SUMMARY:

This posting describes my 6 month effort 
to produce a list of "Most Wanted Grids" for vhf
contest planning, dx-peditions, and rover planning,
in cooperation with the ARRL.

Producing this list requires logs, and the easiest place
to get these was from the contests and VUCC awards
that we pay for through our dues to the ARRL.
Other benefits would also be available from analysis
of contest logs over a long period, such as time of
day, and trends over years and with sunspots 
(see further below).

Contacting the ARRL I found that the logs are
not available for analysis to prevent new contesters 
from learning from winners and thus decreasing the
winner's advantage (letters from Kennamer 
19-21 Oct 1998 below). 

I was accused of wanting the logs for self interest 
but Kennamer himself didn't answer my request 
to declare himself free of conflict of interest 
in setting contest policy. Attempting to see 
out if there was a conflict of interest problem
here from another of our employees at the ARRL, 
I found that they are required as part of their 
conditions of employment to not reveal conflicts 
of interest in others (see the "good conscience" 
letter of Henderson 21 Oct 98).

My request for the procedure to alter this policy
or to find how it was set were met with stonewalling
and eventually with declarations that the ARRL was 
not legally able to release the logs. This was shown 
not to be true in a letter from the League's own 
legal counsell, Chris Imlay.

The following posting is long (about 1250 lines). 
The letters from Kennamer are the most revealing. 


Joe NA3T
jmack (at) wm7d (dot) net


-------------------------------------------------------

BACKGROUND for "MOST WANTED GRID" PROJECT

I (NA3T) am presently involved in an effort to 
produce a "Most Wanted Grid" list for North America. 
In Europe this list is produced at the end 
of the VHF DX season (ie in winter) 
( http://fs1.ilk.de/sites/gap/mwanted.htm ), 
to plan next year's summer vacations and 
dx-peditions.

I run an azimuthal equidistant map server 
( http://www.wm7d (dot) net/azproj.shtml ) which produces 
on-line great circle maps centered at your QTH. 
The software is GPL'ed  and is downloadable from 
the server. I used this server to produce the first 
"Most Wanted Grids" maps from this European list  
( http://www.wm7d (dot) net/az_proj/images/wanted_cc.png ).
Initially I could not see an easy way to do the same 
thing in North America, as there was no person here 
acting as the central authority for grid information.

This changed in summer '98 when a group of hams (mainly
rovers, with most energy coming apparently from N9RLA) 
on the wsvhf reflector expressed an interest 
in having such a list. 

The data for such a list is already available. Our 
employees at the ARRL have been accumulating contest 
and award (eg VUCC) logs for at least half a century 
(possibly 80yrs). The knowledge of propagation gained 
from ham operation is one of the justifications used by 
the League to the public (==FCC) for continued access to 
bandspace. We pay for these logs and the contests by 
providing the money for salaries and materials to organise 
our contests. The logs contain propagation information 
through many sunspot cycles, and track the expansion 
of ham activity into the higher frequency bands and 
new modes of operation (field portable and rovers), 
time of day and time of year. The VUCC award logs 
contain information of grid squares worked by the 
most determined of the VHF operators and the knowledge 
of grids rare in these logs would be most useful to 
those planning grid dx-peditions. Rare band openings
such as occured in the Sep 98 VHF QSO party when one 
station worked VUCC on 10 bands in a few hours, could 
be tracked and requests for information from the public,
as occured on this VHF reflector after the recent 
Leonids meteor shower, could be answered.

Analysing the data in logs is trivial. Anyone with a 
PC at home can install a GPL'ed fully functional SQL 
database and plot worked grids 
( http://www.myhome.ch/hb9dbm/grid_map.gif ) 
or their contest logs automatically (eg 
http://www.qsl.net/~g4cla , maps at 
http://www.turnstile.freeserve.co.uk/radio/plcg/stats/statidx.htm ).
With contest logs being submitted electronically it
would be a simple matter to produce similar maps for 
each grid as a function of time of day or for each 
contest. Older logs submitted as hard copy would be 
more difficult to incorporate, but with some effort 
from interested people, they could be analysed too.

This clearly was a project that the League would
be interested in. All of the propagation information 
that they collect would now be readily available for 
anyone to inspect in a quantifiable form. The
information learned in contests instead of sitting
in filing cabinets at the League unused would now
be available to the ham community.

I contacted N9RLA ( http://www.qsl.net/n9rla/ )
and we agreed to put an effort into this and 
keep each other informed of progress. Initially 
the effort would be directed to produce 
information for Rovers: frequency of working grids 
on each band for each contest, and time of contacts 
(for those operators who can't work 24hrs or who 
cannot work the whole contest). Rovers operate 
under stressful, high noise conditions and provide
welcome grid multipliers to home stations working
in armchair comfort in quiet, temperature regulated 
rooms. Rovers have enough to worry about without having 
to rediscover the already known information
about where to be and when to be there.
 
I started writing software to automatically analyse 
electronically submitted logs and plot grid square 
information. I also was kindly provided with the logs 
from several of the top contest stations on the 
east coast and constructed proof-of-principle maps  
(see http://www.wm7d (dot) net/azproj.shtml 
under "new features" for the Sep 98 version, or
http://www.wm7d (dot) net/az_proj/az_html/azproj_help.shtml#wanted_grids -
not all of the information I have is on this page yet).
The map server will be able to produce worked-grid maps
on-line by contest, band and/or time of day.

I initially contacted Billy Lunt at the ARRL to obtain
the logs (contest and VUCC). I explained who I was, 
what I wanted and what I was going to do with 
the logs. This was about Aug '98.

