Monthly Moan

Yes folks, it's that time of month when RadCom dropping through the letterbox prompts more moaning from me!

This month (October 2013), we are given the half-yearly financial report.  It doesn't make for very encouraging reading.

Inevitably, the National Radio Centre, a legacy of the RSGB's recent 'difficult period' (which saw allegedly criminal conduct), has to come in for heavy criticism.   Why?  Because just under £20,000 of our membership dues have already gone in the first half of 2013 keeping this utter nonsense going.  I suppose it's reasonable to assume it will cost the same amount over the remaining half of the year, so £40,000 for...what?

Frankly, I'm pissed-off with the RSGB endlessly publishing photos of old, white middle-class men trying to look interested at the NRC.  The harsh reality is that the NRC is a useless lead weight around the RSGB's neck when it is, as a society, simply managing - just - to break even financially.  Men in uniforms and ceremonial chains don't convert into hard cash, therefore it is a waste of time.

The RSGB can go on as much as it likes in positive spin about the ''several" who have taken up radio training and obtained a licence as a direct and sole result of visiting the NRC.  But how many is several?  We're never told, because it's clearly a tiny number.  That makes them very expensive new members indeed to recruit.

It's time the board closed the NRC down.  We work hard for our subscription fee, and the NRC is neither a good nor, in my view, reasonable use of that money.  If anyone conducted an objective cost-benefit analysis of the NRC, I doubt any case other than immediate closure could possibly result.  Staff have been cut at RSGB HQ when the money spent on the NRC could keep at least one of them in gainful employment - such as drumming-up more donations, or going round schools to encourage some interest.

I see very little sign that the society is turning itself around in the way it trumpted it would do a year or so ago.  RadCom is still stubbornly inaccessible to anyone with a nascent interest in the hobby, and I typically find nothing of interest to me in there.  Adverts push for £100 what the magazine should be encouraging members to make for pennies.  The Gigahertz section looked promising when a new author took over, and I was even encouraged to try and take it up.  But it's gone straight back into 'if you don't know how to do GHz work, well we do, so tough' mode.

As far as I can see, the RSGB board is now simply managing the inevitable decline that stems from a long-standing inability to make the hobby attractive to youngsters, and the consequent skew in age profile. Personally, I think the RSGB is beyond repair.  I'd rather read about the exploits of the Real HF Mobile on Yahoo! groups than some dull circuits of interest to no-one in RadCom.

Come on, board members.  Wake up!   The society is dying on its feet, as is the hobby.  And before you have a go at me, yes, I am doing my own bit by setting up a station at a local primary school.  And you know what?  I didn't have to push or glitz it up for them to accept the idea as a good one; they were overjoyed at the prospect, and are keen to get it going as soon as possible. Whilst I've taught university students in the past, I know very little about young kids' education and, naturally, feel a bit nervous about starting off.  But it will be worth it, and I know the kids will benefit from someone pushing science at them for once.

The interest is there, it's just that very few are bothering to develop it.