Meet the judge who codes — and decides tech’s biggest cases

Link to an --> Interesting read.

From the article posted at The Verge.

"But if there was one gadget that caught the boys’ imaginations, it was ham radios. The two spent hours listening to shortwave broadcasts, combing frequencies on a Zenith Transoceanic radio with a seven-foot telescoping antenna. They tuned into faraway stations like Radio Moscow, Radio Quito, and Radio Havana, but most of their time was spent listening to the amateur radio operators — the so-called “hams.”

“As we listened to the conversations from hams in various states in the US as well as foreign countries, it was as if a ‘new world’ had been discovered beyond the confines of Mississippi,” Feild said. He would listen as Alsup, who became a licensed ham operator while still in high school, carried on conversations from his bedroom with far-off interlocutors, sometimes in Morse Code.


A young Alsup at his ham radio, around 1963."

 

poor guy , has had only 5 shirts , but a well equipped station , that expresses how important that hobby was those days............

 

Glad to read I was not the only geeky kid that had "dirt clod wars".

Always fascinated by the diversity of backgrounds and life stories, good or bad, that connect with or result from being a Radio Ham.

73 de John WØPV

 

Where DID you get my pix? Taken about a week ago.

TOM K8ERV Montrose Colo

 

Great Article.....It brought back memories of growing up before cable TV, and computers. I am reminded of listening to sports and programs on broadcast radio. The knowledge learned while obtaining my ham licenses have helped me in many of my occupations and hobbys over the years. Saturday I had the priviledge of operating a JOTA station for a few hours at our local Boy Scout camp. (Clark County ARC in Indiana had multiple rigs set up at Tunnel Mill Camp) The look of awe and the gleem in the eyes of the Scouts was a great thing to see.

 

This OP is a very affirmative biographical sketch in support of amateur radio. I applaud it's being published here. Certainly a lot more depth then many of the puff piece publicity podcasts that have come to dominate QRZ News.

A few days ago I made a post, also gleaned from more main stream news media, regarding a recent high profile perpetrator (Las Vegas) whose father, a convicted and notorious felon, was also a licensed Ham.

This made it past moderation, but within an hour of going live it generated such strong irrational backlash from online readers, that QRZ management deleted the post and all traces of it.

I feel those distasteful emotions too, but also think it is unwise and foolish to try to run from or bury such information. Not everything about, nor everyone involved with, amateur radio, is going to be a positive attribute. Nevertheless those elements and history ought to be at least recognized, used for introspection, as we continue to move forward.

If all anyone wants to read about amateur radio is "light and happy" news, then stick to the self-serving propaganda on ARRL.COM. I respect that Fred has a business to cultivate, however hope for, expect, a more "fair, balanced, and UNAFRAID" style of journalism on The Zed.

73 de John WØPV

 

N6XMW, seems like he is pretty busy on the bands too. A very interesting person!

 

A very, very cool article! Thanks for passing this one along, Richard.

Love the Judge's rope tensioning spool on his QRZ.COM page...

73,

Jeff WN1MB
Winsted CT
http://alienjeff.net

 

Tack pianos and Hallicrafters rigs from kits.. .Gee, stereotype enforced here

 

I am of the opinion that things have reversed: the ARRL is doing more 'newsworthy' stuff nowadays, filling in the gap that Zed has created with the new thrust of the 'visual' front page, and editorial staff in hand. Zed 'news' is really, mostly, a ham 'youtube', which is fine if you take it just that way. It should be re-named "AMATEUR RADIO FEATURES", or given the influx of non-ham pieces,"RADIO FEATURES". MO, your may differ, and probably does.

73
Chip W1YW

 

The irony is that the FBI piece on Paddock (senior) was in ARRL's QST in 1970....cold, hard, fact.

Many hams 'north of fifty' have this warm and fuzzy view of ham radio. Sure, its there, but the unseemly side is also non-trivial. Reaction to deny it is just that: denial.

Of course, much of this is a reflection of America in 2017. Last time I remember it being this crazy was, oh, 1968-1971.

73
Chip W1YW

 

Chip,

I concur there seems to have been an editorial policy change VERY recently on ARRL.COM, which has always been quite relevant to amateur radio. Still a bit too Pollyanna-ish for me, but now even more unique, cutting-edge and objective. I read it for those reasons frequently.

It's unfortunate the ARRL online forums, hardly used at all, or some other method, are not linked directly to those front page stories to allow a convenient way to allow reader comment and discussion of those individual topics. This is a powerful strength QRZ.COM News and other forums retain.

I'm often surprised when the ARRL Letter is cross-posted into Zed News there is not more comment activity generated. Perhaps its intimidating because the Letters contain a long list of an entire weeks worth of ARRL posts.

73, John WØPV

 

I imagine one can take a cynical view of the law: populated by history, psychology and theater majors(the theatrics of litigators is often no accident), thus making someone with a technical background out as some sort of freak or Einstein.

Nah.

This is a smart guy who took advantage of the American opportunity and chose to make impartial decisions by becoming a judge. Much respect for that! Tech is lucky to have him playing Samson. But his ham background surprises me not at all-- why shouldn't we expect this?

73
Chip W1YW

 

That was a great read, just goes to show you, don't mess with us old guys, we know a thing or two

 

That was then, now he tells Oracle to stuff it