Digital Mode Filters and Courtesy

What do we owe our fellow hams? When we have different ideas about who to have a QSO with, whose wishes should prevail? Should one ham's preference impose an obligation on others?

These are not easy questions to answer in social activity like our, yet many have strong opinions. Indeed, ask around and you will find that some have strong opinions of one kind or another, while others may express indifference and some are uneasy with the question.

It's a question of courtesy, or discourtesy if you prefer. Consider the following scenario. You call CQ DX and a decidedly non-DX station replies to you. You ignore the caller and repeat your CQ DX. There are 4 possible ways to evaluate discourtesy in this scenario:

1. You are discourteous for not accepting the call and having a QSO.
2. The other station is discourteous for replying to a CQ DX.
3. You are both discourteous: the other station for replying and you for not accepting the call.
4. Neither of you are discourteous. The caller tried and failed, you both shrug and move on.

I suspect that many of you have an opinion, perhaps a strong one about who, if anyone, is being discourteous. I don't know which of the four categories your opinion falls into and I don't really care. I also don't care which might be the most popular opinion. I would not be greatly swayed to fall in line with the majority, though some might. 

Were I to alter the scenario, opinions would shift. For example, imagine a DXpedition asking for only stations that need them for an ATNO (all time new one), yet those not among their number continue to call.

Now I'll add an additional wrinkle: the mode. I suspect that for traditional modes like CW and SSB, when you receive a caller from out of area (e.g. non-DX responding to your CQ DX) you are less likely to ignore them than for digital modes like FT8. I respond to them even though I'd rather not. They "feel" more personal to me, and probably for most hams. Usually they just want a signal report, which can be quickly accomplished.

By contrast, on digital modes I regularly ignore non-DX callers when I send a CQ DX. They can take some time, more than on CW and SSB, and time is precious during a 6 meter opening. Am I being discourteous? You be the judge. As I've already shown, there will be a diversity of opinions. I make no apology for my choice.

My use of the digital modes helps to explain my behaviour. It is limited to the following operating activities, in chronological order of my gradual migration to digital mode operation:

1. 6 meters: My primary interest is DXing and digital modes are very effective for the propagation found on the magic band, and sporadic E in particular. I regularly work non-DX on 6 meters but when I do so I send a simple CQ to solicit calls.
   
2. 160 meters: As the amount of CW activity declines outside of contests, I increasingly resort to FT8 to work DX. When I CQ it is always CQ DX, and I mean it.
3. Rare DX: An increasing number of resident operators and DXpeditions to rare entities include no CW operators. A recent examples is FT4GL (Glorioso). So I worked them on FT8. I also worked FT8WW (Crozet) on FT8 as "insurance" in case I was unable to work him on CW.

I have not yet taken to routine use of FT8 and other digital modes. I may change my mind if CW activity outside of contests continues to decline. However that won't happen soon. I can't say how I'll handle non-DX callers in that future world.

As you can see, my digital CQ'ing on 6 and 160 meters is almost exclusively for chasing DX. Anything that interferes with that is cause for annoyance and, where feasible, mitigation. Until recently I avoided using filters so I was not inconvenienced by the lack of filters in WSJT-X.

Instead of switching to JTDX, which has long had filter features, I chose a different option: WSJT-X Improved by DG2YCB. He includes a variety of features not in WSJT-X and that may never be included. One of those is filters. By choosing his "bleeding edge" version of WSJT-X I retain the familiarity of the original and can select from among the additional features. It is exceptionally easy to do the migration since it installs like any version of WSJT-X and keeps the settings common to both and the log file.

After installing the software and experimenting with its novel features, I looked more closely at its filtering capabilities.

My needs are simple so there was very little that I needed to do. I may never use filters other than the blacklist. Obviously I obfuscated the call signs.

It can be occasionally useful to temporarily disable the filters to get the full picture of what stations are being received. The "BP" checkbox does that. I don't use the "Ignore" feature so I'll say no more about it. You can read about all the additional features of WSJT-X Improved in the documentation.

