Information / News

Dear OMISS Members,

The votes are in, and it is with great pleasure that we announce the winner of the 2011 OM of the Year Award:

James “Sleepy” Cobb KA8III #5952

“Sleepy” will be presented with a nice, wooden plaque containing the following inscription:
OMISS OM OF THE YEAR 2011 KA8III Presented To James C. Cobb OM #5952

By virtue of winning the OM of the Year Award, Sleepy becomes a permanent OMISS VIP.

Godspeed, Sleepy! Congratulations from all of us!

Best regards and 73,

Charlie Gilbert, W4UZI
OMISS
President

Ladies and Gentlemen,

On this special day, we have the distinct honor and privilege of thanking a fellow OMISS Member for his service.

By a Board of Directors action taken on January 8th, 2012, we take great pleasure in announcing that:

Jim “Sleepy” Cobb, KA8III, OM #5952, is awarded the Joe Fish Meritorious Service Award.

Citation

“…. In recognition of exemplary service to OMISS, Jim KA8III, kindly referred to as “Sleepy”, has made numerous and significant contributions to OMISS while serving on the Board of Directors and acting as the 17m Net Coordinator. He has been a true friend to one and all, leaving a positive, lasting impression on everyone he encounters. Jim’s efforts to promote goodwill amongst amateur radio operators are in the finest traditions of the Amateur Radio Service, the OM International Sideband Society, and amateur radio operators around the globe.”

The Joe Fish Meritorious Service Award is a prestigious award. The award, itself, was created in honor of Joe Fish, WG1Q who died in June of 1998, while serving as President of OMISS. During his term, Joe established a sense of excellence for all to follow. In presenting this award, we recognize this same excellence on the part of all who receive it. Having only been awarded seventeen times in the past, the Joe Fish Meritorious Service Award is reserved for members who exhibit exceptional long-term service to the Society - be it voluntary, appointed, or elected. Recipients of this prestigious award become permanent VIP's of the Society.

Congratulations, Sleepy!

Best regards and 73,

Charlie Gilbert, W4UZI
OMISS
President

Dear Fellow OMISS Members,

As a result of two Board of Directors actions taken on 12/11/11, we are pleased to announce the following confirmations to the OMISS Board of Directors:

Secretary: Michael L. Maddox, KI6WOX, effective 12/11/11.

All Bands Net Coordinator: Danny R. Clevenger, W0VD, effective 12/11/11.

Please welcome Mike and Dan to their new positions. We are honored to have them on the Board of Directors, and we look forward to their leadership in the future.

Best regards and 73,



Charlie Gilbert, W4UZI
OMISS
President

Greetings Omiss Members,

To maintain the free QSL Bureau and keep it functioning in an efficient manner, we have found it necessary to make some adjustments. Effective 12/09/11, the free OMISS QSL Bureau has been reorganized to operate out of two locations instead of three. Please read the FAQ, which follows:

FAQ.

Question 1:
Where do I send my Self-Addressed Stamped Envelopes (SASE)?

Answer:
If your call sign starts with A, N, or W, send your SASE to KB4BML.

If your call sign starts with K, send your SASE to KF5RD.

Question 2:
Where do I send my OUTGOING QSL Cards?

Answer:
Everyone’s OUTGOING QSL cards will be sent as follows:

OUTGOING QSL cards that start with A, N, W, and DX QSL cards go to KB4BML.

OUTGOING QSL cards that start with K go to KF5RD.

Check Netlogger or the OMISS website to see if the station worked is good in the bureau before sending OUTGOING QSL’s. Send QSL’s direct if station does not have envelopes in the bureau.

Mailing Addresses:

K Bureau

Peter Mann, KF5RD
722 South 138th East Ave.
Tulsa, OK 74108
KF5RD@omiss.net

A, N, W, DX Bureau

Charissa Dunham, KB4BML
1405 S. Montebello
Olathe, KS 66062
n.dunham@att.net

Complete QSl Bureau information may be found Here.

Family Tree Award - Work 5 (or more) members of your Family Tree. Your family tree consists of all members whose OMISS# ends in the same two digits as yours.

Perfect Attendance Award - Work 30 different Omiss Members, one each day, on any OMISS Net, for 30 consecutive calendar days.

Centurion Award - Work 80 OMISS members whose OMISS #s are from the same century (i.e. starts with the same first two digits...)

