The methods of HF contest refereeing have been discussed widely during the last few years.
Discussions are waged both by contest committees and contestants in various contest reflectors and web-forums. The terms of CQWW contest final result publication are coming closer.
It looks like the number of Disqualified entrants is expected to be high, though most of them will just be moved to different categories.
A program by K1EA has been a major help in revealing rules violations.
The point of last years contests is probably the huge number of protests received by the contest sponsors.
Here on this site we have also received a few comments from an Italian amateur about some Russian contesters, those comments have not been published because they were they were signed with non-existent D4D callsign.
The questions discussed most frequently are:
- demand to keep an audio record of the contest
- ability of an inspection of the contesting position by the contest officials during the contest
- Disqualification of an entrant for a year or even more in this particular contest and probably even in some other major contests
Contest committee members are uncertain about these strict measures as long as they may cause a drop in the number of contest participants.
In the same time the most common rules violation - using DX-cluster and claiming in non-Assisted category - is widespread. Another category, not that widespread spread but growing called in Russia - "Single Operator - 2 radioman" :-)
So I'd like to hear more from our subscribers if they think those operators using DX-clusters and claiming their scores in non-assisted category should be disqualified?
Also I'd like to hear about all other raised topics like sound-records, inspections, and so on.
Maybe some of the readers might like to share their thoughts on these comments.
73 Al 4L5A