> where have to pay for membership and can only use it for certain things Just to clarify for people who might be interested-- this is not a perfect analogy in

> where have to pay for membership and can only use it for certain things Just to clarify for people who might be interested-- this is not a perfect analogy in that you don't have to pay to participate in amateur radio. You have to pay a fee to take the license exams but it's a token amount, and you don't have to pay regularly to use any ham services that I know of. Apart from buying a radio, of course.