I would like to know what everyones thoughts are on have on-the-air meetings (meetings on the 2 meter radios on a local frequency). My opinion is that it is ok to have them once in a while when there is nothing major that needs to be talked about or anything that needs to be voted on.
Major things that need to be talked about in a actual meeting would include speditures of a large sum of money, activites at the club, and the meeting just before and after Field Day.

(01-13-2010 05:16 PM)KC2RPP Wrote:  I would like to know what everyones thoughts are on have on-the-air meetings (meetings on the 2 meter radios on a local frequency). My opinion is that it is ok to have them once in a while when there is nothing major that needs to be talked about or anything that needs to be voted on.
Major things that need to be talked about in a actual meeting would include speditures of a large sum of money, activites at the club, and the meeting just before and after Field Day.

I'm against it!

Ed - KB2KHR

That was good thinking Guy to put that option there. The government requests that we have our meetings in a publicly accessible "forum". However the rules don't specify exactly what is not publicly accessible. If a meeting was held online or on the air, certainly efforts could be made for public access to the topics and discussions. But what about participation? Truly an on-the-air meeting is restrictive. Now, what about utilizing new and inexpensive technologies to allow online interaction AND VOTING. The "Snowbird" membership and anyone abroad (including DX-peditions) would then be able to participate, even when the weather is prohibitive. What form this takes depends on the efforts of those members who care to do some research and can present it to the rest of us.

Just a subject note: The Black River Valley ARC is having On-Air meetings currently until the weather permits normal driving again. No one seems to mind.

I say have them on 2-meter SIMPLEX...maybe 147.500?
Most folks really don't realize the distance that SIMPLEX
covers. Generally, 25 watts is good for about 15 or so miles.

I find it ridicules that people 2-miles away from each other have
to use a machine with a 100 mile footprint!

Inevitably technology will catch up with us and we may find ourselves taking a hint from the Distance Learning Center at JCC and using web conference protocol during our meetings. In the mean time, we Hams might find that the tools exist to put our meetings online with repeater access for licensed members to ask questions via IRLP. A question can be posed to the group via the repeater, any direct responses can be sent back through the repeater while the discussion can be heard online. - And yes, we already have the web feed figured out!