I knew of Billy through his efforts to update 
the EME contest a few years ago and talking to
him at conferences, when some people were interested
in changing the date(s) of the EME contest. This came
at a time when VE3ONT was operating the Canadian
Govt radiotelescope for the contest and was providing
contacts within the range of a modestly equiped
contest station. VE3ONT publicised its logs and
operating schedules and members of the team went to 
meetings and conferences to give advance warning so 
that all interested would be ready. (This provided
my initial impetus to get on EME.) Billy wrote 
to all who had submitted logs for previous EME 
contests, requesting comments. People wondered if
all the conflicting requirements for the EME contest
(the moon had to be at high lattitude for the 
Scandinavians but this gave a narrow window for the
relatively few people in the southern hemisphere, the
weather is not conducive to working on coax connectors
high up on towers at night in some parts of the world 
in December...), were being best met. As it turns out, 
everyone realised that the matter had been addressed
about 10yrs before and the reasons for doing whatever
was being done then, applied just as much now. Billy
presented a report at a conference a year later and 
I was pleased with the process for formulating and
modifying policies for this contest; it was done 
in the open, there was plenty of time for comment 
and at the end everyone agreed with the conclusions. 

Subsequent to my first e-mail to Billy about the
"Most Wanted Grid" (MWG) project, I contacted 
others in the contest branch. The Organizational 
Chart and the people I contacted in the Contest 
Branch (with e-mail addresses), starting at the 
Top and working its way down (as explained by 
N1ND) is as follows:

The ARRL Board - The Division Directors  
(Board President is K6ROD Rod Stafford and 
John Kanode N4MM, n4mm (at) arrl (dot) org, the Roanoke 
Division Director)
Executive Vice President - Dave Sumner K1ZZ, k1zz (at) arrl (dot) org
Membership Services Manager - Bill Kennamer K5FUV, bkennamer (at) arrl (dot) org
Contest Branch Manager - Dan Henderson N1ND, dhenderson (at) arrl (dot) org
Contest Branch Assistant - Billy Lunt KR1R, blunt (at) arrl (dot) org 

as well I contacted 

Legal Counsel - Chris Imlay W3KD, cimlay (at) arrl (dot) org

and cc:ed mail to N9RLA (dlevans (at) mail (dot) hsonline (dot) net), W3EP
(w3ep (at) arrl (dot) org) and a few other hams who I wanted to know
about what I was doing.

who am I?: 
I (na3t) have been doing electronics/ham radio since 
1957, have helped with various VE activities as a 
member of the region 3 VEC (Laurel Amateur Radio 
Club), was responsible along with W3GF (sorry,  
may have forgotten the call), for restoring the 
missing Samuel F.B. Morse historic marker in 
Laurel, Maryland in time for 100th anniversary of 
the "What God Hath Wraught" message. With nv3z, until 
I moved to NC 3yrs ago, did vhf contests, one time 
winning the limited-multi for 3 area (1996 I think),
worked EME on 2m and 432 (designing and constructing 
the antennas for 432). Am co-author (with nv3z)
of the AZ_PROJ software running the map server.

Following is a digest of e-mail exchanges between 
myself and various of our employees at the League. 
(Full e-mail exchanges are available on request.) 
Comments added by me for this posting look like this

[Comment.....
.....NA3T] 

In my initial exchanges with Billy (which I have 
not kept) I found that the logs were not available 
for "reasons of privacy" and because the League 
did not have the resources to provide the 
information. 

I then decided to see if I could set
up a database myself without the Leagues help.


---------------------------------------------------------------

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Joseph Mack [mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov]
> Sent: Saturday, September 05, 1998 9:27 AM
> To: blunt (at) arrl (dot) org
> Subject: request for consistent format for contest logs
> 
> 
> Dear Bill,
> 	I am assembling a database of contest logs for
> the AZ_PROJ website ( http://www.wm7d (dot) net/azproj.shtml )
> so that people can plot the density of contacts and contestants
> for any contest. The idea is so that rovers, and moutain
> toppers can plan their expeditions. 
> 
> 	The problem I have is that the logs are not easily
> parseable, there are many different formats and they are not
> database ready. I can't imagine that the ARRL checks any
> of the logs that are submitted for contests with the Babel
> of formats that are used.
> 
> 	I was wondering if the ARRL would be up for 
> sponsoring/promoting a standard contest log format?
> I would be quite happy to be on a committee to
> set/maintain/work on this.
> 
> 	At the moment, seeing the little movement
> I've had on a similar effort with people who maintain
> beacon lists, and the lack of interest people have
> in standard bumper heights on cars, that this initiative
> may not find any fertile ground, but I thought at least
> that you might be interested to know that I
> would find such a standard helpful.
> 
> 	Thanks Joe NA3T
> 
> 

-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph Mack [mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov]
Sent: Wednesday, September 16, 1998 9:11 PM
To: Lunt, Billy, KR1R
Subject: RE: request for consistent format for contest logs


On Wed, 16 Sep 1998, Lunt, Billy,  KR1R wrote:

> Joe,
> 
> There is already an ARRL Standard File Format for contest entries. You
> can find it on our Web site.


I've found a different one for each contest eg dxlog.pdf and vuelog.pdf
Is this what you mean?

I can see from the number of different contests and the things each
one is aimed at that a single form for all of them is impossible.

