novice 1958, 20WPM Extra now... (and get off my lawn)

AC2EU

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Re: The Problem With Some Clubs
« Reply #44 on: December 29, 2020, 02:45:16 PM »

To even be noticed you have to be 'white' and blessed with non-radio assets. (I'm white..I think..even getting old) Clubs are very private. If you don't get the interest of the clique forget yourself..

Hams are a racist organization? What a concept. Being native American, I see that.

I dunno, is it really racism- or just who shows up?
There is a black man in my club who's a member of the "clique" -but I'm not.
So what is that other than simply clique and non-clique?
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