DX LISTENING DIGEST 4-003, January 5, 2004 edited by Glenn Hauser, http://www.worldofradio.com Items from DXLD may be reproduced and re-reproduced only if full credit be maintained at all stages and we be provided exchange copies. DXLD may not be reposted in its entirety without permission. Materials taken from Arctic or originating from Olle Alm and not having a commercial copyright are exempt from all restrictions of noncommercial, noncopyrighted reusage except for full credits For restrixions and searchable 2004 contents archive see http://www.worldofradio.com/dxldmid.html NOTE: If you are a regular reader of DXLD, and a source of DX news but have not been sending it directly to us, please consider yourself obligated to do so. Thanks, Glenn NEXT AIRINGS OF WORLD OF RADIO 1214: Wed 1030 on WWCR 9475 Mon 0430 on WSUI 910, webcast WRN ONDEMAND: http://new.wrn.org/listeners/stations/station.php?StationID=24 OUR ONDEMAND AUDIO [also for CONTINENT OF MEDIA, MUNDO RADIAL]: Check http://www.worldofradio.com/audiomid.html WORLD OF RADIO 1214 (high version): (stream) http://www.w4uvh.net/wor1214h.ram (download) http://www.w4uvh.net/wor1214h.rm (summary) http://www.worldofradio.com/wor1214.html WORLD OF RADIO 1214 (low version): (stream) http://www.w4uvh.net/wor1214.ram (download) http://www.w4uvh.net/wor1214.rm ** ANDAMAN & NICOBAR ISLANDS. 4759.99, AIR, Port Blair, India, excellent, Vernacular 30/12 with talk 1125, ID 1130 FA "Ashkavani Port Blair" then talk and news continued, peaks on 10degT, almost non existent on 100degT (Sam Dellit, Tamborine, Qld, Drake R8B & SPR4, Icom IC-746, beverages 400m 3m 10degT, 150m 3m 50degT, 750m 6/3m 100degT, DX LISTENING DIGEST) degT I suppose means degrees true (gh) ** AUSTRALIA. 5049.95. ARDS Humpty Doo, fair in Aboriginal lang 31/12 with talk MA 0820 (Sam Dellit, Tamborine, Qld, Drake R8B & SPR4, Icom IC-746, beverages 400m 3m 10degT, 150m 3m 50degT, 750m 6/3m 100degT, DX LISTENING DIGEST) MA = male announcer; FA = female announcer ** AUSTRALIA. 4910. Presumed ABC-Tennant Creek running late on this frequency, international and Aussie news 0930 Jan 4, Aussie sports, ID for ABC 0935, ABC program promo, into talk and music through Top of Hour [sic – bottom of hour in NT --- gh]. Pretty decent signal, with CODAR QRM of varying strength. ABC news again at 1030, item about the Mars lander; and news at 1130, item on Tony Blair visiting Iraq. Still there at 1230. This was Sunday (Jerry Berg, MA, NASWA Flashsheet via DXLD) ** BIAFRA [non]. SOUTH AFRICA: 7380, Voice of Biafra Int'l; 2135- 2159:15*, 3 Jan; M with pro-independent Biafra/very anti-Lagos commentary. Mentioned a pending split in Sudan. 2153 "This has been the VoBI broadcast coming to you from Washington DC...", then anthem? Full ID repeated at 2156, then unknown language vocal to sign-off. All in English except last song. 2004 Passport sez via South Africa. SIO=443 (Harold Frodge, MI, Cumbre DX via DXLD) ** BOLIVIA 4876.8 kHz, Radio Cruz del Sur (PRESUMED), 1019-1035 UT Jan 5 in presumed Aymara (as listed in WRTH 0900-1100). Woman talking with probable religious talk, with brief 10 second musical interlude of small Andean strings and flute several times, brief male talk in likely Spanish at 1032 with questionable ID, back to female talk, fade out 1035. Aymara seems less clipped, and not as many harsh "clicking" sounds as Quechua. SINPO 23222, peaking about 1025. The first time I have heard this one in many years of trying. Drake SW 8 and 50 foot sloper (Roger Chambers, Utica, NY, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CANADA. MAJORITY OF CANADIANS FIND CBC NEWS UNBIASED By Tim Naumetz For CanWest News Service OTTAWA --- The CBC has come to the defence of its veteran news anchor, Peter Mansbridge, and denied that an exhaustive study found viewers believe the public broadcaster has a political bias. Despite the statement in a CBC document that some viewers see The National, the show Mansbridge anchors, as "stuffy, condescending, up- tight," a CBC official said the 1,000-page study done earlier this year was an "endorsement" of CBC journalism and Mansbridge in particular. "The overwhelming conclusion of the study was an endorsement of CBC news and current affairs journalism, including the flagship television newscast, The National," Christine Wilson, senior director of strategy and planning for CBC English services, said in a statement Tuesday, "Therefore, it was wrong for your news report to imply that Canadians felt that CBC News is 'politically biased'," said Wilson, arguing that the study actually found the exact opposite, that the majority of Canadians feel CBC News is unbiased. An executive summary of the study distributed to all CBC news staff recommended "a more youthful and lively style, a style more people like and journals, hosts and a news anchor more people would like." The summary said those things would enhance CBC's image as being engaging. A CBC spokeswoman, Ruth-Ellen Soles, has said she believes the reference was to CBC news anchors in the plural, but some CBC employees believe it was a reference to Mansbridge. He was on holiday Tuesday and unavailable for an interview. However, the question of a perceived political bias in CBC news, discussed in the summary of the study, was also raised in a letter written by Tony Burman, editor in chief of CBC News, Current Affairs and Newsworld, who