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<div dir="auto"><span style="font-size: 16px">The latest ‘award’ from the HamAward farm appears to be running with the callsign </span><span style="font-size: 16px">II0LOVE.</span><span style="font-size: 16px"><br /></span><span style="font-size: 16px"><br /></span><span style="font-size: 16px">Spots are definitely appearing more than once every ten minutes for that station, sometimes coming through from the same ‘spotter’ every couple of minutes.</span><span style="font-size: 16px"><br /></span><span style="font-size: 16px"><br /></span><span style="font-size: 16px">73 Keith G6NHU</span></div>
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<div name="messageReplySection">On 4 Feb 2025 at 16:13 +0000, Dirk Koopman via Dxspider-support <dxspider-support@tobit.co.uk>, wrote:<br />
<blockquote type="cite" style="border-left-color: grey; border-left-width: thin; border-left-style: solid; margin: 5px 5px;padding-left: 10px;">
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">And while we are on this subject and since this debacle, I have been seeing quite a few of these:<br />
<br />
<font face="monospace">sh/dx info {\d\d\.\d\d}<br />
G1TLH de GB7DJK 4-Feb-2025 1607Z dxspider ><br />
14010.0 IT9MRM 4-Feb-2025 1605Z 16.05 SOMMERGIBILE CALVI S-68 <IT9ECY><br />
7098.0 IT9MRM 4-Feb-2025 1603Z 16.02 SOMMERGIBILE CALVI S-68 <IT9CHC><br />
7074.0 IQ9AAP 4-Feb-2025 1600Z 16.00 Accredit Station A. Vespucci <IT9BGB><br />
7074.0 IQ9AAP 4-Feb-2025 1558Z 15.48 AW. AMERIGO VESPUCCI <IK1JNP><br />
7074.0 IQ9AAP 4-Feb-2025 1553Z 15.53 IQ'S DISTRICT ARMI VESPUCCI <IT9CHA><br />
7074.0 IQ9AAP 4-Feb-2025 1543Z 15.43 A. VESPUCCI ACCREDIT STATION <IT9CHC><br />
7098.0 IT9MRM 4-Feb-2025 1541Z 16.41 SOMMERGIBILE CALVI S 68 <IT9ECY><br />
7074.0 IQ9AAP 4-Feb-2025 1538Z 15.38 IQ\'S DISTRICT ARMI VESPUCCI AW <IT9ECY><br />
7094.0 IQ9AAP 4-Feb-2025 1517Z 15.17 IQ'S DISTRICT ARMI VESPUCCI <IT9CHA><br />
</font><br />
Exactly why someone wishes to unnecessarily add an extra 6 bytes of bandwidth to each spot, repeating the spotted time, is beyond me.<br />
<br />
Is this related to IU1NSA's venture below?<br />
<br />
73 Dirk G1TLH<br />
<br />
On 04/02/2025 15:17, Dirk Koopman via Dxspider-support wrote:<br /></div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite="mid:af86ed86-60d8-420b-9bf1-be5835cdfbd2@tobit.co.uk">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" />
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Lorenzo<br />
<br />
Not in any particular order:<br />
<ul>
<li>You are a commercial entity which decided, without ever asking anyone, whether it would be OK to AUTOMATICALLY send spots to the network. And doing this to the extent that about half of all spots were WWA related for several days.<br /></li>
<li>You are using bandwidth provided by others - at their expense - for your commercial gain.<br /></li>
<li>Someone contacted you and was informed that this would stop last Wednesday, but it didn't stop until the evening before least weekend's contest.</li>
<li>For at least the first three days, spots were being sent from unknown users (who were not visibly logged on anywhere) on unknown nodes with apparently forged IP addresses from a node connection (apparently in the USA) that was not visible on the network. There was very little "Ham Spirit" visible there.<br /></li>
<li>As for validating users via qrz.com, a quick scan through the archive will tell you that you are, at best, misinformed.<br /></li>
<li>We all noticed that once we started to filter out this traffic that your tactics changed - for the better - but not enough, so no cigar.<br /></li>
<li>I looked at your website on the day that this started any the ONLY information that I could find (not easily) was a very odd postal address suggesting a location in Italy. No callsign, no email address - nothing useful.<br /></li>
<li>We have no bias against anyone that uses the system responsibly. And we define "responsibly" as a human operator either typing a spot or pressing a (function) key in a user app.</li>
<li>You are not the only app/system that sends stuff automatically. Whichever Ftx app(s) are automatically spotting each contact that they hear/make are next on my list. </li>
</ul>
<p>If you wish / need a distributed channel for communications through the network. There are better methods of doing that without diluting the spot feed. The user base can do that, manually, well enough without machine help :-(.<br /></p>
<p>Your assumption that your idea of "Ham Spirit" would allow your app to do what it did managed to piss off all the active node sysops and a large proportion of the existing user base. As well as causing the sysops a lot of extra work trying to manage it.<br /></p>
