[MiQP-Mail] Rover category

[Richards]

Rover category only makes sense if you provide that a station can
be in only one county at any moment, and must be some reasonable, but
substantial distance within a county to count.   Camping on or near
the corners and claiming multiple counties at any moment is silly
and defeats the meaning of having multiple counties.  Otherwise one
would just camp near a 4 county corner and claim he had four counties
for each QSO - which I feel is illegitimate.

Also, being 600 feet into County A, cannot and should not be counted
as being in County B - or why bother with county borders.  One should
be substantially within a particular county for it to count, and that
would eliminate the problem of claiming you are in four counties at
one time.

I like the rover category - not much different from mobile or portable
except you could require it to cover some stated minimum number of
counties to be a "rover" as opposed to a "portable or mobile" station.
You would then have fixed stations, like my basement shack that does
not go anywhere,  plus a portable category for the field day kind of
temporary arrangement (a kid on a hilltop), and also a rover station
for those guys who manage to cruse X or more counties and who might
be required to stay in a particular county for a minimum time, like
for at least an hour, to be qualified as being in or from that county
long enough to count.  (Cruising through a corner of a county for a
couple of minutes should not be enough - one should remain in the
county long enough to give plenty of chances for others to pick it
up for the log.)

How much does it take to sponsor a prize for a category?   If limited 
funds for prizes is an issue, maybe someone
can just underwrite the category and pay for the the prizes.  I
got a $50 bill that says we should do it.

Just MY take.

/////////////////  Richards - K8JHR  ////////////////

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n8xx at arrl.org wrote:

How can we "show"
> that a new category will increase participation or dilute the categories if 
> we don't try it? 
> 
> As for multiple counties at one time, 

Many/most of them wanted two
> QSL's for the four counties,