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I've been into amateur radio since about 1978 starting in the 3rd grade and have seen the ups and downs but nothing like what we're lacking today. A few of the MPLS/St.Paul area repeaters have some net traffic during the day, drivetime has a few die hard lids to keep the finals warm but the vast majority seems to be imported echolink & IRLP nodes. HF seems dead as well with only a few people on 40M.
As a youth I couldn't get enough of the HF bands. I'd spend the weekends with my Elmer working the stations on his Drake TR-4C, the Donald Duck of SSB and punchy AM signals from across the globe pulled me in while I worked the logbook, the really special nights were when he gave me the pilot seat and D104. I'm going on 52 now and have spent the majority of my life on or around the radio. Yes the smartphone is a transceiver but nothing like what it was when we had a real connection. Unfortunately we are losing amateur radio to the advances of technology, social media of the airwaves has become an app with the excitement of Facebook and google... echolink app anyone?
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