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The 61st Annual International DX Convention held in Visalia, California got off to a contest oriented start today, as a group of heavyweight contest operators announced the formation of a new outside group designed to further amateur radio contesting.
Known as the World Wide Radio Operator's Foundation (WWROF), the group's goal is to not only promote ham radio contesting, but also to bolster the judging of contests by lending support to post contest log checking and more.
"The founders were concerned that the infrastructure current used to support and adjudicate many events was funded by volunteers," said WWROF Chair Doug Grant K1DG.
"New enhancements to the contest-administration process will require significant financial support, and until now there has been no independent organization to raise and administer such funds," he added.
The new group already has a web site set up to take donations.
A release from the group says it is pursuing a special tax status in the United States that will allow donations from American hams to be tax deductible.
The organizational makeup of this new group reads like a Who's Who of well known contesters, many of whom are already involved in log checking and other administrative tasks dealing with contests.
Familiar names and calls include CQ WW Contest Chairman Bob Cox K3EST, CQ WPX Contest Director Randy Thompson K5ZD and log checking gurus like Larry Tyree N6TR and Trey Garlough N5KO.
Thompson K5ZD is part of the new group's Advisory Committee, which includes N6TR, N5KO, George Fremin K5TR and Ken Wolfe K1EA.
The Board of Directors has on its roster K1DG and K3EST, John Dorr K1AR, Tim Duffy K3LR, Mark Beckwith N5OT, Ralph Bowen N5RZ and Tom Lee K8AZ.
That's true even for major contests like CQ WW DX, which last year used contributions from one donor to fund visits by three contest observers, who were on hand in far flung contest locations to check for any rules violations.
That experiment ended badly when donor Al Teimurazov 4L5A ended up in a very public spat with the CQ WW Contest Committee, mocking the work of the three observers, their work habits and their expenses on the internet.
CQ WW officials vowed to continue the program, with a different funding source - but it wasn't immediately clear where that financial aid would come from.
As part of this new group's mission, the idea is to not only provide "support for, and enhancements to log-submission/processing infrastructure", but also other contest oriented aid:
