About Radio and TV as it relates to HAMS, Publicity and News. Talk and Interview shows: A great way to help promote our hobby, without really trying, is to call Talk Shows! Almost every area has one or more "Talk Radio Stations" that invite phone calls from listeners on a variety of subjects. You could call and include Ham Radio in your conversation. In an open forum, you could call to introduce our hobby to those listening. You may find some item related to a discussion topic that may include Ham Radio. Just talking about our hobby helps spark interest and gets our hobby name in front of the public. Don't be overly technical or complicated. "I just got a QSL for a CW QRP QSO on 75 from a UA1" is real meaningful and exciting to US but not to the general public. A sentence like that makes our hobby too complex and hard to understand for the un-initiated. It is better to say, "I got a post card from a Russian Ham I talked to using a simple radio, low power and Morse Code". That makes our hobby sound more exciting to the public than the jargon laden sentence. Be general and pick one or two aspects to discuss. Don't explain every detail of Ham Radio in one shot. Depending on the program you may get 30 seconds or a few minutes of time to talk "on- air". There is a great deal of competition for every second of "air-time" on large radio and TV stations and networks. Smaller, more local stations generally have more time available. Normal "news". If you, your group or club do something "newsworthy", alert your area Radio and TV stations. If you are providing a public demonstration, Field Day operation, Special Phone Patch or Message services, open house, open club meeting, public service communications, or other similar items, send out a Press Release. Nothing elaborate is needed, a simple letter will suffice and in some instances, a phone call too. Invite them to drop by your activity (but don't expect a large turnout). A Press Release should indicate Who you are, What you are doing, Where, When, What you expect to accomplish as well as a contact person and phone number. See KS1A PR article. Don't forget EDUCATIONAL and school stations - they are usually delighted to be included. Timing of your activity is a key factor in determining how much (if any) exposure you will get. If it is a "slow newsday" your item may get more exposure. Weekends usually are better from our standpoint because there is less "hard" news on weekends and more room or space for "soft" news. About Radio and TV as it relates to HAM PR and news page 2 Public Service Announcements: Many stations offer FREE announcements of your club or group activity or event. Send out notices of upcoming HAM classes, Exam sessions, Club meetings and etc. This may help attendance at your activity, and it gets the words Amateur Radio in front of the public. See the page on Basic Publicity. Hot News: When there is a Ham involved New Story (like various earthquakes, disasters, floods and etc.) the media is hungry for information. Alert your section PIO or other Public Information oriented individual. If you can do more than that, do it and let someone know! Record the communications (see section on AUDIO), make yourself available for interviews or as a source of information gleaned from the Ham communications. If there is no organized or informal Public Information effort in your area then YOU can call local station News departments and tell them what is happening and what you can offer. They will probably want your phone number so they can contact you again. Be sure that the newspeople understand that the information you have comes via HAM RADIO or Amateur Radio Operators (usually at the scene of the disaster). It is NOT NECESSARY that you be part of the team conducting communications (but if you are, so much the better). At times like this, it is usually the News Story that is important to the media, don't confuse the issue with technical details of how you are recording or how a NET works unless asked for the information. Radio and TV stations CAN rebroadcast all HAM transmissions at the discretion of the commercial station. Be SURE that you impress on the newspersons that credit goes to Amateur Radio. Look in the Yellow pages for lists of Radio and TV stations in your area. If you have an answerphone available you may want to record "updates" of recent communications. The phone number can be distributed by the News Services (like United Press International or Associated Press) on local, regional or national levels so that individual stations can call if they are interested. The reports should be short - usually 20-30 seconds each. Of course it is better to have actual recordings of some of the disaster communications available. It does take some practice and training to "edit" things down to something that the Media will like. You can supply the "raw" tape of communications either to broadcast stations or Hams skilled in editing for them to edit. The easier it is for the stations the more they will use the information from the HAMS. K1HLZ ARRL EMA PIC 9/88 rev 3/90