An institution among DXers has been shut down after nearly 32 years. Ohio-Penn DX Bulletin founder and editor/publisher Tedd Mirgliotta, KB8NW, announced his retirement in the October 31 (and final) edition of the bulletin. Since 1991, the OPDX Bulletin has been providing DXers with regular updates on DXpeditions, planned activations by operators in rare locations and other news of interest to DXers. The bulletin was always offered at no cost to the reader.
In his retirement message, Mirgliotta noted that he had actually been providing DX information to hams for over 40 years, pioneering the use of computer communication and packet radio to do so, “starting on a local RTTY BBS, Packet Radio BBS and an online dial-up BBS called BARF80 (which received global phone calls before adding the Internet to it).”
John Papay, K8YSE, who has hosted the OPDX Bulletin on his website for many years, recalled that its audience often went beyond the ham radio DX community. “I checked my personal email from work one Monday morning,” he wrote, “and was a little concerned when I noticed there was one from someone at fcc.gov. My first thought was that I had violated some rule. But when I read the email, the question was, ‘Where is yesterday's OPDX Bulletin? It is not on your website!’ I don't remember why that was the case but as we exchanged emails, the sender told me that the first thing they did every Monday morning was to read the OPDX Bulletin while having their first cup. Part of their job was to field complaints about problems on the ham bands (you know what can happen when rare DX shows up), and the OPDX let them know what would be going on with various operations, when they would start and end, frequencies used etc. They could use this information to respond to the complaints in a meaningful way. When you put stuff on the web you just never know who might read it and how it might be used!”
While the weekly bulletins have now ended, Mirgliotta noted that “The OPDX Mailing List will still be active to provide upcoming DXpedition announcements and special press releases.” However, he added, “They will not be in bulletin format.”
OPDX Bulletin archives (back to 1999) will continue to be available online at <http://w.papays.com/opdx.html>.