distributed the summary to CBC staff. "We are seen by some Canadians - particularly in Alberta - as 'pro- Liberal' and 'biased' and somewhat left-wing, but not nearly as biased as CNN," Burman wrote in a letter accompanying the study. He added "all news media are seen as not paying enough attention to 'all sides of the story'." Wilson said nothing in the main study suggests there is a need to change anchors. "There is also nothing in the study to lead to the insinuation that its (CBC) news anchors, especially Peter Mansbridge, are anything but a symbol of the strength of its news program," she said, adding the main study is "full" of compliments to CBC news anchors in general, to the National and "to Peter in particular." The CBC did not release the contents of the full 1,000-page study to its news staff, although there are references to satisfaction among some viewers in the summary. In his own summary of the study, Burman said the surveys found viewers see "too much" of CBC newscasts as reporting "incremental change" or "news of passing interest." He also said many Canadians want more diversity in CBC news and current affairs, more accountability and "less arrogance." (via Harry van Vugt, ON, DXLD) Above story as received lacked a headline, so gh wrote it; story below interprets this quite differently (gh, DXLD) Wednesday, December 31, 2003 CBC television is politically biased, and its news coverage is stuffy and ponderous. That's not just our opinion anymore, it's now the official finding of a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation study - which ran to 1,000 pages, a fact which by itself tells you all you need to know about the CBC --- a summary of which was obtained by CanWest News Service. . . http://www.canada.com/montreal/montrealgazette/editorials/story.asp?id=CCCA2017-6042-4CBD-9043-278DCBB48663 (via Jilly Dybka, DXLD) ** CEYLON. TRIBUTE TO SRI LANKAN RADIO PIONEER A new tribute Web site to one of Sri Lanka's outstanding broadcasters, was recently launched in London. Vernon Corea who died in September 2002, was a pioneer of Radio Ceylon. He had a radio career spanning 45 years in public service broadcasting. He retired as Ethnic Minorities Adviser to the BBC. The Web site contains interesting information on the story of broadcasting in Sri Lanka and looks at the life and times of Vernon Corea. http://www.vernoncorea.info # posted by Andy @ 12:04 UT Jan 5 (Media Network blog via DXLD) ** CHINA. Re UNKNOWNISTAN: 7150 CC crash & bang music jammer; 2243, 3- Jan, Weak (Frodge-MI) 7150 Against BBC Mandarin Al Seela Oman relay 2200-2330 UT. Look out for remaining BBC Mandarin schedule, and you hear more FireDrake music, even with "slowed echo" effect. 6035 2200-2330 Kimjae 250 285 MANDARIN CHN KIM 6065 1300-1530 Kimjae 250 290 MANDARIN CHN KIM 6110 2200-2330 Nakhon Sawan 250 25 MANDARIN CHN NAK 7105 1300-1530 Nakhon Sawan 250 20 MANDARIN CHN NAK 7150 2200-2330 A'Seela 250 50 MANDARIN CHN SLA 7160 2200-2300 Nakhon Sawan 250 40 MANDARIN CHN NAK 7330 1100-1530 Vladivostok 300 228 MANDARIN FE VLA 9580 2200-2300 Nakhon Sawan 250 20 MANDARIN CHN NAK 9605 1100-1530 Yamata 300 290 MANDARIN CHN YAM 11945 1100-1300 Nakhon Sawan 250 20 MANDARIN CHN NAK 11945 2200-2300 Yamata 300 290 MANDARIN CHN YAM 15285 1100-1530 Singapore 100 13 MANDARIN FE SNG 21660 1100-1300 Nakhon Sawan 250 25 MANDARIN CHN NAK 73 wb df5sx (Wolfgang Büschel, Germany, Cumbre DX via DXLD) ** COSTA RICA. 6105, Radio Universidad (tentative), 0445-0532 Jan 4, noted with long segments of non-stop Latin music with some male voice announcements in Spanish. Almost fair with some adjacent channel slop (Rich D`Angelo, PA, NASWA Flashsheet via DXLD) Tent. R. Universidad, per recent definite logs of this one here by David Crawford and Terry Krueger, both FL, I believe it was them with a brief ID ending in "R. Universidad" at 1115 Jan 4. Mostly light romantic vocals, some brief talk and announcement segments but I listened only intermittently. No ID at 1200; signal was better by then because heavy spillover from WSHB-6095 ended when 6095 s/off just before 1200, but there was also a white noise-type generator on 6105, making things messy. At 1204 the announcer started a new program and mentioned the date. Not much left by 1230 (Jerry Berg, MA, NASWA Flashsheet via DXLD) Web site is: http://cariari.ucr.ac.cr/~radioucr/radioucr/ Not much detail about programming, but 6 AM is BLOQUE MUSICAL, perhaps not a CONCIERTO as at other times of day. Another page claims they don`t sign on until 7 AM. Just because it`s a university station does not mean it is non-commercial! They have a rate card (Tarifas). Could not find any mention of SW, or any frequency, for that matter. I also looked for it during the 0500 hour, but no chance between DW Bonaire 6100 and NHK Sackville 6110; would need extremely tight selectivity (Glenn Hauser, OK, Jan 5, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CUBA. 3350 Harmonic, R. Rebelde. 