[detaro]

Two additional things from someone who has considered getting a license a few times, but never quite made the jump because it wasn't clear what for in the end:

- a bunch of interesting radio things are available without a license today - e.g. hunting for various signals with a cheap SDR receiver. Which could potentially be a way for ham communities to then get people deeper into it, but the communities seem quite distinct, or even hostile to each other (the latter is even worse between ham and non-licensed radio communities)

- online communities. For better or worse, thats what people look for today for niche interests, and dedicated ham communities often are ... not the best advertisement. (EDIT: but people are sharing plenty of links in this thread, so I'll have stuff to dig through)

A hackspace is probably a good environment to get people into it (my local ones don't seem to have active hams, but in theory).

EDIT: just noticed the username. Greetings to the Scottish Embassy!

[bityard]

I can't say I disagree with you. I got my ham radio license in my late 30's because radio has always fascinated the hell out of me, even as a kid. But when I was a kid, being able to talk to someone far away without incurring the cost of a long-distance phone call was still a novelty. The ubiquity of the Internet and smart phones took away that particular novelty.

I still have a radio (several, actually) and one day when I have a larger piece of property I may even set up a reasonable HF station to participate in contests and the like but right now it's hard to justify spending time on a hobby that has little productive value at the end of the day.

[hibby]

Gosh it's weird to be recognised on HN for something good that I've done :D