Several points:
1. Field Day is not a contest, it is an activity.
2. In reference to point 1, logs are not scored or checked by the ARRL, so rules such as only one QSO per FM bird don’t work except for the people who only make one FM QSO per bird. The rule can’t work because it isn’t enforced.
3. Making more than a single FM QSO per bird but not including them in your scoring does little to help with the mess on the FM birds during Field Day. One is still violating the rule and adding to the chaos, perhaps with good intentions, but still...
4. The linear satellites are a much more efficient use of satellite resources than the FM birds. Field Day is no exception to this rule, but, due to the concentration of activity the problem is exaggerated. We should expend some great effort during the rest of the year to get people to use the linear birds and to move from FM to linear sats. Those of us proficient on the linear birds should avoid the FM birds during FD and encourage others to do the same. “Here, let me show you how to make straight forward QSOes without all this mess.”
5. Yes, I realize that perhaps the FM birds utilize the user resources more effectively, at least during under utilized or only slightly over utilized conditions, offering people with simple rigs to get on the sats, but I think it important in the long run to encourage people to move off the FM birds to the linear birds. I understand the economic arguments against this, but, especially on Field Day, the reasons to favor linear sats over the FM birds is very clear, and the rest of the year is the same, but perhaps with less intense examples.
6. What happens on the FM birds is an example of “The Tragedy of the Commons”, a scientific, economic, and sociological principle about what happens to shared resources.
Every Field Day satellite operator should read the following before operating the FM birds on Field Day:
< https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons >
< https://archive.org/details/twolecturesonch00lloygoog >
< http://science.sciencemag.org/content/sci/162/3859/1243.full.pdf >
You should probably have learned this in college, but I have heard that this concept is falling out of favor and not being taught with as much fervor as it once was.
7. There isn’t anything in the solution to the Field Day FM satellite situation that we didn’t learn from our families, in pre-school, kindergarten, Sunday school, Saturday school, catechism, or interacting with our neighbors, both as kids and adults. If your mother was a ham, what would she say about your behavior on the FM birds? Yes, my mom was a ham, albeit briefly.
8. If you know someone who made more than one QSO per FM satellite, you might want to gently remind them that their doin so takes away the ability of others to use the satellite and accomplishes nothing tangible for them. Peer interaction is a good way to deal with this problem.
These comments are intended to be general and not target any individual. I am responding to the ongoing discussion on the AMSAT BB, which inspired these comments, so it may seem like I am criticizing particular individuals, some who have contributed to this discussion, but I am not. Those who have written have inspired my thoughts on this topic and I understand almost all of the arguments made. I sympathize with many of them, but that won’t solve the problem.
Operate responsibly and share the resources wisely. Listen for the weak ones. - Duffey KK6MC
James Duffey KK6MC Cedar Crest NM