670 x 5 distorted but heard at 1100 and 2300 Jan 4, both times // 670 (Hans Johnson, Naples FL, Drake R8 50' longwire, Cumbre DX via DXLD) ** DEUTSCHES REICH [non]. DANISH NEO-NAZI RADIO STATION TO CONTINUE BROADCASTING The Danish neo-Nazi radio station Radio Oasen will carry on broadcasting even if a government subsidy is withdrawn because of the extremist views it puts on the air, its director said. "Even in the worst-case scenario with withdrawal of our subsidy - which provides the mainstay of our operating budget - we won't shut up shop, we'll stay on air with less music and more limited resources," said station director Johnny Hansen, who is president of the Danish extreme right- wing National Socialist Movement, the DNSB. Danish Culture minister Brian Mikkelsen has changed the rules for subsidies to local radio in order to end public funds to Radio Oasen, Europe's only neo-Nazi radio station. "The aim of the change in the rules is to ensure that we no longer automatically provide subsidies to radios representing extremist views," he said. The station based at Greve, 20 kilometres (12 miles) south of the capital Copenhagen, has received a total of some 400,000 Kroner (54,000 euros/US$67,600) as part of government funds which are routinely provided to local stations in the interests of maintaining freedom of expression and opinion. The rule changes came into force on January 1. (Source: AFP) (via Andy Sennitt, Media Network blog via DXLD) ** ETHIOPIA. Right now (1610 UT Jan 4) I'm listening to the English service of Radio Ethiopia on 9561.4. Heard them from sign-on at 1600. Brief news update followed by what sounds like a bunch of song dedications. News update again at 1630. Fair signal with some noise, but very readable (John Beattie, Ventura, Southern California!, swl at qth.net via DXLD) ** FINLAND. Hi, Glenn! SWR had its normal scheduled transmission at 3rd January as well. Due, some busies no info was sent to any of lists, sorry! Transmission was hearD quite well at least here in our European target (Alpo Heinonen, Scandinavian Weekend Radio, Jan 5, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INDONESIA. 3325.08, RRI, Palangkaraya, excellent in Indonesian 1/1 with announcements by MA 1506 then theme music 1507, talk continued 1509. 3344.84, RRI, Ternate, excellent in Indonesian 1/1 with MA talk 1450 then ballad 1452, MA announcing frequencies including FM at 1458, C&W song 1459, 1501 MA "Inilah Radio Republik Indonesia stasiun Ternate,`` theme music, then carrier cut with audio 1504. 4789.97, RRI Fak Fak, Fak Fak, excellent in Indonesian 30/12 with talk by FA 0955; 4790.01 31/12 0810. 4869.97, RRI Wamena, Wamena, excellent in Indonesian 30/12 with island music at 1020. 4919.98, RRI, Biak, excellent in vernacular 31/12 with distinctive music 0840, brief announcement in Indonesian at 0900, call to prayer 0901; 4920.00 1/1 0830. 4925.00, RRI, Jambi, excellent in Indonesian 30/12 with MA giving local ID and noting Programa Satu Jambi 1152 (Sam Dellit, Tamborine, Qld, Drake R8B & SPR4, Icom IC-746, beverages 400m 3m 10degT, 150m 3m 50degT, 750m 6/3m 100degT, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INTERNATIONAL. Hola Glenn, Saludos desde Catia La Mar, VENEZUELA. ¡Feliz Año Nuevo a todos los colegas de la lista! EL TOP 4 DE LA DESIDIA RADIAL 2003 El hit parade de las conductas más vergonzosas de ciertas radios internacionales para con algunos de sus oyentes. Algunas por omisión, otras con clara intención y otras por simple descuido, han caído en este TOP 4. Ojalá puedan enmendar sus fallas y mejorar la calidad de sus servicios al escucha. Posición número 4: Radio Exterior de España. En definitiva, hay serios problemas en REE con la correspondencia. En abril del año pasado me gané un premio en uno de sus programas y hasta el día de hoy --- ni una postal. El premio brilla por su ausencia. Varios correos-e de recordatorio han sido infructuosos. Posición número 3: Radio Eslovaquia Internacional. Aún no se ha recibido la QSL correspondiente a un informe de recepción del pasado mes de abril de 2003. A los brasileños les llegan QSL's, a los argentinos, peruanos, marcianos, lunáticos e incluso a constelaciones fuera de nuestro sistema solar --- pero para Venezuela ¡nada! Score de efectividad de correos-e recordatorios: cero. Posición número 2: La Voz de Indonesia. Hasta el cansancio anuncian al aire un bendito Apartado 1157, en Yakarta, pero...¡noooooooo! No se les ocurra perder su tiempo en enviarles algo porque La Voz de Indonesia no va a recoger las cartas a la oficina postal. Believe it or not! ¡Qué cosas, vale! Posición número 1: Radio Praga. En mayo de 2003 emitió un programa especial sobre los 80 años de la radio checa, en el cual se omitían, entre otras cosas, la señal de intervalo de Radio Praga durante el período SOCIALISTA-ESTALINISTA (¡no comunista, como dicen ellos!), la cual era conocida como "Adelante la izquierda" (Forward, Left). En varios e-mail les he reclamado tal tergiversación histórica y ellos -- - bien gracias. Ni siquiera me han respondido los e-mails. Moraleja: Radio Praga sólo responde las cartas "agradables". Por tal razón, les doy el número 1 en este Hit Parade de la Desidia en Onda Corta. P.D. Aprovecho la ocasión para declararme EX-OYENTE de Radio Praga. 