Thanks 

Joe NA3T

-----------------------------------------------------------------
From blunt (at) arrl (dot) org Tue Oct 20 19:04:58 1998
Date: Thu, 17 Sep 1998 11:31:20 -0400
From: "Lunt, Billy,  KR1R" 
To: Joseph Mack 
Subject: RE: request for consistent format for contest logs

Joe,

No, you weren't looking in the right place. These web site sure get
confusing.

You can find the ARRL Standard File Format at:

	http://www.arrl (dot) org/contests/fileform.html

73,
Billy Lunt, KR1R

----------------------------------------------------------------

[Comment...
I realised that trying to get all the logs myself 
or a statistically significant fraction 
of what the ARRL already had was futile. 
I decided to find out why I couldn't get
the logs I'd paid to have collected.
I was interested in finding the policies for 
the vhf contests and how they had been developed 
over the lifetime of the contests.

By not having contest logs available, the 
League did not digest contest information and
would be hard put to justify its claims that hams 
learnt about propagation from hamming. 
It would be reasonable to expect winners of contests 
to be able to publically justify their score and for
the winning logs be open to inspection by the people 
who give them the awards (League members).

The lack of League resources was not a problem 
as no work would be involved on the part of
the League if the data was submitted 
electronically. I asked about the "reasons
of privacy". 
...NA3T]

--------------------------------------------------------------------

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Joseph Mack [mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov]
> Sent: Sunday, September 20, 1998 9:27 PM
> To: Lunt, Billy, KR1R
> Cc: mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov; Michael Katzmann; w3ep (at) arrl (dot) org; Mark
> Subject: Privacy of Contest logs
> 
> 
> Dear Billy,
> 	I wrote to you about a month ago trying to find
> information for rovers to plan grid-DXpeditions. I was hoping
> to find info from the ARRL about VUCC awards or contest
> logs. You were not able to give me this info citing among
> other things, privacy concerns.
> 
> 	I have since started talking to the high scoring
> contesters to get this information to find that they all
> regard their logs as proprietary and will not show them
> to anyone under any circumstances.
>

[Comment...
Later after receiving acceptable evidence that raw log
entries would not be made available to their competition,
some of the top scorers, who I was personally aquainted with,
were happy to make their logs available for analysis
...NA3T]

 
> 	I would find this reasonable if amateur radio were
> a cuthroat business environment where success depended upon
> small advances in the state of the art which couldn't
> be shared with the competetion. However ham radio is 
> a cooperative venture, a hobby with no rewards beyond
> recognition by your peers and self satisfaction. Scoring
> in competitions is on the honor system (there is no way
> of verifying almost anyone's score from what I can see).
> In such a system the person claiming a score should be
> able to publically defend his score by some mechanism
> such as having the logs publically available. 
> 
> 	There seems to be 2 parts to the problem
> 
> 1. some contestants regard their logs as proprietary
> 
> 2. The ARRL agrees with them.
> 
> 	I cannot see any benifit to ham radio that comes
> from this arrangement. I'm not asking them to reveal their
> strategy, their "secret" or the amount of money/time/effort 
> that went into their work. I'm just asking that if they
> claim a score, that they are prepared to show the data to
> the hams who are expected to  accept their claimed score.
> 
> VE3ONT at the Algonquin Radio Astronomy telescope pulicised
> their EME logs, so that people would know what to do better the
> next year. I imagine the same principle would work in
> terrestrial contacts
> 
> Perhaps contestants are worried that others will figure out from
> their logs how to do better, and perhaps last years winners
> will not have such a big margin next year and the year
> after they may not be the winner and will have to figure 
> out what everyone else now knows that they don't know.
> 
> Certainly I am trying to find out information to help rovers
> plan their trips and get better scores (or have a more enjoyable
> time anyhow). I expect the fixed stations will get better scores
> out of it too
> 
> Let's say this is the case and is why logs are kept private.
> I think it would be reasonable for the ham community to say
> 
> "This is the way it is: we're here to make ham radio
> better, for everyone, and if you figure out something to
> make it better, we expect you to tell us. Otherwise
> ham radio doesn't improve and we'll be left in dust
> and there won't be any ham radio any more."
> 
> I assume the ARRL has put a lot of thought into this so
> could you tell me why it is so much better for ham radio
> for the data in logs and awards to be held private than to be 
> publically available?
> 
> Joe NA3T
> http://www.wm7d (dot) net/azproj.shtml
> 
> --
> Joseph Mack mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov
> 

[Comment...
Nothing, so a month later
...NA3T]


-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph Mack [mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov]
Sent: Monday, October 12, 1998 11:32 AM
To: Lunt, Billy, KR1R
Subject: RE: Privacy of Contest logs



Hi Billy,
        Any reply from Bill Kennamer yet?

        Thanks Joe


> Joe,
> 
> I'm forwarding your questions to Bill Kennamer. I believe 
> he is the one that answered your original request.
> 
> 73,
> Billy Lunt, KR1R
> 
> 
>


 
-------------------------------------------------------------------

From blunt (at) arrl (dot) org Tue Oct 20 19:05:49 1998
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 12:19:43 -0400
From: "Lunt, Billy,  KR1R" 
To: Joseph Mack 
Cc: "Kennamer, Bill,  K5FUV" 
Subject: RE: Privacy of Contest logs


I'll forward your question again.

