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Walk through the streets of any American city and it becomes hard to see even the faintest remains of the free, open country that it was just a few generations ago. We may call it progress, but when people drive for miles just to find open room to breathe and explore freely, we've lost something precious. Our very souls yearn for an escape to a less confining existence where we can be creative and truly human again.
But once, for a few wondrous years, there really was a frontier, open and free. A new world where anyone with curiosity could go, explore, be free and fully human. It was a special time. Now the only remains of that glory are found in the scattering of a few national parks. While governments and corporations would develop even these few precious remnants in the name of some greater good, thankfully we have resisted those efforts thus far. For the most part, they remain as they were, open for anyone to come, explore, and taste the wonder of freedom.
There once also was a parallel new world in another realm. Ever since the 1840's, after the telegraph was introduced, various inventors and crackpots sought to send signals freely through the water or air without connecting wires. And just as quickly, there have been those monopolies that sought to control or usurp any such freedom.
Today, with much of the fresh wonder of radio long gone, and the airwaves choking with anesthetizing Muzak on the one hand and vituperative talk radio on the other, it may be difficult to appreciate the ham who takes to the air for fun, or out of curiosity, or to test their technical mettle. But realizing there is a new, invisible dimension out there --the electromagnetic spectrum--that can provide contact with others far away, and that opens up a dark yet crackling part of the universe to the human imagination--puts people, however temporarily, in further awe of the cosmos of which we are part. And this wonder, this joy of discovery before the commercial forces came in --all this we can, and should, envy.
The Amateur Radio bands, like national parks, are the last remaining vestiges of what was once an incredibly large, open electro-magnetic spectrum where the common man can still go, explore, tinker and play. Now only a few small slivers of frequencies are left where people like you and I can freely explore the wonders of radio.
Both hams' transgressions and their heroism on the air have raised a key question, namely who "owns" the spectrum and who decides who gets what. For the amateurs have always operated outside of and often in opposition to commercialism. Once they regarded their portion of the spectrum as a reservation on which they were trapped. Now they argue that it is much like national park lands, a commercial-free zone that must be preserved for them and future generations of adventurers. At a time when greater chunks of the spectrum are being auctioned off for use by cellular phone companies, polluted by BPL and other corporate uses, they are the only voice crying to keep the notion alive that some of the air waves, like the land itself, are a common property resource in which everyone has a stake.
Some parts of above paraphrased with her permission from Dr. Susan J Douglas' book.
If you publish an email magazine/newsletter but you create it in HTML, you can make it look pretty with different colors and graphics. However there's a good chance that many of your readers aren't receiving it.
That's because HTML based emails, which are often used by spammers, can trigger spam filters. The problem is important if reporters you are targeting never see your work. They get many emails - and a LOT of spam.
Others also regularly block HTML emails. Many corporations forbid HTML emails.
In addition, Corey Rudl, an internet marketing advisor, says as much as 40 percent of HTML doesn't get to the intended recipient looking the way you intended it to look. What looks great on a website might look like a child with a crayon in an email. You can never tell how wide the recipient will have their margins of drop-down screens. OK, so how do you get your e-mail message to a reporter with the best chance of it ever being read?
1. Avoiding the filter
You think your news release or pitch letter looks good. maybe even cute or funny.
But to a spam filter your e-mail may be nothing more than trigger words. If
the words are in there, the filter will delete you.
You also need to be aware that your internet provider might be blacklisted.
A server that is found to be the source of too much spam in the past is simply
cut off. Even if YOU didn't cause the spam, the provider of your email
address (JohnSmith@spamaway.com) has been found negligent and all
@spamaway emails are deleted, including yours.
So how do you get past the spam filter? The best answer I have found is at http://www.wordbiz.com/avoidspamfilters.html.
I recommend reading this page and even printing it out for reference. The time you take will save you a lot of frustration later on when you wonder why no one ever heard of your news release.
There is also a lot of debate on including attachments. Most suggest you do not do it as many spam filters will trigger. In other places, unsolicited attachments are simply deleted in this era of viruses. If you have pictures or more material, you might do best simply saying that pictures and background material is available for the asking - and let them ask you.
2. The email is on their screen. Now to get someone to read it.
The key is your subject line.
Try working a three part, short subject line. Remember that depending on how they have their screen set up that day, a long subject line may get cut off, so keep it short.
A) Put what you are sending in brackets.
[News] [Story Idea] [Info] [Follow-up]
B) If you know the name of the reporter or editor receiving the email, put it next.
