In the latest issue of QST Magazine. It was suggested that as a Prepper / Amateur Radio Operator, that you should be willing to offer your personally generated electricity to others for free so they can recharge their cell phones in an emergency.
This bothered me to the point of where I had to read the article again.
The ARRL said that a GOOD HAM will give away their precious power - FREE - to those that are too cheap, lazy, stupid - to plan ahead for an emergency.
Back when I was a child, and MA BELL was the only game in town, everyone had some type of telephone service. My family was connected through a system called THE PARTY LINE..
The phone rang with two rings for the one neighbor, with 3 rings for my mom's house and 4 rings for my grandparents house. Our Nosy neighbor would oftentimes pick up their telephone and listen while you were trying to make a private telephone call.
This lead my parents to get a semi private line - just themselves and my grandparents.
We had this telephone line until the late 1980's when my grandfather died and I moved out of the house and my parents had the line disconnected.
I still subscribe to the Verizon - private line service ( copper), I don't know of anyone that still has a party line or any reductions still offered on the bill for maintaining the party line.
My parents however has gotten more sophisticated and has moved up to the Comcast bundled service.. A all in one package that costs my dad around $100 a month!
When the power goes out, so too does the telephone, along with the cable television.
At that point, the cable company has about one hour to load their trucks, haul a generator up to the green box on the telephone pole and connect it to the generator.
By this time, all data on the computers that were not saved are lost, the router needs to be logged back into the system and the telephone will work as long as Comcast keeps gasoline in the generator.
The even more sophisticated people has shut off all of their home services and has moved everything to their cell phones.. With most younger people tied via an umbilical cord to their social media to their cell phones, when the cell phone battery goes dead, or more importantly when the cell phone tower is blown away in a tornado, washed away in a flood, or is blown up by terrorists or looses power for more then a couple of days and the batteries goes dead and the generator runs out of fuel - they are left with no phone service.
The few remaining pay phones - kept available for the Amish community are their only lifeline to the outside world.
It grates me that the largest amateur radio association in the world would have the audacity to suggest to me that I should have to provide free power to those that thinks that someone else should have to take care of them in an emergency and that they themselves should not have to provide for themselves and should live off the fat of the land - or live The Life of Riley.
I'm wondering what your opinions are on this subject?
This bothered me to the point of where I had to read the article again.
The ARRL said that a GOOD HAM will give away their precious power - FREE - to those that are too cheap, lazy, stupid - to plan ahead for an emergency.
Back when I was a child, and MA BELL was the only game in town, everyone had some type of telephone service. My family was connected through a system called THE PARTY LINE..
The phone rang with two rings for the one neighbor, with 3 rings for my mom's house and 4 rings for my grandparents house. Our Nosy neighbor would oftentimes pick up their telephone and listen while you were trying to make a private telephone call.
This lead my parents to get a semi private line - just themselves and my grandparents.
We had this telephone line until the late 1980's when my grandfather died and I moved out of the house and my parents had the line disconnected.
I still subscribe to the Verizon - private line service ( copper), I don't know of anyone that still has a party line or any reductions still offered on the bill for maintaining the party line.
My parents however has gotten more sophisticated and has moved up to the Comcast bundled service.. A all in one package that costs my dad around $100 a month!
When the power goes out, so too does the telephone, along with the cable television.
At that point, the cable company has about one hour to load their trucks, haul a generator up to the green box on the telephone pole and connect it to the generator.
By this time, all data on the computers that were not saved are lost, the router needs to be logged back into the system and the telephone will work as long as Comcast keeps gasoline in the generator.
The even more sophisticated people has shut off all of their home services and has moved everything to their cell phones.. With most younger people tied via an umbilical cord to their social media to their cell phones, when the cell phone battery goes dead, or more importantly when the cell phone tower is blown away in a tornado, washed away in a flood, or is blown up by terrorists or looses power for more then a couple of days and the batteries goes dead and the generator runs out of fuel - they are left with no phone service.
The few remaining pay phones - kept available for the Amish community are their only lifeline to the outside world.
It grates me that the largest amateur radio association in the world would have the audacity to suggest to me that I should have to provide free power to those that thinks that someone else should have to take care of them in an emergency and that they themselves should not have to provide for themselves and should live off the fat of the land - or live The Life of Riley.
I'm wondering what your opinions are on this subject?
