BE Informed No. 1.  W3BE CHECKLISTS - Use to review your duties before causing or allowing a station to transmit on amateur service frequencies. The applicable Part 97 Rules are rearranged into two lists; those that apply to the station licensee and those that apply to the control operator.

  BE Informed No. 2.  RILEY'S LIST Of GOOD AMATEUR PRACTICES - Amateur radio's best friend tells it like it should be.

  BE Informed No. 3. SECTION 97.113 SMELL TEST - Your station should never be used for any communication unless "No" can be answered truthfully and completely to each and every one of eleven questions.

  BE Informed No. 4. WHICH CALL SIGN? - Explains your options and accountability when someone wants to use your station apparatus or vice-versa.

  BE Informed No. 5.  EVALUATION OF JULY 1, 2007 ELEMENT 3 QUESTION POOL - For VEs and instructors; identifies defective, freebee, trick and misleading questions.  Also identifies questions not needed to know in order operate a station properly with General Class operator privileges and questions unnecessary because reference materials are widely available.  Also identifies questions that should have been asked in Element 2.

  BE Informed No. 6.1 REVIEW OF QUESTIONS IN ELEMENT 2 POOL EFFECTIVE JULY 1, 2010 - For volunteer examiners, instructors, training aid providers and examinees.

  BE Informed No. 7. ALL ABOUT THIRD PARTY COMMUNICATIONS - Tutorial for instructors and others who want to really understand what third party communications is all about; includes section on Advanced Studies for 1, 2 and 3 Party Communications.

  BE Informed No. 8. COLLECTION OF EXCUSES - Collection of reasons for not complying with the FCC rules. Reality-based dark humor.

  BE Informed No. 9.  HAMFEST UNIFORM - We should all wear color-coded apparel so that anyone can see our class of operator license just by looking.  Humor.

    BE Informed No. 10.1  INSTRUCTIONS TO THE QUESTION POOL COMMITTEE.  Thought to be the instructions thought to have been adopted by the National Conference of VECs on July 24, 2009.

  BE Informed No. 11.  QCWA VETERAN'S ID PETITION - Amendment of Part 97 of the Commission's Rules to Provide for Recognition of Amateur Operators Who Have Served in the United States Military.

  BE Informed No. 12.  CW FOREVER! -  W3BE denounces no-code quickie drive-thru exams.

  BE Informed No. 13.  A TIME TO RENEW - W3BE's personal experience in renewing his amateur operator/primary station license on-line.

  BE Informed No. 14.  ABOUT THAT STATION IDENTIFICATION - Section 97.119 and excerpts from FCC webpage;  Includes recommendations for appended self-assigned indicators.

  BE Informed No. 15.  CLUB STATION LICENSE GRANT DOCUMENT OF ORGANIZATION GO-BY - Discusses requirement for obtaining a club station license grant; Includes a sample Document of Organization.

  BE Informed No. 16.  OBTAINING A NEW CLUB STATION LICENSE GRANT WITH A DECEASED MEMBER'S FORMER CALL SIGN - Includes examples of consent letters.

  BE Informed No. 17.  WHO DISCOVERED RADIO? - Ray Dio's report. Humor. 

  BE Informed No. 18.  READ THE RULES - HEED THE RULES - W3BE's arguments for complying with the FCC rules.

  BE Informed No. 19.  AMATEUR STATION ANTENNA STRUCTURES - Section 97.15(b) says: Except as otherwise provided herein, a station antenna structure may be erected at heights and dimensions sufficient to accommodate amateur service communications. (State and local regulation of a station antenna structure must not preclude amateur service communications. Rather, it must reasonably accommodate such communications and must constitute the minimum practicable regulation to accomplish the state or local authority's legitimate purpose. See PRB-1, 101 FCC 2d 952 (1985) for details.)  In PRB-1, the FCC granted a Request for Declaratory Ruling.

  BE Informed No. 20.  YOUR CLUB CAN OBTAIN A CLUB STATION LICENSE GRANT.

  BE Informed No. 21.  HOW TO OBTAIN YOUR DECEASED RELATIVE'S FORMER CALL SIGN

  BE Informed No. 22.  BE IT RESOLVED - In recognition of the importance of the International Morse telegraphy code to the amateur radio service, the Board of Directors of the QCWA expresses its support for the continued authorization of International Morse telegraphy coded on-off CW transmissions on all frequencies on all amateur radio service frequency bands.

  BE Informed No. 23.  RILEY'S TALK - - Remarks by Riley Hollingsworth, K4ZDH EMCOMM WEST & PACIFICON May 2009; Egyptian Radio Fest June 2009.  Boise, Reno, St Louis.

  BE Informed No. 24.  WE ARE REGULATABLE (Aren't we?)  - From the questions asked by readers, our amateur service community seems to be having difficulty in adapting to digital technology, particularly with systems of stations.

  BE Informed No. 25.  WHO MUST THROW THE BIG RED SWITCH? -  W3BE standards for a control operator of a station transmitting third party message.

