The saying, “Amateur Radio is a service, not a hobby” has been popular for a while now.
Adherents of the saying point people to the fact that the Code of Federal Regulations refers to Amateur Radio in Title 47 CFR 97 as the “Amateur Radio Service” and says one of the five purposes is “a voluntary noncommercial communication service, particularly with respect to providing emergency communications.”
First, let’s acknowledge that Title 47 lists a multitude of radio services, including the Family Radio Service (FRS – those walkie talkies you can buy at Target, Walmart, and just about any sporting goods store), the General Mobile Radio Service (GMRS – can also be hand held, or also mobile or base radios), the Radio Control Radio Service, the Citizens Band Radio Service (AKA CB), etc. And groups like REACT do use CB for public service. So the fact that Title 47 calls ham radio a “service” doesn’t really mean anything. Second, most practitioners of ham radio pay little more than passing interest in public service. They instead get into it for recreation, personal use, personal readiness, experimenting, contesting, and so forth. They don’t get the additional training or skills needed for public service.
In other words, yes, it is a hobby. Public service is one thing we can do with the hobby.
There is a much more appropriate saying, “Amateur Radio is a hobby, public service is a commitment.”
In simple terms, to be a public service, simply having a ham radio license will not suffice. To be of public service, an operator has to commit to getting more training such as FEMA ICS courses or SKYWARN training, to improve and maintain their skills and equipment, and to participate. An operator has do more than just check into a weekly radio net. Can they be Net Control, keep accurate logs, and send a net report? Most net managers that I know have a heck of a time just getting people to step up for something as simple as this. Can the operator originate, relay, or receive and deliver a basic radiogram? Can they program their own radio? Does the operator know the difference between a COML, COMT, and INCM?
A lot of the people are lacking in such skills and knowledge, including a lot of those proclaiming Amateur Radio to be a service and not a hobby. Which means when it comes to actually being “of service”, they aren’t. If an incident arises where ham operators are needed, these folks would just be in the way.
Participation is also critically important. In the volunteer world, there is a “20 Percent” rule of thumb. In reality, this can vary, usually between about 10 to 20%. The rule tries to articulate that most people who could sign up to be part of a volunteer group do not, and of those who do, few actively participate and fewer still reliably participate. The theory is that if there is a pool of 1,000 people eligible to join a volunteer group, only about 200 will do so. Of those 200, only about 40 will actively participate and only 8 will do so reliably. Those 8 individuals end up carrying the group, until they get burned out and stop.
Pikes Peak ARES is illustrative of this situation. There are about 4,200 licensees in El Paso and Teller counties combined. We have over 160 people registered on our website. We have 20ish people who check in to the Tuesday evening nets and we only have about 5 people who step up to do Net Control duties. Our Weather guru loves doing weather nets and such and has been incredibly reliable for years, but his health is not great and we need to hand the reigns over to someone else, but nobody will step up. We have pulled back from supporting many of the public events that we used to be involved with because we could not get enough people to support them and could not get Mission Coordinators. And just recently, when there was a fire where we needed volunteers, it was like pulling teeth over multiple days just to get 10 and we ended up calling in people from other districts to help out.
If people think Amateur Radio is more than just a hobby, people need to show it. Unless more people participate, our ARES organization will fail.
Actions Not Words