[IRCA] Possible Yahoo e-Group for Ultralighters

["John H. Bryant" <bjohnorcas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

A couple of people have mentioned a yahoo group for ultralighters 
recently. As you know, there is one that I host called ultralight 
hotrodding.  It is more-or-less restricted to discussing either 
electrical or mechanical modifications to ultralights, as the name 
suggests. When I created the hotrodding yahoo group, I also created 
one called "ultralightdx," just in case we ever wanted/needed to have 
a discussion group not embedded in the general flow of the IRCA 
discussion group.  I wonder if the time has come to officially launch 
that group???

Several things lead me to think that the time has come.... not to 
abandon IRCA, but to have a separate discussion group to post the 
voluminous loggings that some of us are achieving and to reach beyond 
the bounds of the MW hobby (the crystal set community) and beyond the 
shores of North America.  Several people have asked me where to post 
their loggings from the Sprint and other general activity. Rob Ross 
has been very diligent at posting his logs on IRCA, but several 
others have been reluctant to do so, since the "normal flow" of 
domestic DX loggings does not appear in the IRCA chat group, but 
rather is more-or-less restricted to the bulletin. I get the sense 
that most folks wishing to post ultralight loggings wish to do so in 
some place where they are clearly identified as ultralight loggings.

Honestly, I don't plan to submit domestic loggings except during a 
contest.... that just isn't in my hobby vocabulary... and I don't get 
much out of other folks domestic logs, I'm ashamed to say (probably 
because there are no other ultralighters near me here in Oklahoma. 
However, when I'm out in the NW, I'll be submitting both ultralight 
and normal loggings of TPs (lord willin') and I would darn sure like 
to see my ultralight loggings recognized as distinct from "normal" TP 
DXing. Having a place for ultralight loggings would let me do that.

There are several other advantages to an ultralight yahoo group, of 
course... the ability to attach audio clips and documents to 
messages, the 100 MB of free storage for files, etc. Mostly, though, 
I wonder if a yahoo group not associated with any particular MW club 
or country wouldn't be a plus at this point in spreading the 
ultralight addiction???  It would certainly strengthen sense of 
community within the ultralight niche.

Personally, I would not like to have ultralight disappear from IRCA, 
for IRCA's sake, as I think that the movement has been a breath of 
fresh air for much of IRCA.  However, from a narrow point of view, I 
don't think that our continued presence on IRCA will gain us many 
more ultralighters... everyone who is on IRCA and not yet an 
ultralighter has probably heard more than they wish on the subject....

So, should we found a general ultralight yahoo group, still intending 
some presence in IRCA and use of the bulletins and dxer.ca for 
articles and a public presence????  Should we fold the ultralight 
hotrodding group into the larger ultralight group or leave it as a 
highly specialized venue.... or is the time just not right to do this 
now???  Or, is some separation from IRCA just a bad idea all around???

If you have thoughts, please "Reply All"  so that everyone can share 
in the discussion.

John B.




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