73's y buen DX (Adán González, Catia La Mar, VENEZUELA, Jan 5, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INTERNATIONAL VACUUM [non]. Website for latest Mars lander info: http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/home/index.html (Glenn Hauser, DXLD) ** IRAQ. Re DXLD 4-002, January 4, 2004: Glenn, The 914 area code with 360 exchange number for Baghdad IS NOT a mistake. It's a cell phone with "roaming" capability with towers somewhere in Baghdad. A friend is stationed in Baghdad and has the same area code/exchange. It indeed appears as "Westchester County NY" on the phone bill, but the call definitely goes through to a Baghdad cell phone supplied by a U.S. carrier (Sprint?) to a number of American troops (Earl Higgins, St. Louis, MO, USA, Jan 5, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** IRAQ. VOICE OF IRAQ WEB SITE SETS OUT STATION'S EDITORIAL POLICY Voice of Iraq, a radio station which launched in Baghdad in summer 2003, has a web site at http://www.voiraq.com The web site states that the station broadcasts for 12 hours a day, from 0800-2000 local time (0500-1700 gmt), on 1179 kHz. It says that the station "covers an area with 12 million Iraqi inhabitants". Material on the site is entirely in Arabic. The following information is contained on "Page 2" of the site: "The Voice of Iraq, which transmits from Baghdad on 1179 kHz, is the first independent radio in Iraq's history. It started transmitting on 15 July 2003 after a month of testing. The founders of the radio wanted the station to be a distinguished media organ in terms of both accuracy and objectivity, broadcasting all news reports and analysing developments in a serious, impartial, professional and unbiased manner. "The Voice of Iraq presents a wide variety of intellectual talks, field investigations, panel discussions and many programmes on various subjects. "The radio is eager to safeguard unity and amity among the Iraqi people following decades of attempts to foment sectarianism and practise murder and oppression against the majority of the Iraqi people and the rest of Iraq's citizens. "The editorial policy of the Voice of Iraq takes great care of the Iraqi people's national unity, encouraging close relations among the various ethnic groups - Arabs, Kurds and Turkomans - who must have equal rights without any form of prejudice. "The Voice of Iraq is also eager to strengthen relations with neighbouring states and peoples and promote them in a way that would eradicate the harm that the defunct regime's aggression against these states had caused." On "page 4," the site gives the following information on English- language programmes: "The English-language programmes include a full newscast, a political commentary, readings from the book 'What is Islam?' by His Eminence the late imam and reformer Al-Sayyid Muhammad al-Shirazi, a brief explanation of Islamic principles, readings on the life of Imam al- Husayn, peace be upon him, and the Ashura tragedy [the killing of Imam Husayn in 680 AD]. The English-language programmes also include a series of lessons on the principle of nonviolence in Islam. "The aim of the English-language broadcast is to present Islam in a serious and scientific manner to English-speaking people in Iraq; namely, foreign diplomats, businessmen, politicians, and thousands of US, British and other coalition troops. We are working with God's help to increase transmission hours and transform the station into an English-language station in the future." The fifth page lists five Arabic audio samples from the station's archives, including news, a commentary and a press review. The following e-mail addresses are also given: admin @ voiraq.com director @ voiraq.com and webmaster @ voiraq.com English-language programmes have been observed daily since October 2003 at 1200-1300 gmt. Source: BBC Monitoring research 3 Jan 04 (via DXLD) ** ISRAEL. Kol Israel --- Here are some more details regarding the Hillel transmitter site: The Hillel station closed on Jan 1 and with it the two AM transmitters: 200 kW for Alef on 576, and 1200 kW for Dalet on 738 that was not in use due to ban from the environmental authorities. That location also had two shortwave transmitters: 100 kW Thomson from 1959 (11585 kHz) and 500 kW from Telefunken from 1983. Only the 500 kW transmitter is being retained; everything else in the station is being scrapped. Staff have been dispersed and dismantling is now starting. As opposed to the original plan, they have decided not to replace any of the lost frequencies so Alef coverage is greatly reduced. (FYI- The Reshet Alef website mentions 576 cancelled - no longer mentions 531 as new frequency for Reshet Alef.) -- The http://www.israelradio.org shortwave schedule has been updated. -- New on the IBA website: IBA Sales - Videos/Books http://sales.iba.org.il contact email: sales @ iba.org.il Website is both Hebrew and English. Most (all?) videos available in both PAL and NTSC. Some videos are available in English (Daniel Rosenzweig, Jan 5, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Later: Reshet Alef is now on 531 kHz AM (MW) instead of Reshet Gimel (Doni, ibid.) ** JAPAN [non]. CANADA / JAPAN 5800 kHz, Radio Japan (Sackville), 1152 UT Jan 5 with traditional instrumental music, "a Japanese dance" and at end of program "from Tokyo." SINPO 34333. No actual ID, then RCI interval signal heard once, and transmitter off just before 1200. Drake SW 8 and 50 foot sloper (Roger Chambers, Utica, NY, DX LISTENING DIGEST) This is the other side of the 6280 mixing product we have been discussing under CHINA non, and see also VIETNAM non in this issue. I should add that mixing products do not necessarily fall outside the bands, but are just more noticeable away from the clutter --- nor are they limited to around the 6 MHz band (gh) ** KOREA NORTH. 3219.98, Hamgyong PS, Hamhung, excellent in Korean, 1/1 with band music 1515. 