If you do not know the name but at least know the topic area, use that.
C) The third part is a very short summary
So putting it all together, it might look like:
[News] Jim- Hams are trying New Activity on June 21
[Story Idea] Community Page - Hams practice for local disaster
With these subject lines, Jim is probably going to open and look at it.
3. Now you have to grab them.
The very first sentences must tell the reader why this is important.
Vs
Which page would YOU read?
4. Never forget to give your contact information!
It's amazing to me how many press releases I see out there which don't have any contact information. Even if I was interested in them and wanted to do something, I have no idea who to call. Reporters have plenty to do already and will not spend the time hunting you down. Make it easy for them to find you!
Suggestion - don't overlook all those second-level publications, the free weekly shoppers and alternative newspapers, that might be hungry for a story idea or article. Look for them at the entrances to grocery stores shopping malls. They are usually more than happy to get material!
Many businesses have a day set aside for parents to bring their child to work. But how about your HT? Most of us have one (or more) of these little guys sitting there, looking forlorn as we go off on our daily tasks. Why not bring the little fellow along one day? How about June 21st?
Just clip him to your belt and go about your day. Let your HT see what you do every day when you go away. I am sure your HT will appreciate it. More importantly, people will spot him and want to meet him. Let him say hello to your workmates. You just might get your co-workers to thinking about getting one of their own!
You'll hear a lot more on this next month!
Entertaining kids for eight hours at work is often overwhelming for the staff volunteers who host the kids all day while the parents are working. Recently we spoke to one Kid's Day coordinator at a large corporate office building. She said that in a building full of desks and pc's it's often difficult to figure out how to educate or entertain the kids.
Here's your opportunity to offer a ham radio hook for part of the day. You might be able to bring the HT in and let kids make a random contact. If your community coordinates Kid's Day in town maybe you can make contact with other businesses in town. If you want to get a little more involved and your company is involved with electronics, communications, or travel you might be able to build a small kit, show Morse code or digital communications, or bring in some QSL cards and make a contact using VOIP technology. The possibilities are endless. Each shows how ham radio plays an important point in everyday life. They probably won't remember how many widgets were sold last year, but they will remember the contact on ham radio. -- Bob Josuweit, WA3PZO
Here's another excellent email sent in from one of our members:
We do some pretty strange stuff with radio waves, not
obvious to the general public used to static-free, instant communications with
premanufactured communications gear. We hams love radio for the sake of radio
-- building rigs, mountaintopping, reading propagation charts, and tinkering.
We must focus on getting out the good works of ham radio one-on-one.
Ever tried Elmering -- introducing others to ham radio by personal attention?
It's worked for me. Here's some suggestions!
* Leave ham radio magazines in your workplace breakroom.
* Carry an HT with you everywhere -- to work, at the bus stop, to the park, and
to the mall. Most people will misidentify your rig as a fancy cellphone, but a
few will ask questions, then you can promote ham radio.
* Invite non-hams to a hamfest, reminding them that there's other things to
shop for, buy, and eat, other than ham radio.
* Get behind the key and microphone at a museum station, and volunteer! The Arizona Science Center in Phoenix has one excellent demonstration station. Look up W7ASC, and
follow the link!
* Donate a public safety scanner preprogrammed with local popular repeaters to
a potential ham. My brother called me to tell me that his friends enjoyed
tuning in to the local autopatch on Shaw Butte on 449.525- here in Phoenix. He and his friends were impressed by the excellent audio quality of narrowband
FM, and the heft and quality build of the HT's, compared to their tiny,
screeching digital cellphones!
* As tempting as it is...do NOT denigrate CB, FRS, internet, cellphones and
other popular telecom modes to promote ham radio as superior. You cannot shame
a potential ham into getting a license! My brother worked his first DX on an
FRS radio -- twenty miles with a half-watt UHF micro-HT, and now he's going for
his ham ticket. On the other hand, I once made fun of CB, to prove that ham
radio was "superior", and the CB op I was talking to was not happy,
since he enjoyed shooting skip and getting directions on his 11M rig.
* When promoting ham radio at a public gathering, dress like you are going
to work, not changing oil in your lawnmower. The first time I saw a ham
wear a "Ham Radio -- Help All Mankind" t-shirt, it was on his torn
and stained undershirt hand lettered with a laundry marker...
I have tried all of the above, and my positive methods work! But, I've also
been guilty of making fun of other radio and wired modes to promote ham
radio....gotta stop that... When I did that, non-hams looked at me like I was
crazy.
