For less than the cost of that 10 watt transceiver, I can buy two Magic Jacks and communicate with people I have some reason to want to communicate with (privately even) for practically nothing. I can run the thing on auxiliary power too if I want.
Again I am not bashing ham radio, but in anything short of a total global meltdown, email, VOIP, or even POTS are much more efficient and useful ways to communicate worldwide. Besides with ham radio you have no privacy and cannot carry on business over the air.
Ham radio is great, but it's mainly a hobby and not a practical means of carrying on essential communication. In certain dire emergencies, it can be much more and I fully support keeping hams around.
Try communicating to the other side of the planet without a phone line/cable while off the grid, on 10 watts, completely independent of any software or supporting elements, for free.
For less than the cost of that 10 watt transceiver, I can buy two Magic Jacks and communicate with people I have some reason to want to communicate with
Uh...Magic Jacks?
Don't you have to plug those into a telephone line, and need a computer to operate?
BTW, speaking of communicating, if you'd read back, my position wasn't about efficiency, it was was simplicity, free communications, being off the grid, and using extremely low power.
Of course, you can spend lots of money per month hooked up to the web, VOIP, and hundreds of others schemes to take your money on monthly installment plans...
But that's not what I'm talking about.
Later
But it is used to provide communication in situations that fall well short of total global meltdown.