73,
Billy Lunt, KR1R


----------------------------------------------------------------


From mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov Tue Oct 20 19:06:53 1998
Date: Mon, 19 Oct 1998 14:06:58 -0400 (EDT)
From: Joseph Mack 
To: "Kennamer, Bill,  K5FUV" 
Cc: "Kanode, John (Dir, Roanoke)" , mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov,
    dlevans (at) mail (dot) hsonline (dot) net, michael (at) ieee (dot) org
Subject: Re: Privacy of Contest Logs

On Mon, 19 Oct 1998, Kennamer, Bill,  K5FUV wrote:

> Dear Joe,
> 
> 
> More than a few competitors take their contest logs quite seriously, as
> you found when you tried to obtain logs from them. They regard these
> logs as proprietary information, based upon their experiences in
> learning how to compete and win. I can agree with this logic, as there
> is much information that would remove a competitive advantage gained
> from several years of experience in contesting.
> 
> This would be equivalent to allowing NASCAR competitors to see the
> winning engine after the race, or for a NFL team to give other teams its
> playbook. Information such as this gained by experience is not something
> someone wants to give away lightly.

The NASCAR driver wins by getting his car accross the line first, not for
showing the engine privately to the judges.
The whole race is viewable by other competitors and spectators.

Since a ham radio contest is a points event, a decathalon might be a
better analogy. The other competitors and spectators
are allowed to see each place in the event where points are scored and
to know the score gained at each stage. I'm just asking to see the
entries that people use to claim their score.

We can analogize to death and not really address the real issue of
what is best for ham radio. 

You have addressed the issue of protecting the interests of the
winners of the contests. What may be best for the winners may
not be best for ham radio. It is my understanding that ham
radio is a cooperative self educating training organisation and
that the League sponsors contests to enhance what it regards as
good features of ham radio, so that hams will be better at 
whatever we all have agreed hams should be better at. 
Magazines, journals and books for hams are designed to
impart information about every aspect of ham radio to
the reader.

In a contest is to the advantage of the winners not to let anyone 
else have information about their entries. There are other places 
where the holders of information useful to others want to keep 
it secret. Examples are competitors in business, physician's treatment
records, drug trials, safety records for products. None of these are
cooperative ventures. 

Just as clearly the rest of the people who participate are
put at a disadvantage as you acknowledge. People such as myself who 
would like to analyse the results of a contest so that others can better
compete in the next contest are unable to do anything. This is not a good
thing for ham radio. It would be better for instance if rovers had same
the information the ARRL has about the contest to plan their next
contest/grid-expedition. 

I have asked for logs for VUCC and similar awards to find that they
are not available from the ARRL for privacy reasons too. What is the
reasoning behind that? Are we trying to prevent other people from learning
what they know so that they have to reinvent everything to get their VUCC
award too? 

Since ham radio is a cooperative venture, and if the winners of
contests know something that the rest of us don't then, for the
betterment of ham radio, it seems imperative that some mechanism should
be available for hams to learn what the winners know, otherwise contests
will be an agent for fostering non-cooperation rather than
cooperation between hams.

I would interested to know what the ARRL contest committes is trying to
promote with our contests, and how you think contests fulfill promote
those goals. I assume this is a matter that has been publically discussed
and I am not aware of ins and outs of it, as the consequences of your
policy are against the cooperative basis of ham radio.

Thanks Joe NA3T

[Comment...
I take _my_ logs seriously too
the entries in them should be available for public 
inspection if I wish to claim credit for them.
....NA3T]
----------------------------------------------

Date: Mon, 19 Oct 1998 16:40:41 -0400 (EDT)
From: Joseph Mack 
To: "Kennamer, Bill,  K5FUV" 
Cc: "Kanode, John (Dir, Roanoke)" , dlevans (at) hsonline (dot) net,
    michael (at) ieee (dot) org
Subject: RE: Privacy of Contest Logs

On Mon, 19 Oct 1998, Kennamer, Bill,  K5FUV wrote:

> Dear Joe,
> 
> I repeat, the analogy of the NASCAR situation does apply, because it's
> the knowledge of how to build a better engine/chassis that puts the car
> across the finish line first in front of the crowd.

In a cooperative venture,
anything that hams learn as part of being a ham, particularly
using money contributed by members (eg in a contest funded by
members) should be returned to the members/ham community.


> As I read your statement, you are looking to the contest results in
> order to better your achievements. 

That's a limited understanding of the matter. I want hams to ham
cooperatively and to use what we do to better ham radio. My immediate
goal is to draw maps so that rovers who have a hard enough time
of it all already, have a reasonable chance of having a good trip
and making good contacts or can pick a good grid to go for a 
grid-expedition. I'm trying to foster rovering. I myself 
don't rover and haven't operated in a contest for several years. 
The acheivement I will get out this is to get the information out to
others and you are absolutely right, I do want to better this 
achievement. 

> This is the competitive advantage
> that others have built over time, and which they are reluctant to give
> away. I can't blame them.

Someone had to find out about the F2 layer too. If they'd kept
that quiet, they may have a lot of plaques on their wall, but
hamradio would be very much poorer for it.

> 
> There is no directive to disclose this information.

Is there a directive to not disclose this information?

I asked you in my last e-mail

>>I would interested to know what the ARRL contest committes is trying to
>>promote with our contests, and how you think contests fulfill promote
>>those goals. I assume this is a matter that has been publically discussed
>>and I am not aware of ins and outs of it, as the consequences of your
>>policy are against the cooperative basis of ham radio.

you did not reply to this

this is the main point of the matter: how is ham radio best served
I would like to know the policies here. All I know so far is that
there is no directive to distribute VUCC and contest logs.


> Also, the time
> involved in doing so (can you imagine how many requests we might have to
> service, all at a cost to the League?) makes this proposition cost
                                ^^^^^^^
> prohibitive

you mean us don't you? _I_ pay for these contests.

