August 27, 2029

A full house was expected for tonight’s meeting of the Logan Lake DX Club. The main presentation was going to be a live video session with the owner and chief promoter of the rapidly growing FacilisQSO amateur radio service. Since its launch a few months earlier interest had been running high and word on the street was that tens of thousands of hams had already subscribed.

Once the meeting got underway all the normal club business was completed quickly. Everyone was anxious for the presentation and a few minutes later the lights went down and the big screen connected. The rules for the evening were that all questions and comments would be held until the end of the presentation, and then only a few questions would be taken.

Suddenly, there he was, Daan de Vries, creator and President of FacilisQSO a radical new concept for active radio amateurs that was quickly becoming ubiquitous and taking the hobby by storm. Applause from the local audience was loud and sustained. Apparently, these folks loved it. They quieted down with some gentle urging from the speaker who began his presentation.

“I got the idea for FQSO when one weekend I was working a few POTA activators using CW and realized the operator exchange was always the same. While thinking about that it occurred to me that the same was true of all contest exchanges, whether voice or CW the exchanges were brief and predictable. ‘599 TU’ over and over and over was making the hobby boring to me. But I wanted to be in the contest, rather, I wanted to run up a score in contests but it was brutally boring and life is too short to waste a perfectly good weekend duplicating that same exchange with thousands of stations. There must be a better way…”

“From that point I set about building an interface between the radio and computer that would permit agentic operation of these events without need for an operator.”

“As I was chewing on that, it occurred to me that chasing DX was just as boring. Why waste a good night of sleep in a pile-up screaming to be noticed? This could all be automated too. CW was easy. Phone was easy. FT8 was even easier. In fact, it was trivial to put it all together and next thing I knew, I was running up big scores in contests while filling my log with choice DX. And I wasn’t even home. In fact my best weekend of radio took place while me and my family were visiting the Magic Kingdom.”

Laughter and more raucous applause followed that proclamation.

“I got together with a few other well-known radio hams and showed them what I had done and the idea to offer this to the fraternity as a complete turnkey system immediately followed and here’s what we have to offer.”

“We have connected thirty global HF superstations to the network. By the end of this year there will be a hundred. These are modern SDR’s running full legal limit on all amateur HF bands. All include rotatable antennas for 40 thru 10 meters with wire antennas for 160 and 80 meters. These aren’t intended to be accessed directly by our subscribers, instead, our customers fill out an online form indicating what contests and events they want to work or what DX they need. That information is turned over to the AI and it goes to work making contacts on your behalf.”

“Most of our customers have managed to earn DXCC, even making the Honor Roll within hours or days of signing up, all without touching a radio. Big numbers can be collected by the AI while you and your family are enjoying life - together. Once you sign up, there are no more radio ‘widows’ even while your logbook is being filled to the brim!”

“Since you aren’t using radio equipment, there’s no more RFI, costly repairs, or antenna work. No more big ticket purchases to anger the XYL. Its all covered in the price of your annual subscription. And bonus, since the ‘operators’ are all AI, we’ve eliminated the bad behavior of humans on the air. No more unruly pile-ups, no more DQRM. The agents have endless patience and are happy to call using your call sign for hours on end without becoming frustrated.”

At this, the audience erupted into a standing ovation and all seemed ready to whip out their credit cards and sign-up, even before they had the cost details.

Daan de Vries swelled with pride as the adulation washed over him. He was saving amateur radio from the luddites who rejected the new technology that would now revitalize the service. Those old school radio heads, the knuckle-draggers holding amateur radio back would finally be vanquished — by a system that required no amateur radio operators at all. And every licensed radio ham could paper their walls with certificates and awards they couldn’t have imagined just a few months earlier.

Last I checked, more than 80% of all hams in the US had purchased a subscription. The bands have never been busier. Or quieter, depending on how you look at it.