WSJI648

Count it a blessing that you find it "rare" to have people "jabber jawing." In my AO on the local repeater, you'll have guys jaw jacking all night long about smoking meat or how many guitars they have. Last night it was about a local get together for BBQ. It reminds me of an old ICQ chatroom. And there are so many repeaters, they talk about leaving one to go to another because the traffic is too heavy on the one they are currently on.

I'm only just now dipping my toe in anything past FRS radios. I've watched a few HRCC videos and HAM seems super intimidating....although the allure of being able to talk to the ISS from my backyard is incredibly tempting!

Just for the heck of it, and not knowing much at all, I just took the Technician's level test on the freeham website. Failed it. 45%, but that's with ZERO studying or prep. I'm sure that with some effort and prep, OP could do it. Go for it!

It's like Linux, I guess. I mean, you certainly can do it...but why? In a true, grid down situation I just don't understand it. I have to keep two devices powered and essentially I'm hooked into a group text? I understand the implications of it being far reaching based on propagating through other people's devices but one those devices go down - and the most assuredly will - my reach is diminished, if not destroyed. It's like those internet radios and zello. They aren't 100% self reliant and because of that, I wouldn't count on them. But hey, at least you can still but HRCC, ammirite?

I've been listening to a repeater channel that is local to me in ECONUS. It is a private repeater that is run by a club here. They hand out callsigns in addition to your FCC ID. I have been listening to it for the better part of a month or so now. There's a mixture of people using both the NATO and just the phonetic pronunciations. It seems that the NATO people are also Ham people, which makes sense. I will agree with the OP in so much as there seems to be a proliferation of redundant and unnecessary identifications. Like just a few minutes ago, a member keyed up for a radio check. A guy gave his ID and proceeded to tell him that he had a good copy. The original guy thanked him and signed off. Then the guy who answered gave his ID and called clear. The entire transaction was less than 2 minutes but yet we have to suffer through four identifications. Seems a bit much, I think. It's like those guys that have CCW badges and sashes.

I just watched both of your videos and I absolutely can not believe that my first post here on mygmrs forums is going to be regarding meshtastic. Bleh... I've enjoyed your approach. As a "normal person," I've never really even understood what meshtastic was. Even their one line description didn't mean much to me. I have to say, though, as someone who is only wading into the GMRS pool (CB radio user for many decades) and by extension, long range-ish communication, it seems like the meshtastic thing is definitely a niche market. In a catastrophic, grid down situation, it's going to require power for two devices and with that many links in the chain necessary for it to propagate, I just don't see the value in it. But then again, I confess to knowing very little about a lot of things.