Are Millennials are Killing Ham Radio??

In a thought-provoking blog post, Sterling Coffey N0SSC discusses the current state of Amateur Radio and its future
 
He notes not every young person has a Mom who's sufficiently well off to spend $1000+ on an HF rig for their offspring - Remote Stations could provide the answer:  
 
Sterling suggests because young people do not often have access to the the kind of money an HF radio station requires, I strongly believe to captivate more young people, we need to do more of one of these two things.
- Promote your club’s shack, your own shack to young people.
- Put your shack on a remote service provider for others to use when you’re not."
 
But Amateur Radio should not just be about people-to-people communications but people-to-machine comms as well: 

...what’s much more interesting and impactful to the next generation is is the idea of people-to-machine communication. In other words, Digital Voice is dumb, Digital Data is smart, and the only ways to utilize digital data are explicitly NOT provided by the commercial manufacturers of amateur radio, but instead by Adafruit, Ubiquiti; HackRF, RFSpace, and USRP; and soon FaradayRF, among others.

Older Callsigns Available from Ofcom

Following a freedom of information request by Derek Flewin, Ofcom has made available a list of (unassigned) amateur radio call signs

Requests like this have been made in the past and Ofcom provided a list of callsigns that are available to anybody who has just passed a Foundation, Intermediate or Full exam.

We no longer hold a list of available amateur radio callsigns, as we now use a system that randomly allocates callsigns upon request
— Ofcom Request

For someone who'd just passed their Advanced exam, these lists have shown them that Ofcom would issue G0, G1, G6 and even G3 call signs if they asked for it via the online system.

Full Freedom of Information Request - https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/unallocated_uk_amateur_radio_cal_4#incoming-1071737

 

10 Watt EME contact from Essex

On 2nd December 2017, Essex radio amateur/ham operator Dorothy operating M6EBQ achieved a Moonbounce EME contact using just 10 watts

The contact was made with DL7APV on 432.063 MHz using a Yaesu FT857 running 10 watts, using mode JT65B into a 17 element yagi mounted on a short pole less than 2 metres above the ground. The signal made a round-trip of some 768,800 km.

Essex Ham Story - https://www.essexham.co.uk/news/essex-eme-success.html

Essex DX Group - https://www.facebook.com/mx0cns/