3249.54, Pyongyang BS, Pyongyang, excellent in Korean 1/1 with band music 1520, unstable carrier constantly drifting 10-20 Hz. 3320.03, Pyongyang BS, Pyongyang, excellent in Korean 1/1 with band music and vocals 1525. 3350.04, South Pyongyang PS, Pyongsong, excellent in Korean 1/1 with band music and vocals at 1528 (Sam Dellit, Tamborine, Qld, Drake R8B & SPR4, Icom IC-746, beverages 400m 3m 10degT, 150m 3m 50degT, 750m 6/3m 100degT, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** KOREA SOUTH [non]. Those "R. Korea" `casts were first heard on KBLA/1580, while it was under other ownership, circa 1992-1998 or so; since then the programs had been heard on KYPA/1230 here in L.A. KYPA's been heard with brokered Spanish stuff since 1/1. No doubt our correspondent's referring to Multicultural Broadcasting Co., which is owned by Chinese-American Arthur Liu, the same guy who's purportedly buying Radio Única's owned stations. 73z (GREG HARDISON, Jan 5, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** MADAGASCAR. 5010, presumed R. Madagascar, apparently on late for New Years, right through 2300 Dec 31; music sounded like them. Not very strong, and much Dom. Rep. QRM from 5009.8 (Jerry Berg, MA, NASWA Flashsheet via DXLD) ** MALI. 4785.39, RTV Malienne, Bamako, barely carrier 31/12 0650, audio after 0700, possible sign-on or maybe just faded up, still just poor, needed both 10dB low noise preamps in, equal on both 50degT & 100degT, gd in FF by 0740, gone by 0810; 4784.40 1/1 0738 so drifting rapidly (Sam Dellit, Tamborine, Qld, Drake R8B & SPR4, Icom IC-746, beverages 400m 3m 10degT, 150m 3m 50degT, 750m 6/3m 100degT, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** MEXICO. 4809.99, Tentative XERTA, light religious vocals around 0445 Jan 3, into rap at 0530, pops at 0600. Never did get an ID; there were a couple of Spanish announcements at the outset, but then the announcements stopped and it was all music. However, it but sounded like their telco-ish signal from the past, and Bob Wilkner reported an XERTA ID here at 0130 Jan 3. Pretty fadey; strong carrier at times, but mostly fair; and slightly low audio. While this station was dominant, there was another on 4810.15 at the same time, but I had to use LSB due to a huge noise blob on the high side, so it was hard to make anything out of the 4810.15 station. Also, big carrier on 4810.0 1000+ Jan 4, no audio (Jerry Berg, MA, NASWA Flashsheet via DXLD) 4810.0, R. Transcontinental Presumed, 1158-1405 Jan 3, missed ID at 1158, continuous pops and EZL, started good faded to poor about 1215 (Jerry Lineback, KS, ibid.) 0315-0347 Jan 3, non-stop mix of eclectic music including some leftover Christmas tunes and "Spirit on the Sky." Man with Spanish language ID and frequency announcement at 0334. Poor to fair. Noted again at 1030 with same programming and another round of "Spirit in the Sky" under poor conditions (Rich D`Angelo, PA, ibid.) ** MONGOLIA. 12085: Propagation today is again not what I would expect but some interesting signals have been noted. Mongolia is heard back on 12085 (ex-12015) maybe to avoid Firedrake on 12010. English was heard today at 1000+ but weak. However, I hear something on 12015 --- nothing on 12085 --- at 1145 but its weak and I can't copy the lang. They should use their 100 kW transmitter on 12 MHz between 1030 and 1230. The 250 kW moves to 7470 at 1100 to carry RFA Tibetan (Noel R. Green, UK, BC-DX Jan 3 via DXLD) ** NEW ZEALAND. 711 kHz, 2XP, Wellington, received a fantastic package of goodies in 30 days, QSL letter, Bumper Sticker, and a beautiful long sleeve shirt "Radio Pacific". V/S Richie Fullard, Network Promotions Manager. Station is 5 kW. They also called me the 23rd of Dec and interviewed me on the air. This is really great. Cost almost $18 NZ to air mail the package to me. Address: Radio Pacific, Private Bag, Ponsonby, Auckland, New Zealand. New Zealand MW QSL #111 (Patrick Martin, Seaside OR, Jan 3, NRC-AM via DXLD) ** OKLAHOMA. KCSC/KBCW Classical Radio Programming Notes January, 2004 The module GRACE NOTES has ended its six-year distribution, but I`m delighted to announce a new, locally originated program that will air at 5:06 p.m. weekdays [2306 UT]. Gordon McDougall, director of drama at the University of Oklahoma, has developed POEM FOR TODAY. Each day he`ll share events of note from literary, dramatic, and musical history on that day`s date, and will bring a short poem as well. KCSC is excited about this project, which is a joint production with our sister station at OU, KGOU-FM. Kent Anderson Program Director (from http://www.kcscfm.com via John Norfolk, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PAKISTAN. Checked a few R. Pakistan outlets tonight. Russian 1415- 1500 heard ME/Arabic pop music and news on 9382.68 kHz. 32222. But \\ channel 7375 was covered by CNR2 Beijing in Chinese, no trace of a Russian service. Urdu 1700-1900 on 9395.00 (ex-9320) 33333, and 11570.00 Irani 1715-1800 a poor 21221 signal, tentatively R PAK on 5847.68, same offset 2.68 kHz like Russian service!!!!! But much QRM of Digital transmission centered at 5849.3 kHz. On 7550.33 kHz a very thiny signal could be traced, S=1 signal level, very poor. But nothing traced on the program content so far (Wolfgang Büschel, Germany, BC-DX Dec 29 via DXLD) ** PAPUA NEW GUINEA. 3220.00, R. Morobe, Lae, excellent 1/1 with, OC no programming at 0809 (too much new year's cheer?) 