I too expect that this would be a popular service.
The distribution of the information is a different issue
than the availability. Once our staff announce the 
availability of logs, I expect that the members 
will be able to handle the distibution of information with
minimal trouble. If no-one steps forward, then your fears 
and those of the winners the fears will prove to be unfounded.

Joe NA3T
---------------------------------------------------------
[Comment...
at that stage n9rla who had been cc'ed on 
the matter stepped in making the following comments
...NA3T]



From dlevans (at) mail (dot) hsonline (dot) net Wed Nov  4 20:49:19 1998
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 1998 00:57:36 -0000
From: Dan  Evans 
To: Joseph Mack 
Subject: Re: Privacy of Contest Logs

Hi Joe

Sounds like you're being 'stone-walled'.  I might suggest you recomend the
ARRL poll thier members on if they would object to the info contained in
their submitted logs being used for a 'positive' ham reason.  They might
even want to consider making a privacy disclaimer on the contest log summary
form:

for example add a line such as:

May we use the info in your log to promote ham radio?   Y/N

Just a suggestion.  I know it would slow things down, but it would be nice
to leave the decision up to the individual.  And I think you would probably
see the vast majority of contestors OK the release of the info.  I know I've
never met a contestor that would 'with-hold' any information on how to be a
better contestor.

73 and good luck with the beauracrats!

Dan, N9RLA

-----------------------------------------------------------

[Comment...
a good idea - I tried again
....NA3T]



-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph Mack [mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov] 
Sent: Tuesday, October 20, 1998 8:44 PM
To: blunt (at) arrl (dot) org; mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov; dlevans (at) mail (dot) hsonline (dot) net;
michaelk (at) ieee (dot) org; wm7d (at) wm7d (dot) net
Subject: Privacy of contest and award logs


Dear Billy,
	Over the last 2-3 months I have been in contact
with you and various other people that you have put me over
to about getting information from logs from various awards
(eg VUCC) and contests. I have found that the league does
not distribute this information because of privacy concerns
amongst the winners of these contests. 

I contacted you about a month ago in an attempt see if there
was anyway that logs could be made available. Among
other things I wanted to know what the official ARRL policy
on the matter was.

This week I had 2 exchanges (included below) with Kennemyer,

[Comment... 
deleted for this posting
...NA3T]

who expressed his personal opinion on the matter, which 
I did not ask for, and did not want. He agreed with the
winners of contests that it would not be good for them 
if logs of contests were made available to other contestants.
He then accused me of wanting to better my position 
(ie in contests) ignoring the reason that I had requested
the logs, which was so that I could generate maps for rovers
so that they could get better scores. I do not rover and
I have not contested for several years. Kennemeyer himself
did not think it neccessary to make a reciprocal declaration 
of lack of conflict of interest in protecting the status 
quo for current winners.

I asked for the policies of the ARRL on the matter of
contests again, and again he replied with his personal
opinions. I pointed out that he had not answered my
questions and asked again.

I have not received a reply from Kennemeyer and I
request that I do have anything to do with this person again.

I send money to the ARRL to help ham radio.
I do not expect the people I employ there to 
use this money to push their private opinions on 
hams making legitimate requests in pursuit of their
ideas of a better ham radio and to stonewall these
requests. Further I don't expect to be accused of
trying to get unfair advantage by doing so, when the 
accuser has not had the courtesy to enquire as the 
circumstances of the request or to read the information
which was available in my letters. Least of all by 
someone who is not prepared to make any corresponding 
declarations of lack on conflict on interest on his behalf.

I find this most offensive and I would like an apology
on behalf of the ARRL.

As to the matter of my original enquiry, I would still
like an answer to my original request (in my letters
to kennemyer below) and I would like to propose that a paragraph
similar to the following be inserted in contest announcements.

"The ARRL would like to make available the logs of contests
for any legitimate amateur purpose. Please indicate on your
logs whether you are prepared for your logs to be used in 
such a way. 

The ARRL has no official policy on withholding or distributing
logs in contests. However we have not distributed the data
in the past largely to protect the status quo of winners who don't want
others to learn from them. This has led to a situation where
contests are working against the cooperative nature of
ham radio. We would now like to discourage this trend and
instead foster the disemmination of information that is
learned in contests. You are free to ask that the contents
of your log not be given out. 

Historically, analysis of ham logs has given new insights 
into propagation such as propagation at wavelengths shorter
than 200m, sporadic E and transequatorial propagation (all
modes discovered, pioneered or popularised by hams). Analysis
of contacts made during contests are of interest because
of the large numbers of hams operating at any one period. 
During the Sept 98 VHF contest an opening allowed 1000km
contacts on 10Ghz and VUCC to be worked on 10 bands in 
the contest by one station. Analysis of contacts made by
by other people in the vicinity of this opening might
be of interest to hams. Rovers are a new addition to 
VHF contesting and much work is put into outfitting a 
vehicle so that it can be operated for 36hrs during a 
contest. Rovers go to rare grids giving fixed stations
multipliers that they would normally not have. Analysis
of contest logs could determine which grids are rare 
allowing Rovers to better plan their contest or dx-pedition
trips.

Amateur Radio is a cooperative hobby where hams help
one another to learn about operating, theory, construction
and community service. These contests are run by ARRL members, 
paid for by ARRL members, and it would be reasonable for ARRL
members to be able to have access to the information 
gained in a contest. 

