Pete:
I agree with nearly all your comments. All my statements go with the implication "in my hands". I try to keep my methods simple for general use in improving efficiency, but until others try them we have no means of telling if I meet my goal.
Since it takes less than 10 min to check my findings on the 25-m course while doing a standard calibration, I hope others will do so.
To be fair to your experience with the measurer trying electronic counting, he did badly mess up with even the taping of the calibration course. His problem with the Protege counter was that he could not program it properly even though it is no more difficult than doing so for a VCR. The latest counters I have found do not require programming, so this need not be a problem anymore.