Some of these awards include additional endorsements and award levels.

Complete details are available on the OMISS website under Awards Rules.

Effective immediately, members now have the option of receiving their Awards Certificates by email.


Members taking advantage of this option will receive their certificates immediately, by email, without the hassle of waiting on snail mail delivery.

In addition, the normal $1 fee for awards processing will be waived.
This service is free and applies only to paper certificate awards.

To take advantage of this option, when you submit your next award application, please let the Awards Manager know that you prefer to receive your award by email.

It’s as simple as that.

Fred, Kc9nn sent me an email which roused me from my lethargy so got on 20m and 80m yesterday.

While listening to about 100 OM members, I wandered through a long and happy list of OM memories. Here a few: When we talked of newsletter, suggested OMISSILE; was president of OM for a couple of years a long long time ago; For a few years, we had get-together's in Louisville and what fun they were! Used to run nets--at one time I ran three of them per day till was rescued by net
controllers.

The computer, band noise and bad band conditions slowed down my ham activity and it hasn't quite recovered yet.

Had my 90th birthday in Feb. but am still in quite good health. I no longer have a guide dog but have a good companion chocolate lab named Piper.

You'll probably hear her bark on OM sometimes from now on. OM has grown so much but I am going to have to make lots of new friends.

+++++++++++


You can view Helen's member profile here.

There have been some additions to the OMISS.prf file used by NetLogger. The goal is to provide additional information about who can be worked for which awards.

In addition to the GIB (good in bureau) information and M D E F P codes you will also see:

V - To designate an OMISS VIP who can be worked for the VIP award
(see complete award rules)

T - To designate a Top Op of the Month award recipient who can be
worked at any time for the Kings and Queens Award


There are three more codes which are not award specific, but recognize individual honors or accomplishments, and also signifies a station that can either help with 'whatever', or probably knows who can.

Y - To designate an OM of the Year Award recipient

Q - To designate an NCS of the Quarter Award recipient

N - To designate a Certified OMISS Net Control Station


And remember, if this does not work out for some reason, we can always go back to the old way.

Have you read the blog? Why not check it out....

Do you want to contribute to the blog? Drop a note to the webmaster.

All pages on the OMISS web site now have a ShareThis icon in the top right corner. By clicking on the ShareThis link, you can share the page you are looking at with whomever you like in whatever format you choose. Email it, txt it, Facebook it, Blog it, Tweet it -- ShareThis supports them all.
Why not give it a try today?

A listing of Operating Awards granted in the last 14 days is now available on the OMISS news and information page, which is located here.

The whole idea here is to help our members toot their horn in recognition of their accomplishments.

This listing is dynamically updated when the page is presented, so it should always be current.

A while back I solicited input from the OMISS membership concerning the website. This weekend I finally had the time to address the remaining issues.

* I have created a forms page. All OMISS forms can be found here as well as in their original locations. Links are on the home, news/info and awards pages.

* The Rosters page now has links to the First Responder and Military Rosters. Those pages also now have direct links to the pages where you can add or update your listing on those rosters.

* The anticipated NCS Schedule can now be displayed on the home page by pressing a button. I used Google Calendars for this because its free, fast, and full featured. I expect a little howling about this at first. The calendar is in UTC to match the published net times. However, some folks may be visually confused at first. e.g. The 80 meter net I run on Thursday nights (my local time) appears on the calendar, quite correctly, @ 02:00 UTC on Friday.

* The latest news headlines from various sources can now be displayed on he home page on demand. This is a common use of RSS -- gathering content from other sources and displaying it on your own site.

* I added permanent links for the Checkin Archive to the home and news/info page.

Today I created an RSS feed for the OMISS News and Information page.

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. Wikipedia has a very good introductory article on RSS here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rss

Another common use is for end users to subscriber to RSS feeds from multiple sources (web sites, blogs, online newspapers and magazines) and present it in an aggregated form with links back to the original source.

Why should you care? Well if you use iGoogle or MyYahoo!, for example, you can add the OMISS RSS feed right to your page and see whats new without having to go to the OMISS web site.

You might want to give RSS a try. Just look for the RSS icon>

To access the Archive.

1. Point your browser to http://omiss.net/Facelift/listCheckinHistory.php (A permanent link will soon be added to the menu system)

2. Select a net from the list and click Submit or press Enter. (As the list grows you will need to scroll the page or use CTRL-F to locate the net that interests you.)

3. The Checkin list, summary, and graph appear. To view the checkin's on a Google map click the Map It! item on the OMISS Tools sidebar. The map can be scrolled or zoomed in/out using the map controls.

Important notes:
*Not all nets are listed.* -- NCS stations are not required to use Netlogger, in which case there would be nothing to archive. In order for a net to be listed, the NCS must send out the checkin list via the OMISS website. (We are almost at 100% compliance with this process.) Nothing can be done to recover any *missing* nets.

*Some nets have multiple entries.* -- This is most likely because the list was uploaded more than once, perhaps to correct a problem. Please report what you believe to be duplicate net entries to the webmaster for investigation.

Dear Fellow OMISS Members,

I am extremely honored to have been selected as the 15th President of OMISS. It is with deep humility that I accept the responsibilities of this office, and I ask for your continued support as OMISS moves forward into 2011.

As we approach the 30th Anniversary of OMISS, it boggles the mind to think that from very humble beginnings, back in 1981, OMISS remains a vibrant and proud organization to this day. Indeed, over the course of the past twenty-nine years, OMISS has proven over and over, again, that it is a class act. One of my main goals, as President, will be to maintain this strong heritage and carry the very best traditions of the Society forward into the future.

As the newly elected Board of Directors takes office, we take pause to thank Greg AE9W and Warren WA4ZOP for their outstanding leadership. While serving as President and Secretary of OMISS, Greg and Warren consistently demonstrated a strong sense of values, which served as a moral compass for all to follow. Their presence on the Board will be sorely missed. We look forward to their continued support of OMISS in the future.

In closing, I thank the membership for putting its trust in me. It will be an honor to serve. Please keep in touch.

Best regards and 73,

Charlie W4UZI #6193
OMISS President

The results of the OMISS 2010 Election are as follows:

President: W4UZI / Charlie / KY / 6193

Vice President: K0MAF / Jack / MO / 5274

Secretary: KA8MMI / Neil / KS / 4538

Treasurer: K5ENA / John / OK / 4604

Director: ND8F / Homer / GA / 774

Director: KA8III / Jim / OH / 5952

Congratulations to the winners! We had a record turnout this year with more votes cast than in any previous election on record. We wish to thank everyone who participated, to include the Nominating Committee, those who made the nominations, those who ran for Elective Office, and last, but not least, all the members who voted.

Thank you, OMISS.

Some thoughts about tuning up for the net.

Click HERE to read.

Just when you thought you had heard it all...

Kudos to N4JTE Bob, #1440
Download it here...(Right Click - Save Link As...)

Here is something every OMISS member should be proud to own and display.

We asked Bill K5YRT at www.hamplaques.com if he had ever considered offering an OMISS organizational plaque and he came up with a really nice product offering that you can purchase on the web at: http://hamplaques.com/o-omiss.htm

This is something you can even ask the XYL to buy for that "Ham that has everything." (i.e. you) it is fairly priced, it doesn't take up a lot of space, and it is100% guaranteed not to cause TVI, hi hi. Click on the image above for a larger view...

OMISS has nothing to do with the pricing or payment, so please direct any of those questions to Bill K5YRT.

The folks over at Hosenose.com have incorporated support for OMISS into their products for years, so we decided to reciprocate.

LOGic 8 can programmatic-ally import the OMISS roster and track ANY OMISS award.
Click the banner ad and read for yourself. (There is even a free demo.)

How many of you know that "Cheap QSL's" is run by one of our own members? Hal, K6RF #5240 has special pricing on QSL cards for OMISS Members. I just sent him a few more OMISS logos to use, so if you're looking for a card that has the OMISS look, check out his web page at http://cheapqsls.com/club_omiss.htm.

OMISS Mugs Available!

After working with Rick, NV5A "The Signman of Baton Rouge" on a design for an OMISS Mug, we have come up with one that any OMISS Member would be proud to display in the shack - or at work!

To view the mug and/or place an order for one, surf on over to: http://www.thesignman.com/clubs/omiss.html and see what you think. OMISS has nothing to do with the pricing or payment, so please direct any of those questions to Rick, NV5A.

When sending corrections or news items for the web site, be sure to include the web address (URL) for the pages you are correcting.

Frequently, it is difficult to find content without knowing which pages to look at. Please send all corrections and news items to the address at the bottom of this page.