Logs will be made available to ARRL members who must
agree to not reveal the raw data (the individual
contacts) in the logs but who are free to distribute
the results of their analysis of the data. A list
of those who have requested logs will be publically
available. You will not be put on some junk mailing list
if you allow your logs to be analysed by ARRL members.
"


Thanks Joe NA3T

------------------------------------------------

[Comment...
I was surprised to then receive a reply from DHenderson, who I did
not know. Previously I only knew Billy and had assumed
he was in charge of the Contest Branch. Kennemeyer I concluded 
from his attitude was a junior clerk with no understanding
of ham radio ethic or how to deal with employers making
reasonable requests on matters of policy.

At this stage most of my questions, have not been 
answered or even acknowleged.
who does Kennamer contest with that he is so
eager for winners interests to be protected?
...NA3T]

-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph Mack [mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov]
Sent: Wednesday, October 21, 1998 1:25 PM
To: Henderson, Dan N1ND
Subject: Re: Privacy of Contest email


On Wed, 21 Oct 1998, Henderson, Dan N1ND wrote:

> Joe:
> 
> My assistant KR1R has forwarded your correspondence to me in regards to
> releasing entry logs.  The policy of the Contest Branch is that the logs
> are not released.  This is based upon the simple fact that they are the
> private property of the person submitting the log.  This policy has been
> in place for some time and I do not anticipate a change in it.
> 
> I have forwarded the emails which you sent to KR1R on to my Department
> Head, the Membership Services Chairman, and N4MM John Kanode Roanoke
> Division Director, since the issues you raise in regards to changing
> policy are beyond my authority.
> 


Thank you, I hope to hear from N4MM soon.

I would be pleased if you would address the issue of whether
Kennamer has been free of conflict of interest in his replies
to me over the last few months. Could you tell me who he contests
with? He has accused me of self interest, even after I declared
my interest at the outset to dispell such a possibility, yet his
position has not been declared even after I asked for it. This leaves
me with the only possibility that Kennamer has not been acting
in good faith in representing the ARRL's position.

Thank you

Joe NA3T

--


>From DHenderson (at) arrl (dot) org Wed Nov  4 20:51:21 1998
>Date: Wed, 21 Oct 1998 13:41:01 -0400
>Subject: RE: Privacy of Contest email

>Joe:

>Your question places me in the direct position of openly disputing or
>questioning my immediate boss.  With apologies, and with a clear
>conscience, I must decline to respond further to that question.

>Dan Henderson, N1ND
>Contest Branch Manager, ARRL


I take this to mean that Kennamer is your immediate boss.
I had assumed from Kemmamers ability to reply to questions asked
that he is some junior flunky under Billy. We hams are in deep
do-do if this is who is representing us. I think we have the answer
to why young people are fleeing ham radio in droves right before us.

I am sorry you cannot tell me who he contests with. Looks like
the ARRL needs some housecleaning with regard to being upfront
about conflict of interest. 

I first started to liberate useful information held by the ARRL 
about 3yrs ago. I received the same stonewalling then that I'm
getting now. This most recent round started about 3 months
ago and only now do I find from your letter that none of the people
who have been e-mailing me are in a position to talk about the 
topic I'm interested in. I thank you for your clarification.

In case you're interested in what I'm doing with all of this, the 
AZ_PROJ website, which generates azimuthal equidistand map projections
(a projection of interest to hams), has the beginnings of
a database where people can draw maps of contacts made in
contests, to help them plan grid-expeditions. I only
have sample maps from a few of the high scoring stations
at the moment. I expect that more contact data will be
available shortly.

http://www.wm7d (dot) net/azproj.shtml

the text about the contest maps is in the second section
under "new features" - it's the 5th item. There is a link
which will take you to the sample maps.

Since I have misjudged the responsibilities of the people at the
ARRL based on their ability to answer e-mail, would you do me a favor and
tell me the ARRL org-chart as it relates to these people

Billy Lunt
yourself
kennamer
John Kanode

All the best

Joe NA3T EME(B,D)
--
--------------------------------------------------
[Comment...
I will be interested to find out the ARRL policy on "clear consciences"
...NA3T]
--------------------------------------------------


From: "Henderson, Dan N1ND" 
To: 'Joseph Mack' 
Subject: RE: Privacy of Contest email

Joe:

The Organizational Chart as far as the Contest Branch, starting at the
Top and working its way down, is as follow::

The ARRL Board - The Division Directors  (Board President is K6ROD Rod
Stafford and John
							Kanode N4MM is
the Roanoke Division Director)
Executive Vice President - Dave Sumner K1ZZ
Membership Services Manager - Bill Kennamer K5FUV
Contest Branch Manager - Dan Henderson N1ND
Contest Branch Assistant - Billy Lunt KR1R

Please note that as per ARRL policy, I have Cc: your mail to K5FUV, my
boss, and Director Kanode since you are in his division for their
information.

73

Dan Henderson, N1ND
Contest Branch Manager, ARRL

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

[Comment
didn't hear anything for a few weeks
maybe they're busy reading each other's e-mail
...NA3T]

From: Joseph Mack 
To: "Henderson, Dan N1ND" 
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1998 06:19:59 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Re: Privacy of Contest email
Hi Dan,



It's been 2 weeks now since you contacted these people and I have not
received any replies. John Kannode has not replied to
me nor acknowleged my own email to him. I have not heard anything
from the ARRL as a result of your efforts here. Since August I have not
been able to get a copy of "The policy of the Contest Branch" that you 
mention above, no-one will tell me the mechanism to change this policy
and there has been no action by the ARRL to address my proposal.
I would hope for policy that the contest section would have a record
of its efforts to set policy, the comments and input that have been
gathered from the members, the goals of the policy, statements
as to how the policies in effect fit into those goals and a mechanism
for updating the policies.

