We have about a hundred Associations. If they all want an annual update that would be eight a month or two a week, then there are new Associations, we have at least ten in preparation, do they get higher or lower priority than updates? The work flow has to be managed, there is no getting over that fact, the work doesn’t do itself! We try and allow a slot for annual updates all around but Associations have to take turns.
Brian
Every new association has been in the same position since 1 May 2013. That means it was done for 5700 summits in the following associations:
VK9 - Australia - Islands
W4K - USA Kentucky
W9 - USA (W9)
W8M - USA - Michigan
KH6 - USA - Hawaii
W4A - USA - Alabama
W8O - USA - Ohio
VK2 - Australia - NSW
VK4 - Australia - Queensland
K0M - USA - Minnesota
W0N - USA - Nebraska
VK8 - Australia - Northern Territory
EA6 - Balearic Islands
VE9 - Canada (New Brunswick)
W0D - USA - Dakotas
YU - Serbia
VK6 - Australia WA
KP4 - USA Puerto Rico
VK7 - Tasmania
CU - Azores
R9U - Russia - Urals
On the contrary - I kept being asked to submit the update as the MT was “making a special exception as an update could normally only be made at the time of the original launch”.
Can anyone tell me where I would find this rule?
Does that make the fact that these requirements have never been officially published or communicated any better?
They must have been communicated or you wouldn’t know about them!
Why should you expect to find everything posted on line? The information that you need to perform administrative tasks is given to you at the time - would you rather that we published all the necessary little jobs to keep every part of SOTA running in one place and expect you to search for them when you need them? No, when you need them we tell you what they are. That way you get the current requirements leaving us to worry about silly little things like Google changing its working and leaving us trying to recover data.
We ask for information like the col positions because experience has shown us that it is necessary to have that data. Rest assured that these things are not introduced just to annoy you by making more work for you - and incidentally for us, too. Remember - you only have to deal with one Association, we have to deal with all of them.
Brian
Just trying to calm down the things a bit, I think that these questions are stated clear enough at point 3.6 of the GR:
“3.6 Adding and deleting summits
The list of Summits for an Association is not necessarily exhaustive. It is acceptable that the list will evolve over time, as the Programme develops within the Association.
Summits can be added to the Programme provided they meet the definition agreed for the Association. A Summit that is added in this way will be valid for general activation from the date that the Reference Number is issued.
The Management Team reserves the right to demand sufficient information to confirm that any proposed summit meets the required criteria. Such information may include references in publicly-available independent lists (e.g. www.peaklist.org), official government publications, or the results of detailed analysis of mapping data. In the event that such additional information is not supplied, the summit will not be added to the Programme.”
I think that the MT would be allowed to ask for information concerning the summits definitions, and, by the other hand, summits catalog updates could be asked for at anytime, not only when the association starts (always depending on everybody’s free time, prelation, and other factors).
I think we probably cannot agree on every point, but IMHO, we are trying to build something, and please, let’s do it following the ham spirit of cooperation and polite behaviour.
73, Mikel
Hello Walt,
An example for Germany:
Night night
Mike
Dear Guru,
I think we cannot complain about summits number in our Association. Having some 52 SOTA associations in Europe, if you calculate the ratio between surface and summits number, you can see where we are placed on the list. 
73 de Mikel
I would be interested to know where you got those figures, Mike, because to the best of my knowledge the AM has not finished his revision and furnished us in the MT with any figures. Assuming that they are correct, note that this gives a total of 310 valid P150 summits. In the G Association we have 176 valid P150 summits, so the DM Association can hardly complain of a shortage of summits. There is more to it than that, too - last Tuesday I activated Binsey LD-041, a nice summit and good value for one point, but in DM it would have been worth two points and attracted a winter bonus of three points in season.
By the way, do you know how many summits were removed in the 2008 revision? It was 3676, not one of which reached P100, at least one of them could be said to have negative prominence in that it was a point on the shoulder of a higher summit.
Explain something to me, Mike, why do you seem to think that DM should be excused from conforming to rules that apply to the rest of the world? What is your interest in this?
Brian
You couldn’t have expressed the MT’s attitude any better - this is exactly the reason for my complaint!
Sylvia
I see no grounds for complaint.
