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Doc. #30
REPORT FROM THE PUBLIC RELATIONS COMMITTEE
January 2001
Rather than talk about the last 6 months, I'd like to take a look at the year 2000 because it may have been the best year for ham radio publicity in the past decade, or perhaps ever. The year started on January 1st with a wonderful NBC Nightly News story about Kid's Day. Then the story of the van Tuijl family generated an enormous amount of publicity a few months later. Not only did the story get picked up by the AP and papers such as the Dallas Morning News, the family and the ham radio operators who came to their rescue were interviewed for national TV programs such as "Good Morning America," "20/20," "The Early Show" (on CBS) and in People magazine. Just prior to the Board Meeting, the van Tuijls were featured in People yet again, in a section called "2000 Sequels."
Amateur Radio's presence in the news media remained strong in the last half of 2000.
The New York Times ran a story on ham radio and featured HQ staffer Dan Miller, K3UFG, and the popular licensing classes he offered at ARRL HQ. The launching of Oscar 40 and ham radio on the International Space Station got good play on CNN.com's "Space" page. Just prior to this writing, the Van Tuijl family was featured once again in People magazine. The issue focused on "the most intriguing people of 2000."
Some of the large circulation newspapers that carried Amateur Radio stories this year included The Plain Dealer out of Cleveland, The Charlotte (NC) Observer, the Atlanta (GA) Constitution, the Miami (FL) Herald, the Los Angeles (CA) Times, Detroit (MI) News and USA Today.
Right now your committee is brainstorming ways to publicize the ARRL's request to the FCC to get CC&Rs covered by PRB-1, and more broadly, perhaps get some of the national media interested in the Hitlerian conditions created by overreaching homeowners groups.
Since 2001 will start the new millennium (I'm glad we don't have to publicize THAT fact), I'm going to ask my committee to spend the first couple of months brainstorming ways to get regular, national stories in the print and broadcast media, which are in one way or another related to Amateur Radio and come up with a specific proposal with some achievable goals. For your July meeting, I hope to present that proposal for your approval. It should be a blueprint for ham radio publicity and public relations in the early years of the 21st Century.
There is little doubt that among most professionals in the media we are perceived as a bunch of old guys tinkering around with their radios while the modern world is out there doing the cutting edge stuff on the Internet. There is no doubt that Kids' Day and to a lesser extent Field Day are antidotes to that cliche, but like many cliches, the old guys tinkering has some truth to it. We need to turn that partial truth into a positive news story, even if it's for the AARP magazine Modern Maturity.
PRC Report - 2
We are trying to get a story out of Steve Wozniak whose early ham career in no small way was the genesis of the Apple Computer, but he's been tough to nail down. There are other if somewhat lesser "media stars" who owe at least some of their success to ham radio and we need to corner them and make them work for us.
The ARRL PR awards programs, the McGan Award for nonprofessionals and the newly named Bill Leonard Award for professionals are honoring the instigators of the best ham radio stories of the each year, and each of these programs is in good shape, but there were not enough candidates this year for the McGan Award (perhaps indicating that our volunteers are too few in number). The "Media Hits" column in QST is, I think, extremely helpful in motivating PIOs and PICs to keep up the good work, however thankless the job sometimes seems to be. It's also good reading for hams.
Once again we are going to have the PR Committee annual meeting at the Dayton Hamvention (at minimal cost to the League) and once again we are going to have our annual PR Forum at the Hamvention. Last year we did a "PR Sprint." This year we may be our own version of "Jeopardy." There are only a few actual ARRL forums at Dayton, and we're pleased to be one of them. We urge that Directors and Vice Directors attend our forum to meet our committee members, take part in the fun, and who knows, maybe learn something.
Respectfully submitted,
Dave Bell, W6AQ, PRC Chairman