3235.00, R. West New Britain, Kimbe, excellent in Pidgin 1/1 with ad for store holiday closing times at 0808. 3245.00, R. Gulf, Kerema, excellent in Pidgin 1/1 with talk by MA 0805, best on 10degT. 3260.00, R. Madang, Madang, excellent in Pidgin 1/1 with talk by MA at 0804. 3290.00, R. Central, Port Moresby, excellent 1/1 with OC 0756 thru 0810, expected sign-on but was not to be. 3305.00, R. Western, Daru, good in Pidgin 1/1 with island music at 0755. 3315.00, R. Manus, Lorengau, good in Pidgin 1/1 with MA talk, then island music at 0754. 3355.00, R. Simbu, Kundiawa, good in Pidgin 1/1 with talk and island music at 0752. 3365.00, R. Milne Bay, Alotau, good in English 1/1 with talk by MA 0750, best on 10degT. 3375.00, R. Western Highlands, Mount Hagen, fair in Pidgin 1/1 at fade-in 0745. 4890.00, NBC, Port Moresby, excellent in Pidgin 30/12, island music 1148; excellent 31/12 *0700 (Sam Dellit, Tamborine, Qld, Drake R8B & SPR4, Icom IC-746, beverages 400m 3m 10degT, 150m 3m 50degT, 750m 6/3m 100degT, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PERU. 4826.49, R. Sicuani, Sicuani, good in Spanish 29/12 with Andean music 0940; 4826.44 30/12 1014; 4826.50 1/1 0735. 4939.69, R. San Antonio (presumed), Villa Atalaya, fair Spanish 29/12 with FA talk 1040, then into music, was not on at 0930; 4939.68 excellent 31/12 0925 with LA music, announcement 0931 señoras y señores, atención, but missed ID; 4939.69 excellent 1/1 0920-0938 with OC (Sam Dellit, Tamborine, Qld, Drake R8B & SPR4, Icom IC-746, beverages 400m 3m 10degT, 150m 3m 50degT, 750m 6/3m 100degT, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PERU. (Unidentified) 4975 kHz, Spanish at 0955 Jan 5 with male religious talk, piano musical interlude, questionable ID "Radio Cultural (?not sure)", "cinco de la mañana" (UT -5), into male with Indian language. Recheck at 1035 with male vocals with Andean strings/flutes, woman talk in ? Likely Quechua from 1038-1056 the same piano theme as an hour previous, religious organ, into lengthy brass band anthem, then female with questionable ID, dreamy orchestral music with male voice over and unintelligible ID likely in Spanish, then woman in unreadable language. (Is this programming consistent with Radio del Pacífico? The time checks and reception conditions are consistent with Perú). Drake SW 8 and 50 foot sloper (Roger Chambers, Utica, NY, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PHILIPPINES. PHILIPPINE COMMUNISTS SET UP RADIO STATION IN CAGAYAN VALLEY | Text of report in English by Benjie Villa, Christina Mendez and Artemio Dumlao, carried by Philippine newspaper The Philippine Star web site on 5 January The 16-day holiday ceasefire declared by communist rebels ended last night, a day before the military is expected to launch operations against the rebels who have admitted plans to collect fees from politicians during the next elections. Lt-Col Daniel Lucero, Armed Forces spokesman, said the military will ensure that candidates in the 10 May elections will be free to roam and campaign in rural areas. "We want candidates to campaign freely, and prevent the NPA [New People's Army] from its mulcting activities," he said. When the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) marked its 35th founding anniversary last 26 December, the New People's Army (NPA) received instructions to launch more attacks against the government. The orders were contained in a rebel campaign plan, from 2003 to 2005, authored by CPP central committee chairman Armando Liwanag, the suspected nom de guerre of exiled communist leader Jose Ma. Sison. Liwanag said each guerrilla front must attain company strength, with one platoon as the "centre of gravity". NPA guerrillas must "aim at having a platoon as centre of gravity in every municipality" and that "each region must have at least six guerilla fronts", he added. Liwanag said that the rebel movement must put up "regional strike forces" that will carry out wide-scale attacks on government positions. Luis Jalandoni, National Democratic Front peace panel chairman, said the on-and-off peace process between the government and the rebels would not likely be resumed soon. Government negotiators have yet to agree with the rebels in issuing a joint statement, he added. In Cagayan Valley, Communist rebels have set up a radio station broadcasting as Radyo Gil-ayab, the Ilocano word for "blaze". In its January issue. the CPP official organ Ang Bayan said Radyo Gil- ayab, was "like a spark that started a prairie fire" in Cagayan Valley. "It is now ablaze in the entire Cagayan Valley," Ang Bayan said. Ang Bayan said Gil-ayab will regularly broadcast every two months and will be disseminated in the form of compact disks and cassette tapes. It is not the first time that the communist rebel movement had used air frequency for their propaganda. They had used it in the 70's and 80's in Northern Luzon, and had challenged military commanders "on air" on reported human rights violations, illegal logging operations and gambling. The initial broadcast featured "Paran", an adaptation of a Bombo Radyo-Cagayan advertisement on the rottenness of jueteng [illegal numbers game], and how it is used as a milking cow by politicians. But in the rebel radio station's adaptation, Paran argues with his wife not on whether to place a bet in jueteng but about joining a confrontation rally of peasants to reduce interest rates on loans. Source: The Philippine Star web site, Manila, in English 5 Jan 04 (via BBCM via DXLD) WTFK!!!!! Tho probably not SW ** RUSSIA. Starting from Dec 28 our Radio Rossii - the main state broadcasting network in our country - has resumed its old program format for various time zones here in Russia on all bands including some SW frequencies: "Dubl' 1" for the Russian Far East: 1800-1400 UT "Dubl' 2" for Eastern Siberia: 2000-1600 UT "Dubl' 3" for Western Siberia: 2200-1800 UT "Dubl' 4" for our region between Vol`ga and the Urals: 0000-2000 UT and one relay for our European part at 0200-2200 UT as earlier (Mikhail Timofeyev, Russia, DXplorer Jan 2 via BC-DX via DXLD) ** SURINAME. 