This sort of follows on from my semi-satirical “real” ham radio post. I first heard about QSO1 while lurking on the Brandmeister Worldwide talkgroup. It’s a very nifty app to be sure, but sometimes I do wonder if I’m fooling myself. Like what separates the average QSO1 experience from, say, Discord, besides worse audio and fewer text chat features.
Yes, you are potentially transmitting over any number of repeaters on RF, but if QSO1 becomes the path of least resistance for rag chewers like myself and everyone ends up using it, what makes it “real” ham radio?
I got licensed because I like the “radio” part of ham radio.
Computers? Cool…hook them to radios.
Networking protocols? Cool, how can I use radios to build networks?
Packet radio? Still has radio involved.
All-star node? Great! It’s hooked into a dedicated radio.
Just got my first HF amplifier for my…you guessed it, HF radio.
OK I’m starting to sound like an ass. I don’t understand why anyone would go through the trouble to test and get licensed only to get involved with things that have…no radio?
No, seriously, that is my approach as well. Ham radio is when you do things over a radio. Exchange information over RF that you either own or have been kindly given access too, for shits and giggles. I don’t mind things like remote stations or repeaters, but I’ve kept my distance from the DMR side for reasons. Talking to my own brandmeister hotspot from a 2m distance would not “count” for me, talking to a DMR repeater 20 km away, when putting your antenna in just the right spot, would.
And if I want internet voice chat, I just use internet voice chat, from discord to matrix.
Indeed. Just to set the record straight here, I am A HUGE proponent and unofficial cheerleader of free, open and decentralized protocols. Free as in freedom, jot necessarily free beer, as that saying goes. Normal people probably don’t think about these things, but they underpin an internet that maintains a low barrier to entry and exit. Meaning, it’s made for ordinary people to use, participate in, and even help build with their own services. Things like Lemmy, Mastodon, Matrix and the other tools you can host yourself are amazing and personally interesting to me. I mean, email is decentralized…we sort of take that one for granted but that’s a side topic discussion right there.
However, I don’t get recreating closed walled off systems that don’t do the job as well as I mentioned, and require you to be licensed in your country to use it to boot.
These networks are run by centralized authorities, or sometimes just one or two people. I’m assuming this app is another scenario like this.
To me, this the worst of all combinations.
A big part of ham ratio for me is figuring out the antenna and signal propagation — having a QSO is a nice proof that I got the system working. How much does QSO1 work out-of-the-box?
It’s pretty seamless, honestly. You make an account and enter any details for the various networks (Echolink/D-star stuff etc)
I have no issue with digital radio at all and in fact use it quite a bit. But I do find that there has become an over reliance on VOIP in place of actual RF communication.
In my opinion there is no difference in using an app like QSO1 in place of any VOIP application. I just feel as if there are far more interesting things to do within the hobby.
If you are interested in VOIP try out some of the more interesting programs like Mumble, Matrix, or even something radio related like Reticulum.
I see the use case of things like echolink or dmr but I find that most people simply replace their radio with a phone as it is easier. It’s far more fun to use RF