Who is the person I should talk to now? Dave Sumner, the board?

Thanks Joe NA3T
--------------------------------------------------------
[Comment...
I promptly received a reply from John Kannode, to my above 
mentioned follow up. Here is my letter and John's reply
...NA3T]


From: 	Joseph Mack[SMTP:mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov]
Sent: 	Wednesday, November 04, 1998 9:41 PM
To: 	n4mm (at) arrl (dot) org; mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov; wm7d (at) wm7d (dot) net; 
        michaelk (at) ieee (dot) org; dlevans (at) mail (dot) hsonline (dot) net; w3ep (at) arrl (dot) org
Subject: 	Use of contest and award logs for propagation studies and expedition  planning

Dear John,

I have been in contact with Dan Henderson who tells me that
he has forwarded my request to you. In case you don't have
the request, I would like to use the information that
in available through awards that we grant (eg VUCC) and 
contests that we run (eg the VHF QSO party) to be available
for things like propagation studies or to help plan grid-DXpeditions
or rover trips. 

I have been exchanging e-mail with the ARRL since about
August and have requested but not yet received anything 
like a contest policy statement or resolution or minutes 
of meetings, nor any of the views of members who were
consulted when formulating these decisions (as 
happened about 3yrs ago when changes were 
considered for the EME contest).
I have not been able to find out how policies are
changed when members ask for them. I would be pleased
if you could provide this information.

I don't have any direct interest in contesting myself
at the moment, and am interested in this information
to find rare grids for rovers and dx-pedition people.
I run a map server for hams 

(http://www.wm7d (dot) net/azproj.shtml)

I have done similar efforts for Europe (published
the first "Most Wanted Grid" Map for D-land about
3yrs ago) and would like to do similar things here.

As a start to making contest information available, I 
proposed that the following notice be put in QST
along with the announcement of a contest and some mechanism
be made available for distributing the information made
available. I understand that the ARRL is too busy to do
this itself, but I expect a request for volunteers would
find people prepared to distribute the information. 




Thank you 
Yours sincerely
Joe NA3T

------------------------------------------------------

From jkanode (at) visuallink (dot) com Sun Jan 10 12:48:14 1999
Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1998 05:15:21 -0500
From: John Kanode 
To: 'Joseph Mack' 
Subject: RE: Use of contest and award logs for propagation studies and expedition  planning

Hi Joe:

I will have this issue put on the next agenda of the MSC.  
I am not sure if there is any legal problems with this, so I want to be sure that there are not.  
Everyone is suing for everything and one has to proceed very carefully. 
The next MSC meeting will be in January.

73, John, N4MM

----------
[Comment...
OK what is the MSC? It isn't listed on the ARRL web page.
No-one seems to hear my question about contest policy. 

What I've discovered so far is that log entries are NASCAR engines, 
are not disclosed to prevent winners from losing their competitive 
edge and to stop new people from learning ham radio, to stop people
like me who wish to better my achievement, they are a serious 
matter, a private matter and now a legal matter. This is 
5 blind men touching the elephant.

I decided to contact Chris Imlay, the Leagues legal counsell.
I had worked with Chris in connection with a tower collapse.
The nut on the lead screw which lowered the tower had stripped.
The tower manufacturer had not done an engineering study for the 
design and offered a much beefier replacement nut at the usual 
price (rather than a free replacement). I had asked the ARRL 
to put out a safety warning. They didn't think it worth doing. 
However they regarded it seriously enough that they would
not allow the manufacturer to advertise with them if ever they 
were interested in doing such a thing. I had then contacted Chris
about the tower. 

I've only included Chris's reply
...NA3T]


From W3KD (at) aol (dot) com Sun Jan 10 12:48:54 1999
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1998 15:45:32 EST
From: W3KD (at) aol (dot) com
To: DHenderson (at) arrl (dot) org, mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov, n4mm (at) arrl (dot) org, w3kd (at) arrl (dot) org,
    bkennamer (at) arrl (dot) org
Subject: Re: Privacy of Contest email

Greetings, gentlemen. I don't know all the background on this, but it would
not be prudent for ARRL to disclose to third parties the contest logs
submitted to ARRL by the contester, without the express written consent of the
contester. They don't become public information simply because they are
submitted to a private association by the submitter. 

Is there anything that the above doesn't cover on the issue at hand??

73, Chris W3KD

[Comment...
Could the ARRL publish digests of contest logs, but not the logs 
themselves? Could a suitably appointed volunteer do this work?
...NA3T]



From W3KD (at) aol (dot) com Sun Jan 10 12:49:13 1999
Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 08:18:30 EST
From: W3KD (at) aol (dot) com
To: mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov
Cc: DHenderson (at) arrl (dot) org, n4mm (at) arrl (dot) org, w3kd (at) arrl (dot) org, bkennamer (at) arrl (dot) org,
    dlevans (at) mail (dot) hsonline (dot) net, michaelk (at) ieee (dot) org, w3ep (at) arrl (dot) org
Subject: Re: Privacy of Contest email

Sure, Joe, I remember you. Good to hear from you. The questions you asked just
now are really more policy matters than legal ones. Surely, ARRL could release
data about numbers of contacts, how many grid squares worked, etc. if no
individual logs or identifying information were to be disclosed. As to whether
an ARRL volunteer could compile that data from actual log submissions, however
(other than an officer or director) I would suggest that carries the same
disclosure problems that I spoke about before. The data you are looking for
would seem to be useful, and the best way I know of to cause that compilation
to be done would be to contact your division director and ask that he or she
push the matter. It is a simple policy decision, though it is clear that there
is a lot of belt-tightening at ARRL these days, for good reason....