  BE Informed No. 26.  AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION AND THE AMERICAN RADIO RELAY LEAGUE, INC., WITH REPEECT TO AMATEUR VOLUNTEERS -  The FCC and the ARRL agree to cooperate in a joint effort to improve rules compliance in the Amateur Radio Service, as provided for in Public Law 97-259 (the Communications Act of 1982.)

 BE Informed No. 27.  PETITION TO RESTORE PRIVILEGES.  Request to take corrective action facilitating the restoration of  privileges withdrawn from Advanced and General Class operator licensees on November 22, 1968.

  BE Informed No. 28. THE MAGIC OF RADIO -  Remarks of Riley Hollingsworth, Special Counsel for the Spectrum Enforcement Division of the FCC's Enforcement Bureau, at FCC Forum 2008 Dayton Hamvention

  BE Informed No. 29.  A QUIET YEAR   Remarks of William Cross of the Mobility Division of the FCC's Wireless Telecommunications Bureau at the annual FCC Forum at the 2008 Dayton Hamvention.

  BE Informed No. 30.  GEPS AND GAPS - A collection of observations, including W3BE's proposed good engineering practices ("GEPs") and good amateur practices ("GAPs") most of which have appeared in the WorldRadio Rules & Regs column THE RULES SAY... .  

  BE Informed No. 31.  HAMSLANGUAGE   The probable meanings of unofficial words and phrases sometimes used in our amateur service community.

  BE Informed No. 32.  STANDARD TERMS AND PHRASES -  A collection for writers about the amateur radio service.

  BE Informed No. 33.  OUR TPMSP "CLASS"  - A report on a movement underway within a segment of our amateur service community that is bent on changing dramatically our operator class structure.

  BE Informed No. 34.  15 STEPS TO MAINTAINING QUESTION POOLS - All 14 VECs must cooperate in maintaining one question pool for each written examination.  This file suggests series of 15 detailed steps for carrying out this work.

  BE Informed No. 35.  W3BE COMMENTS IN RM-10867 -  Comments as filed with the FCC on April 2, 2004.  It proposes and operator class structure for the 21st Century would make it possible for our amateur service community to continue fulfilling its obligations.

  BE Informed No. 36.  HOW TO DUMB-DOWN AN EXAMINATION QUESTION -  Illustrates the limitations on writing a question for the VECs' question pools.  

  BE Informed No. 37.  EVALUATION OF JULY 1, 2008 ELEMENT 4 QUESTION POOL - For VEs and instructors; identifies defective, freebee, trick and misleading questions.  Also identifies questions not needed to know in order operate a station properly with Amateur Extra Class operator privileges and questions unnecessary because reference materials are widely available.  Also identifies questions that should have been asked in Elements 2 or 3.

  BE Informed No. 38.  TERMS USED IN PART 97 OF THE FCC RULES - A collection of terms used in Part 97 of the FCC rules.

  BE Informed No. 39.  VEC'S QUESTION POOL SYLLABI - A compilation of the three syllabi.

  BE Informed No. 40.  END OF THE WORLD - Ray Dio advises.

  BE Informed No. 41.  THE SIGNIFICANCE OF MY NOVICE RIG - 1954 homebrew 6AG6-6l6 and its meaning.

  BE Informed No. 42.  GET YOUR POOLS RIGHT!  W3BE report delivered at the 2009 VEC Conference

  BE Informed No. 43.  PHOTO REPORT FROM THE 2009 VEC CONFERENCE

 BE Informed No. 44.  PROVIDING EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS - Questions and answers about the amateur service rules during emergencies 

  BE Informed No. 45.  REMOTE BASE, REPEATER AND OTHER SYSTEMS - FAQ  answers numerous questions from readers. 

  BE Informed No. 46.  SOME THINGS ABOUT REPEATERS THAT YOU MAY NOT KNOW - From talks given in December 2009.     

  BE Informed No. 47.  SUPERHAMS of 2009 - Those who were named SUPERHAM-OF-THE-MONTH in the column THE RULES SAY...in WorldRadio On-line during the year.

  BE Informed No. 48.  FILING COMMENTS ON FCC RULE MAKING PROPOSALS.

  BE Informed No. 49.  QCWA 2009 CARIBBEAN CRUISE - Photos from the cruise of a lifetime.

  BE Informed No. 50.  HOW TO BE CLUB PRESIDENT - Advice when your luck turns bad and you have to serve - Humor

  BE Informed No. 52.  INCLUDING A SELF-ASSIGNED INDICATOR WITH YOUR STATION CALL SIGN - Recommendations for appending self-assigned indicators consistent with Section 97.119(d).

  BE Informed No. 53. COMMENTS IN WP Docket NO. 10-72.

  BE Informed No. 54.  RECONSTITUTING PART 99 OF THE FCC RULES PROVIDING FOR A DISASTER RADIO SERVICE -  Petition for Rule Making to enable our amateur service community to provide radio services during a disaster without negatively compromising the integrity of our amateur radio services or our status as amateur radio operators.

Read the rules - Heed the rules

Parts 0, 1, 2, 17, 97 and 214. 

Question about the amateur service rules? e-mail john@johnston.net

Report rule violations to fccham@fcc.gov