At this point you might be wondering why I filter stations. I ignore callers manually, which only requires that I do nothing. I don't often program the software to auto-respond to callers, and when I do I can easily click the CQ message button.

The blacklist would grow large indeed were I do enter every non-DX caller that replies to my CQ DX. Besides, I might want to work them, just not when I am hunting DX.

I am not even inclined to put many suspected robots in the blacklist. In most cases they don't really bother me. Again, I ignore them. To repeat a point that I made earlier:

A station's desire for a QSO, whether by human or robot, does not create an obligation on my part.

In the past I would occasionally work a robot just so that they would never again bother me. In a few cases I did not log them. I now believe that it's more honest not to work them than not to log them. Filters help me to do what I believe is the right thing, in accord with my needs and interests.

Well then, who goes into my blacklist? I am not driven by anger, to "get back" at anyone or to smugly deal with stations that operate in a manner that I disapprove of, or stations that splatter or QRM others. I do not engage in vendettas or pointless battles. My true reasons are more mundane.

The stations I typically want to eliminate are those that I'll describe as digital mode spam. Those are stations that flood my screen with endless CQing (often an hour or more), that respond to everyone whether they've worked them before or not, hound stations that obviously don't want to work them, and that are sufficiently local that I can't avoid them. Not all are robots though many are. I am rarely annoyed enough to filter a station that is only heard when propagation is favourable to their location.

Of the 4 calls in the filter screen above, 3 of them are local to me (VE2 or VE3 regions) and one is a nearby US station. This time of year I monitor 6 meters whenever I am not doing anything else with the station. I'll leave it monitoring when I'm out of the house and sometimes overnight. Having the monitor screen overflow with their "spam" means that I can easily miss the occasional message from a distant station, either because it scrolled off the screen or, during periods of heavy activity, it is difficult to spot amongst the clutter.

When I put those stations on the blacklist, my band monitoring experience is more pleasant and effective. The monitor window stays empty while the endless CQ's scroll down the waterfall. This is not about hate, disapproval or philosophical differences. I just don't want the screen filled with their clutter. 

I use the blacklist like an email spam filter. I am not even too bothered by distant "spam" since those stations at least inform me that there is propagation in that direction. I only filter the local spam.

I have only ever blacklisted stations heard on 6 meters. For my limited digital mode operating on other bands, I've never had cause to filter anyone else.

The bottom line is that if I don't respond to you it is almost certainly not because you're blacklisted. Either I'm ignoring you or simply not copying your signal. If you wish, you can judge me as being discourteous. I won't care.

I expect my blacklist to remain short. I might even delete entries since people's habits change. Perhaps I'll do that each spring at the start of 6 meter season. I can always add them back if their bad behaviour persists.

Your reasons to filter stations may differ from mine. Indeed, filters are used by few stations: they either don't use them or they stick with WSJT-X which does not support filters.

Many fervent 6 meter DXers use area filters to silence all callers out of the area they are interested in. For example, European DXers that filter all callers from Europe. There is no need to blacklist every station. I have yet to use one of those filters despite the temptation, since I consider it discourteous for a station in Canada or the US, unless they are very far away, to call me when I send CQ DX. 

Sometimes nearby friends answer my CQ DX. I usually reply to them when no DX calls me. I don't blacklist friends! With the limited message diversity on digital modes this is their way of saying hello. Custom messages are a bit of a bother and I've never used them.

I was averse to the use of filters for a long time. Times change. Perhaps the reasoning I've provided in this article can be food for thought as you consider whether and what to filter. I don't expect everyone to agree with my choices.

With the increasing number of hams attracted to 6 meter digital modes -- generally a good thing -- some bring behaviours antithetical to those of us DXing on 6 meter. The small step I've taken with selective filtering is helping to restore my 6 meter summertime experience to what it once was. Now if only propagation were better!