Here are some examples of what some of my friends have done that have worked...
* Tom, the leader of the local Explorer Post 599, heard that my brother was
intrigued by ham radio -- so he offered to take my brother to meetings.
* A different Tom, N7RPZ, took me to his engineering class at Glendale Community College. I did a brief talk on ham radio, and Tom followed up with "Now
You're Talking". Of his sixteen students that semester, fourteen obtained
their Technician class license, and the other two upgraded to General. Tom
promoted ham radio as a way to turn the engineering and physics concepts they
learned in class to real equipment the students could use in the real world.
What have you done yourself to promote ham radio one-on-one? What works -- and
what did not?
73
KB7AQD Robert Homuth
Thanks! Good ideas and insights there!
You know the type. If you have dealt with them before you avoid them like the plague. They can ruin your whole day with a sentence. They just don't make sense! But what about the times you don't have a choice and MUST deal with them? How can you have a chance at getting something settled?
More tips on how to deal and negotiate with people to get your message out are hidden in the Harvard Business School website. While the pages are targeted to executives, the tips they provide are also excellent for working with press and other media persons. I found a lot of good ideas in there already and I am still mining it.
A free, simple and very useful tool for any PIO with a computer is the Google News Services. By signing up you can easily ask it to send you a daily list of newspapers, websites or other media that match your key words. Put in "ham radio" and "Amateur Radio" and you'll get a list of all the major papers and stories that have the Amateur Radio Service as their topic that day. Then you just click on the ones you actually want to read. It's easy!
In this way you can be right on top of the events happening with ham radio or most any other topic you choose. Among other things, I use it to follow the BPL publicity and, if appropriate, respond to editors and reporters. Go to www.google.com and click on news in the top center. When the news page comes up, look to the left side and click on News Alerts. It will take you step by step setting up the process.
Highly recommended. -- Google News
Remember the joy of owning a Swiss Army Knife? It had all those little tools right in one place. So what if the pliers were wimpy - they still were better than fingernails. It was a one-tool-to-do-it-all and still the joy of many of us "older" children.
Well, we've developed a Swiss Army Knife for new PIO's. One computer CD with an index which has everything you need to get a good start and then some. Forms, backgrounders, ideas, PSA's, audio of conferences on being a PIO, and help files.
But wait - there's more!
The PIO handbook, speaker's tips for all sorts of situations, facts sheets, information, stats and history. It's all there. And in the 05 series there's even copies of Field Day releases you can take and use for your local area. It's all been put onto one CD and indexed.
This is a new idea and will be tried out to see if it helps raise more and better PR by aiding PIO's. If it works, we hope to continue it each year. The CD is available to PIO's listed with the ARRL. Write to me at apitts@arrl.org and I can send you one. It's also being sent to new PIO's to help them get a quick start. In addition, the PR Committee will have them available at the PR Booth in Dayton at the Hamfest.
Pause
Did you catch that?
The Public Relations Committee will not only be sponsoring the PR Forum on Sunday morning at Dayton this year, but there will also be mini-presentations in the main area and a booth all our own.
This will be a great place for PIO's and PIC's to finally meet, chat and share ideas!
We can use your help! We need PIO's willing to spend a little time at the booth meeting and greeting other PIO's If you will consider donating a little time at the Dayton Hamfest to help others promote Amateur Radio, then please let us know. Write to the Chairperson, Sherri Brower at w4stb@bellsouth.net and let her know what times you could be able to help out at the booth. Thanks!
Because we took the option of placing the audio PSA's on the website and making them freely available for downloading, it is impossible for us to tell just how many people took copies for distribution. But we continue to get new reports from all over the country of radio stations heard playing the audio PSA's and PIO's letting us know they were able to get stations to run them.
In addition, the first pile of copies of the new video PSA went out very quickly and have been well placed. Because of the high cost of commercially duplicating DVD's, we'll try to make copies to send out using the computer system at headquarters for a while and see if it works out. We hope that it will give a cost effective option which can meet the continuing demand for the video and allow for even more new materials in the future.
Unlike audio, which has settled on MP3 as a fairly standard format, video reproduction remains divided into several incompatible camps. DVD and Beta-sp are the two current leaders, but there are several others remaining from previous years. Of the leaders, DVD+R is the format most universal and playable in the largest number of systems. (There are several types of DVD's) DVD+R is what we will be duplicating here. Beta-sp is available on a limited basis through the help and donations of volunteers. If you have the ability of turning DVD+R into a Beta-sp and would make the cassettes available to other PIO's, please let us know.