73, Chris W3KD

--------------------------------
[Comment...
So there never was any reason for the logs to have been 
private in the first place. They would become public by 
requiring contestants to release their logs for public 
scrutiny. The currently held "private" logs could be 
analysed in the manner I suggested just by declaring
it as part of the Contest Branch policy.

We're back to "how does Policy get changed?"
I contacted John Kannode again 
...NA3T]



From mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov Sun Jan 10 12:49:52 1999
Date: Sun, 6 Dec 1998 14:23:25 -0500 (EST)
From: Joseph Mack 
To: John Kanode 
Subject: RE: Use of contest and award logs for propagation studies and expedition  planning

On Thu, 5 Nov 1998, John Kanode wrote:

> Hi Joe:
> 
> I will have this issue put on the next agenda of the MSC. 

Dear John,



	I cannot tell from your reply whether I should be pleased or not 
since 

1 no-one, including you or the contest committee, will give me any
information about the basis for deciding the
current policies nor the procedures for changing them.

2. I have not idea what MSC stands for, what it does, what you
will be putting to them, what authority it has, or who its 
members are. I can only assume with the information I have, that
the MSC is composed of the same detractors of this proposal that
I have been dealing with in the contest committee, or else 
people who know of, agree with or accept the policies/actions 
of the contest committee.

3. An advocate for the proposal will not be present 
and will not be able to counter the statements of the MSC.

4.  The ARRL which been accepting contest and award logs
for probably 80yrs, on one hand touts to the membership the 
value of studying propagation as another justification for 
our licenses, while on the other hand does not allow the release
of this data for analysis of propagation because it would result
in transfer of knowlege from the contest winners to the people learning
contesting and because the ARRL did not have the foresight to declare
beforehand that the logs would be made available for analysis
that would help ham radio.

	I would expect then that the MSC will say "if we accept
this, then we'll have to do something - lets forget it". No 
minutes will be available, and I'll get the reply "we've considered
your interesting proposal very thoroughly and but regret due
to current exigencies that we do not wish to go forward with it."
The ARRL will be able to loudly beat its breast about taking note
of the wishes of the members, I will be expected to be thankful
for your consideration, and the members will not be learning anything
from the 80yrs of propagation data.


>  I am not sure if there is any legal problems with this, so I want to be
> sure that there are not.

It's clear to me that those there are can or could have been handled
at any time by declaring submitted logs to be publically accessable. 
Chris Imlay's reply states that access to already collected logs
is a matter for ARRL policy only.

>The next MSC meeting will be in January.

Could I have replies to my issues 1,2 above before then
and could I have some sort of resolution to issue 3 before
the proposal is put to the committe

Thank you

Joe NA3T

----------------
[Comment...
Do you think I'd get an answer now to Policy and mechanism for
changing it when they'd managed to avoid it for 6 months so far? 
...NA3T]

From: 	Joseph Mack[SMTP:mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov]
Sent: 	Monday, December 21, 1998 3:19 PM
To: 	n4mm (at) arrl (dot) org; w3ep (at) arrl (dot) org; Dan Evans; Michael Katzmann; Joe Mack
Subject: 	[WSVHF] Science Project (fwd) - publically accessible logs


Dear John,
	I haven't heard a reply to my e--mail of 6 Dec concerning
the proposal for making publically available contest and award
logs. 

	In the meantime the following was posted on the net
by W8WM 


	I think this points out the use, not only to hams but
to the public of having amateur logs available for analysis.

	Thanks Joe
	NA3T

From jkanode (at) visuallink (dot) com Sun Jan 10 12:50:46 1999
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1998 16:05:54 -0500
From: John Kanode 
To: 'Joseph Mack' 
Subject: RE: [WSVHF] Science Project (fwd) - publically accessible logs

Dear Joe:

There is not much to say about it until it is discussed by the Membership Serv
ices Committee.  That will take place in mid January at our Board Meeting.

73, John, N4MM

----------------------------

Did they write back to me? noooo

From:   Joseph Mack[SMTP:mack (at) ncifcrf (dot) gov]
Sent:   Sunday, January 31, 1999 3:11 AM
To:     John Kanode
Cc:     Joe Mack
Subject:        RE: [WSVHF] Science Project (fwd) - publically accessible logs

On Tue, 22 Dec 1998, John Kanode wrote:

> Dear Joe:
> 
> There is not much to say about it until it is discussed by the Membership Services Committee. 
That will take place in mid January at our Board Meeting.
> 
Any news?
Thanks Joe NA3T

-----------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Feb 1999 09:32:35 -0500
From: John Kanode 
To: 'Joseph Mack' 
Subject: RE: [WSVHF] Science Project (fwd) - publically accessible logs

Hi Joe:

I brought this subject up at the MSC meeting and with other directors.  There is absolutely no
support for doing this.  Also, I have received about 5 unsolicited e- mails from other contesters
stating that no way do they want their logs sent to anyone outside of ARRL HQ.  

If you want to conduct any surveys. you will have to contact the contesters directly and if they
want to send you copies of their logs, that is fine.  It is not going to be done from ARRL HQ.  

73, John, N4MM


----------------------------

CONCLUSION:

I still don't know how Contest Policy is set or Changed.

Is this the service you expect from your fees?
Do you want these guys to restructure our hobby?

Thanks for reading this far
Joe NA3T
jmack (at) wm7d (dot) net
---------------------------------------------------------------------------