Is Farnsworth the Enemy ?

Not really but sometimes Farnsworthing Morse Code causes problems.  Farnsworthing is sending Morse Code at a relatively fast speed with exaggerated spacing in between the characters to result in a lower overall speed.  W1AW does this during code practice at slow speeds to prevent the listener from "counting".  5 WPM code practice is sent at 15 WPM with extra spaces.

https://www.arrl.org/code-practice-files 

https://www.arrl.org/files/file/Technology/x9004008.pdf 

You want to hear/recognize each Morse character as a sound, counting the dits and dahs will work up to a point but it slows you down.  Kind of like reading out loud (aka moving your lips) is slower than reading silently so teachers discourage young readers from verbalizing what they are reading.

A customer had a problem with his Island Keyer II keyer (http://wb9kzy.com/ik2.htm).  He was trying to record:

  QRL? 

into a memory.  But the Island Keyer II wasn't recording the question mark.  This is due to using the question mark to embed commands into a memory.  This is covered on page 4 of the Island Keyer II manual:

http://wb9kzy.com/ikeyr2pa.pdf 

summarized here:

To record a question mark, two question marks must be sent in a row - NO FARNSWORTHING !

Farnsworthing is only mentioned once at the top of page 6 of the manual in regard to numerical entry commands:

I realize that some of this stuff is kind of complicated, I guess I didn't think people would be recording question marks in a memory that much.

Best Regards,
Chuck, WB9KZY
http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm