I don't like criticising amateur radio, or amateur radio operators in anyway, but sometimes you come across a situation where you wonder what the hell you are doing participating in this hobby. Ask yourself a question, would you sit in a room with a load of people you've never met whilst everyone is screaming and shouting over each other and basically totally disrespecting everyone in the same room ? I wouldn't, that is for sure, it's no wonder that SO1MZ vacated the frequency this afternoon. I don't understand the mentality of some of the operators on amateur radio at the moment, some of them are showing little if no respect for any of their fellow operators when a DX station appears on the frequency. I know that people get excited and want to contact his stations. I'm also aware that it's not easy for some of the guys who haven't got very efficient antennas. But not having a big antenna is not an excuse for selfish and irritating behaviour on the airwaves. Remember that just because the dx station can't hear you, it doesn't mean other people can't hear you shouting, in fact your fellow Europeans will probably be receiving a huge signal from you and won't hear a damn thing when you transmit. The worst thing you can do is to continually blurt out your call sign over and over again, this will only make it difficult for everyone else to hear the station and will just slow things down.
The station from the Western Sahara was on 20 m today and the video I made only goes to show how bad things get when everybody shouts at the same time and nobody listens to what is going on. Now I'm not suggesting that I'm the best operator in the world, but please take note of how I listen to what is going on, I will wait for the DX station to finish his QSO before I announce my callsign. I will announce my callsign once to begin with, if I don't hear him coming back to somebody else I will go again, but I do not under any circumstances continue to announce my callsign over and over again.
Anyway, enjoy the video