4990.00, R. Apintie, Paramaribo, good in Dutch 31/12 with hymns 0832; 4990.00 1/1 0825 with hymns (Sam Dellit, Tamborine, Qld, Drake R8B & SPR4, Icom IC-746, beverages 400m 3m 10degT, 150m 3m 50degT, 750m 6/3m 100degT, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SYRIA. R. Damascus, 13610: full data station card signed by Director (unnamed). Received in 63 days for an English report, two dollsrs and self-addressed envelope (not used for reply). Address: Syrian Radio & Television, P O Box 4702, Damascus. Website: http://www.rtv.gov.sy (Sam Wright, Biloxi MS, The QSL Report, Jan MONITORING TIMES via DXLD) ** TANZANIA [and non]. Sitting on a mountain in Tanzania While visiting in Tanzania I had the opportunity to sit in a mountain village and try to DX. I was using my old Sony 7600 which my daughter took there with her --- still a good radio. There is no electricity, no phones, no newspapers, no running water etc. The batteries for her radio use a solar charger. I received 4 to 6 stations during the day all in K-swahilli which she translated enough to locate 3 of them for sure. At night there were few more stations (not the same ones always) but I was listening with earphones and didn't get a translation. I tried clipping a 20 ft. wire to the antenna but it didn't make much difference. I think the Sony only uses the rod for AM. Apparently the stations do not always have dependable power but I could [not] find out how many hours they usually were on the air. The point of this message is to emphasize how important MW is in that country (outside of the big city at least). There are 3 or 4 other radios in the village all powered by car batteries which have to be charged by riding them on the back of a bicycle for two hours to a city. The radios are the major source of information and are listened to by big groups of people. A few do listen to the BBC and VOA but only one that I met (not counting my daughter). (Richard E. Hillman, Jan 4, NRC-AM via DXLD) Richard, people listen to AM in our country as well. North Dakota, Michigan's upper peninsula and other less populated areas. My family out in North Dakota listen to AM except when my nephew is working on something in the barn; then he listens to an FM station. It would have been interesting to see what you could have received in Tanzania if you had a large loop or beverage antenna! Thanks for the report, Richard. Very interesting! (Fred Vobbe, OH, ibid.) ** U S A [and non]. I listened to parts of the Jan 4 AWR Wavescan 470 online, and heard that the ``all-new`` Wavescan is hosted by Piper Anna Shields, or something like that, and by Ray Allen (sp?); another announcer reading a segment was Ariel McCleghan (sp?). As John Norfolk notes, the link to the script for this edition leads nowhere, but the scripts don`t usually mention the names of the announcers, anyway. In the 28th minute of the previous edition 469, Dave Barasoain briefly said his goodbye, ``leaving WS and the AWR family for different horizons in the new year``, after 12 years of employment there (Glenn Hauser, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. WBCQ PUSHES THE PROFANITY ENVELOPE I was somewhat surprised to hear Michael Ketter use the work "fuck" on air, repeatedly, this evening. I was listening to WBCQ on 5105 kHz at about 0015 UT (1/5/2004). Michael was discussing the recent FCC ruling on the use of the word "fuck", and in doing so, gratuitously repeated the word several times in different contexts. In spite of the FCC ruling that the word may be used in a non-sexual context, it seems that Allan Weiner is again sticking his middle finger out at the establishment. The FCC itself is indicating that it may reconsider its ruling on the remarks made during the Golden Globe awards. If so, Allan may again find himself in a whole lot of fucking trouble (Dan Srebnick, Aberdeen, NJ, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Comedy Channel (not premium or scrambled), was just re-running the South Park movie, with that and other naughty words prominently displayed on the chalkboard, as well as, er spoken, if you can call what comes out of Cartman ``speech``. I am not offended (gh, DXLD) ** U S A. Re KAAY 1090 Little Rock AR, also on 2180, transmitter problems, DXLD 3-164 and 3-165: That would certainly explain why I haven`t heard it in a long time. Normally these big stations don`t stay on backup facilities for a long time like this one. Most of them have a backup full power transmitter. Maybe they should have bought the MW 50 that was on Ebay a month or so ago |grin| (Paul Smith, W4KNX, Sarasota, FL, Jan 4, NRC-AM via DXLD) I bet it's a MW-50, if the mod transformer went out (Powell E. Way III, SC, ibid.) I've noticed this pest is weaker than normal and that makes Plainview TX easier than normal. Perhaps I can finally catch XEPRS (their pattern is unfavorable towards me to put it mildly). 