<p>But, on a positive note, I had a good hard look at the filtering code, fixed a few small bugs and improved the debugging messages so that, next time, when someone tries something that behaves in a dumping huge gobs of spots on the network - we will be better prepared.</p>
<p>If you wish to discuss how to use the network responsibly, and in the first instance, please feel free to contact me directly.</p>
<p>But, BE WARNED, any attempt to flood spots onto the network will not be permitted. And will hold you to your statement saying that all spots are generated manually and will insist your system makes sure that users are logged into (a) real node(s) with real IP addresses. I may yet invoke the "nuclear option" of dumping all protocol spots from users that cannot be identified in real time, one way or another, via the routing tables for all active users/nodes that each DXSpider node has. </p>
<p>Dirk G1TLH <br /></p>
<br />
On 04/02/2025 14:14, Dirk Koopman via Dxspider-support wrote:<br /></div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite="mid:2327fdf3-d1dd-4cbf-9ef2-ccef38d6c6a7@tobit.co.uk">On 04/02/2025 14:02, Lorenzo IU1NSA via Dxspider-support wrote:<br />
<blockquote type="cite">Good afternoon,<br />
<br />
I am Lorenzo IU1NSA, and I am part of the HamAward team.<br />
First of all, I would like to thank Niklas for informing us about this mailing list.<br />
<br />
I am writing to express our deep concern regarding the recent ban of our node IU1NSA-6 and the IPs of HamAward, which we only became aware of thanks to reports from our users during an important event. Operators informed us that their spots were not appearing on many web clusters, forcing us to intervene promptly to ensure the proper execution of the event, in respect of both participants and sponsors involved.<br />
<br />
We are unable to understand the reasons for this ban, especially since we never received any prior communication, neither directed to IU1NSA nor to HamAward. From the emails you exchanged, it is evident that some of you visited our website: I therefore wonder why none of our contacts, clearly visible on every page, were used to reach out to us and clarify any doubts. This total lack of communication has left us puzzled and concerned, considering the impact such decisions can have on the activities of thousands of operators.<br />
<br />
Personally, I was particularly struck by the attitude of Luigi Carlotto IK5ZUK. I know Luigi IK5ZUK well, as we collaborated to organize the WRTC 2022 cluster node in Italy, and until recently, we exchanged advice on which servers to rent for managing our nodes.<br />
Moreover, Luigi IK5ZUK has my direct phone number, and we have often communicated via WhatsApp. Therefore, I find it difficult to understand why he decided to ban my node without even contacting me, despite having the means to quickly resolve any issues. This behavior, combined with your arbitrary handling of the situation, forced us to reorganize independently to continue our activities, while also raising concerns about a potential unjustified bias against us.<br />
<br />
I would like to emphasize that the HamAward platform complies with all the rules required for sending spots: every user is registered through a mandatory QRZ authentication procedure and can only spot under their own name, with a limit of once every 10 minutes. There has never been any flooding of the network, and no spot has been generated automatically. All spots were manually submitted by users. Your assumptions regarding automation do not reflect the reality of the situation.<br />
<br />
We believe that banning nodes without first attempting to contact us for clarification is inconsistent with the Ham spirit, especially when all the necessary means to do so were readily available. This is even more serious considering that we have official agreements with A.R.I. Italia for the management of awards, and the HamAward node was banned even during one of these official events. I wonder what the Ham spirit represents when an activity linked to A.R.I. itself is blocked.<br />
<br />
We feel it is important to open a direct dialogue with you to understand the reasons behind what happened and, above all, to prevent similar situations from occurring in the future. Transparency and communication are fundamental to the proper functioning of this community.<br />
<br />
I take this opportunity to commend you for the excellent work you do in managing the network and Dirk G1TLH for the development of DXSpider software, which represents a benchmark for all of us.<br />
We appreciate the work you do and recognize your technical expertise, and we hope that in the future we can establish a more transparent and direct dialogue, with mutual respect and for the benefit of the entire community.<br />
<br />
I look forward to your response.<br />
<br />
Kind regards,<br />
Lorenzo IU1NSA<br />
<br />
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