OK, your favorite hamfest was canceled due to COVID-19 concerns! How about joining 21,000 of your closest ham friends for a virtual convention. ARRL-sanctioned, and the brainchild of Eric Guth 4Z1UG, the creator and producer of the excellent QSO Today podcasts, invites everyone to what looks to be a fantastic event. 75 speakers, dozens of vendors/exhibitors and an agenda of talks about many, many aspects of our hobby will be available for 30 days after the event. Registration is free and there are even prizes at the end of the show! For all the details you need, and to register, visit https://www.qsotodayhamexpo.com/ today! This is the first of its kind that I know of, and could be the beginning of many more to come. DISCLAIMER: I was interviewed by Eric a couple of years ago for the podcast, and we've become friends. I have also volunteered to be a docent (moderator) for the Sunday morning program. Otherwise, I have no pecuniary interest whatsoever in the event. I'm just hoping it will be informative, entertaining and a success! 73 DE N2GJ, Gerry Jurrens (Albuquerque, NM USA)
First, I am one of the 21,000. We all are looking forward to this. IMO---here's a couple of bits of 'innovation' trivia. 1) The beginning of large 'virtual' crowd events actually started a few years back with some of the 'techno/rave' people who did the equivalent of a virtual Woodstock. I'm not into that stuff, but its important to acknowledge origins; 2) virtual hamfests are likely here to stay, but they just won't replace real hamfests (in case anyone is wondering). THERE IS A REASON why we go to hamfests. We are social animals who normally don't see each other-- yet communicate with each other. Hamfests are the excuse to execute our 'prime directive'. 3) Its more likely that virtual hamfests will eat into MAGAZINE markets. Why? Because the number and variety of talks are not replicated in a physical hamfest, but are in magazines. And the easier one to access of the two is....? Furthermore, magazines depend on ads, and that money will be spent , or at east divided, by virtual hamfests for vendors. They will spend their money where their customers are. 4) Dire events force many innovations to get critical traction, as is happening here. The best recent example (19 years ago) was 9/11. Horrible as it was, the changes in (what is now) TSA rules made it impractical to bring film cameras--and film-- through airports. This directly spurred adoption of digital photography. IOW it should be obvious how virtual hamfests fit in with our ham activities. Some parts you may like, others may have the impact of watching Gilligan's Island reruns. Even if just curious, you should check out, IMO, this interesting new innovation for us hams! 73 Chip W1YW
I like it. I think the prize pool should be random, however. You would have to stay pinned to your computer and do as many activities as possible, all weekend long, for the best chance to win something.
I scanned the list of speakers. I didn't see anything that interested me. A majority of it looks to be targeting nubes. "Is 3 dB Worth a Divorce? - Glen Johnson, W0GJ" kinda makes me wonder what kind of "hook" that title is. There's an hour and a half interview on his QRZ page, but I just don't have the patience to sit through it to try to figure it out. And I can't imagine what the vendors plan on doing that's different than what's on their web sites other than maybe offering hamfest discounts. The other thing I'm being cautious about is all the information you have to enter to "register" for a ticket. How much more spam is that going to generate in my email? I think I'll just watch Gilligan's Island reruns and pass on this one. Edit: And wait and see what kind of comments are generated about it afterwards...
I felt the same scanning the list of speakers. How to solder should get QRZ people all in a dander. Looks like it takes you to youtube videos and webpages. Held my interest for about 10 minutes. If it was going to rain all weekend I might have a different attitude. Sunny and mid 80's here, I'm sure not sitting in front of a computer. Gosh if they just had this through the week... "virtual" doesn't have to be on a weekend. Carry on.
Waiting for the doors to open in 4 minutes. The closer it gets, the less excited I seem to be. Spending hours in front of a computer is what I did for the last 21 years of my work life...retirement has changed my desire to that for any length of time. Time to go...the crowd is starting to shuffle to the doors. Social distancing is being ignored. Crunch time has arrived. Gotta mask up. Regards, -Bruce
I was quite interested until I read that the giveaways were only point based and not random drawings at the end like normal hamfests have. I do not have the time to stay in front of my computer following a list of things to do to gain points to try and be one of the top 5 of 21,000 people to win a prize. Totally the WRONG way to do it. I will not be attending.
Gave up after 10 minutes... My browser turned to a sloth! It seemed every vendor either went to Youtube or the company web page. The prize arrangement was a horrible idea. Going through that all weekend? I think not. Gud luk in the contest!
I won't hate on anyone wanting to try new approaches to HamFests in the COVID-19 world. However, the prize structure is highly suspect.
It seemed odd that you look at the "point structure" and then the leaderboard with people having thousands of points the minute the door opens? It's a nice dashboard to take you to youtube videos and webpages. Nothing really "virtual" about it execpt maybe the 1990's style chat rooms.
The 'prize structure' is copied from large, successful trade shows. There, you get your 'ticket' scanned (once)when you go to a booth and those with the most scans are weighted most eligible for certain prizes.. Obviously a virtual version has some time-oriented modifications. Look: I know we've been locked in our basements for 6 months, but don't you think we should be aware of how the real world works first before attacking a 'standard of practice'? 73 Chip W1YW
I think I just did. Should I have typed slower? Here let me try again... It's a nice dashboard to take you to youtube videos and webpages. Nothing really "virtual" about it execpt maybe the 1990's style chat rooms.