Brian
You are definitely right, Mikel. I agree with you and I would even say not only that we can’t complain but we are highly fortunate with so many summits around within a short distance from our QTH’s.
I must confess that in a 100 Km radius circle from my QTH, I have many more summits than I can activate in a year given the WX and my currently little free time with work, a non ham XYL and 3 little kids, plus a house with garden plus a dog, plus… many things.
I’ll forget about that idea of p100 for EA2 and will try to activate little by little all of the many p150 summits we currently have, which would take me several years.
Best 73 de Guru
No - only new summits unless we questioned a specific existing summit. Here is an example that anyone can check using the SMP. Start from VB-005 Signalhorn 3210m and work NW along the ridge to VB-008 Silvretta-Egghorn 3147m. For VB-008 Silvretta-Egghorn to be P150 vs VB-005 Signalhorn we would expect to see a col/saddle between the two down to 3007m i.e 3147-150 but both are clearly contained within the 3100m contour so max prominence for VB-008 appears to be 47m a long way short of 150m but to be precise we would need to know the col/saddle location and height. You may have to use the Windows magnifier to see this.
I could list dozens of similar examples not just in OE, So to ensure that proposals for additional summits or new associations are properly thought out before submission, and save ourselves time in checking, we do require the co-ordinates and height of the col to be provided.
Fortunately in the UK such data is available at http://www.hills-database.co.uk/ and in the US at http://listsofjohn.com/
73 Jim G0CQK
This was an intermediate result of my work on the reply regarding P150. You will realize, HE is still missing in this table. You will agree, finishing my work and evaluating the impact of P150 before presenting it to the MT is a good idea. One topic was finding out the participants’ opinion regarding a possible change in the summit lists.
By the way, Rob has received my official statement just a few minutes before via email, so the MT is completely up to date now.
No, winter bonus in DM starts above 900 m. LD-041 is only 447m in height, so no winter bonus for it. BTW the 900m for winter bonus are higher than in similar countries like OK.
In my email to the MT dated 31.01.2015 I had proposed correcting the height bands for DM in case the MT is unhappy with the amount of points German activators can achieve. This proposal was not commented by the MT up to now. So this argument does not count!
And the reference manual containing these 3676 summits was officially accepted by the MT some years before. So it was not only the DM association manager’s fault but also the MT’s fault.
I agree, a large fraction these 3676 summits was not in the spririt of SOTA. So the summit lists were revised regaring the MT’s requirements. In 2008 the MT officially agreed to P100 in DM: I have got a copy of Tom’s M1EYP email dated 18.03.2008 regarding this. Once the P100 summit list was finished the MT again approved this summit list based on P100. Even in 2010 the MT approved the lately prepared DM/BM summit list based on P100. So please stop arguing P100 was only a fault - it was officially approved by the MT for years!
BTW still in several associations like HA, OH,… still P100 is accepted without meeting this SD 2000 criterion.
Because these rules are neither published nor applying to the rest of the world! Changing the rules of a running game without discussing with the concerned associations it bad style in my eyes.
To my mind Mike (and me) are interested in an active DM association.
Michael, DB7MM - Association Manager DM
Brian (G8ADD) has already said that these rules will be published in the next update.
wunder
Thanks, Mike (G6TUH). That is very interesting.
I was trying to locate the original announcement that the German summit list is going to be revised. I have still not found it, and I am wondering where you got the information in the first place.
The second issue is: Will chaser points already earned for working P100 summits in the OLD list still be valid for awards after the shorter, revised list comes into effect?
73,
Walt (G3NYY)
Couple of things:
If it’s agreed this table is accurate then I think it’s pretty easy to see why our German friends might be upset!!!
Rob
Well, to make a start, the table does not distinguish the Associations that are in transition. Are you trying to give the impression that G, GW, GM, GI and EI are P100 by lumping everything together?
You have DM entered twice, I assume the second entry is supposed to be DL but it has the same area as DM, and your area for DM does not exclude the area of DL.
I could say more but I am very busy at the moment, but I may return to this later.
Brian
As Michael said, this is an intermediate result.
DM (P100) is DM as it is today.
DM (P150) displays DM if P150 applied.
Michael clearly marked the associations where P100 applies. I can see no lumping at all.