The FRRL — a Web site whose acronym stands for “The Future of Radio and Radio’s Legacy” — has published an excellent article encouraging its readers to check out the Liberty Net. Here’s an excerpt, but do visit the FRRL site for a great array of radio-related features and videos (and much more):
I CAN AGREE WITH the sentiment below – so many amateur radio conversations are vacuous. How about taking it up a notch and get amateurs into the national conversation on topics of the day?
A past president of the ARRL said that a renewed focus on technology will reawaken the relevance of Amateur Radio. Will it? Or will this just drive Amateur Radio into a smaller and smaller niche market on the margins of society?
Would Amateur Radio be more relevant if it hitched its wagon to the national conversation where “everyone” can participate? Check out the Liberty Net. Not an Amateur? — you can listen to archived nets on-line at the links below. Are you a shortwave listener with a radio capable of LSB/USB or a BFO? Then blow the dust off that set and listen in real-time.
SO MANY amateur contacts are empty and meaningless, an exchange of signal reports or technical descriptions of the most rudimentary sort. Such is seldom the case for the discussions that take place on or around 3950 kHz SSB during the weekly Liberty Net — a current events discussion net that has been meeting weekly since the 1970s.
Every Saturday night at 10:00 PM Eastern Time, the Liberty Net begins and usually runs until the wee hours of the morning. W1WCR, Victor Misek, is the Net Control Operator, and his commanding signal spans the continent and beyond with perfect intelligibility. In addition, Vic’s array of Beverage antennas (he is the author of the Beverage Antenna Handbook) allows him to receive signals through noise and interference that would stymie most operators, and relay important information to the rest of the net participants.
The FRRL site also provides a lot of thought-provoking essays on science, economics, and even philosophy. Intelligently done!