[amsat-bb] AMSAT-BB Digest, Vol 14, Issue 292 (HEO's, AMSAT perception)

[Michael]

Just from the outside looking in...

AMSAT APPEARS only to be interested in hoisting flying repeaters and 
PACSAT/APRS and showing the average ham how "easy" it is to work sats 
with a handheld and a simple antenna. I guess that's all well and good 
but I didn't get in the sat end of the hobby for "easy".  I wanted a new 
challenge. I was too late for A0-40 because of lack of funds for a 
station but I did have fun for awhile chasing AO-51, FO-29, AO-7 etc. 
with a TS-2000X and a homebrew rotator and antenna system. 
Unfortunately, life got in the way and I needed family funds so the 
Kenwood hit Ebay and I'm inactive on the birds now. I sometimes consider 
buying a couple of Baofengs (you should ALWAYS operate full duplex but 
that's another thread) and getting back in on the cheap, I even recently 
bought a beat up old telescope with a computer tracking tripod system I 
spotted at Goodwill, but honestly, the challenge isn't there to give me 
motivation.

Before everyone flames me, as I said, this is from the outside looking 
in and just one man's opinion. I really wish AMSAT would do something, 
anything, to change my perception. Seems to me I saw something about a 
YL running for the board who's interested in open sourcing stuff.  Her 
candidate statement was IMHO, a much needed breath of fresh air but I'm 
no longer a member and don't keep up so no idea if she got elected. If 
AMSAT wants my membership and donation dollars back, they need to change 
perception and I suspect there are many out here in the community who 
feel the way I do.

73,

Michael, W4HIJ


>>   Somewhere in AMSAT there is someone who has "Project Managed" long enough
>> (or has access to process-flow diagrams) and can publish a generic work
>> breakdown of both the steps and resources needed to put a highly elliptical
>> (presumably less expensive) or Geostationary (presumably more expensive)
>> bird into orbit and manage it.
>>
>> If that person (or people) could publish that along with a "checkmark"
>> next to the items that are "already in place", "in active progress", and
>> "needs sponsor/enthusiast" then we are more likely to fill-in the gaps.
>>
>> Remember the "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" game (a.k.a. "Bacon's Law")?
>> Let's play it out here!
>> Ev, W2EV
>>
>>      On Tuesday, July 30, 2019, 6:15:19 PM EDT, Jerry Buxton via AMSAT-BB <
>> amsat-bb at amsat.org> wrote:
>>
>>   On 7/28/2019 18:46, Ev Tupis via AMSAT-BB wrote:
>>> What are the top barriers to revisiting highly elliptical and AO-40 type
>>