73 KAZ 35 miles NW of Sears Tower (Neil Kazaross, ibid.) ** U S A. Re WRIB 1220 nightly DX tests from Rhode Island: I'm usually up for work by 2 a.m. most mornings. I'll try to check it out over the next few nights. WRIB usually makes it up here at night on low power, so it should get out fairly well. The antenna sits at the mouth of the Providence River into Narragansett Bay, a good salt-water path to the south. It's worth a shot for those who need Rhode Island (Bruce Conti, Nashua NH, Jan 2, NRC-AM via DXLD) Below is a copy of the reply I got from Craig Healy regarding the ongoing WRIB test. Some of the details may be helpful for those who will be trying for this one. As always, we own a huge debt of gratitude to both the engineer (Craig) and the station for providing this test. I've personally thanked Craig and encourage others to do the same. This is an experiment I'd love to see other stations conduct. As Craig mentions in his reply, we've all tried for tests in the past, only to see them ruined by lousy conditions --- given that many stations are computer controlled, this would seem even easier for some stations to do. I've got a local on 1220, but I can null them fairly easily, so I'll certainly be trying for this one. Hope all of us who need Rhode Island can log this one. The test runs daily through at least March at 02:55 until 03:05 AM EST [0755-0805 UT] using a non-directional pattern and 1 kW of power. Craig's web site has full details at: http://www.am-dx.com 73, (Les Rayburn, N1LF, AL, NRC-AM via DXLD) | News of the WRIB test was just posted to the NRC e-mail list tonight. First of all, many thanks to whoever is responsible for getting this one going! | It was me. I'm the engineer for the place. All it involved was setting a couple of extra entries in the time clock for the power change. It should be active now. | Do you need help in getting the Morse ID added? I can provide you with an .MP3 or .WAV file of whatever you need. Not so much a matter of making the audio, but in setting up a tape cartridge machine and a timer to fire off at 3 am. I hope to get it done soon. In the meanwhile, the normal TOH ID will have to do. | Can you tell me if this test is active? I'd like to set up the software to start recording this every night, as it's my best hope for RI. Thanks again! It's off and running. Wish the station had more than a kW, but... I set it that way rather than doing the classic hour long test on a single day. I think we've all been greatly anticipating one test or another, just to have it blown out by lousy propagation. In the rest of this DX season, there oughta be at least one good night, hi. Actually the Remote Receiver on the am-dx.com site is tuned to 1220. You can hear WRIB over that, with a significant delay from real time. Let me know if you hear them. You can send QSL requests to me at WRIB, 200 Water St., East Providence, RI 02914. Also, http://www.wrib.com is their site with contact info (Craig Healy, NG1U, answering |questions via Les Rayburn, Birmingham, AL, NRC-AM via DXLD) They are Spanish music overnight. You can check their format by logging in to the Remote Receiver off the am-dx.com web site. It's tuned to 1220 and seems to hear WRIB very well. By the way, Craig Healy was dropped off this list last year, and is no longer in the NRC because of that. A real shame for all concerned (Denny Bouchard, ibid.) 1/4 0300 [EST] --- WRIB Providence RI, test heard here this morning, Spanish religious music, talk by man in Spanish, English ID 0301, in tough WHK null. Got a .WAV file if anyone is interested. Thanks to Craig Healy and AM-DX.COM for arranging this (David Yocis, Washington DC, R8B, Kiwa loop, ibid.) ** U S A. Re DVS, CANADA, 4-002: Is there any regular, or any at all use of DVS on the US commercial TV networks? If so, a well-kept secret. Lacking any promotion, I am unable to check here since none of the OKC TV stations are running SAP. Glenn: -- The Turner nets are running DVS on some programs (not all); this usually shows up on Turner Classic Movies and TNT (GREG HARDISON, CA, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. On Tuesday Jan. 6, the Democratic candidates will participate in the only radio debate of the election season. NPR's Neal Conan will host a two-hour conversation with the candidates, and this close to primary season, what they say may determine who wins the presidential nomination. The debate will be broadcast from Des Moines, Iowa, but NPR will ask the candidates questions that come from e-mail at election @ npr.org WUOT will carry the debate in its entirety 2:00-4:00 pm (WUOT Knoxville mailing list via DXLD) in reality, 1906-2059 UT (gh) ** U S A. I'll say this for NPR versus a Fox News or a CNN or pretty much ANY other broadcast news outlet: NPR is at least sufficiently aware of its own potential for bias that it employs an ombudsman to keep an eye out for those issues. He has issues of his own, to be sure, but you'll NEVER see the sort of internal criticism of Fox News or of CNN that NPR's ombudsman offers of that network's operations (including a recent column that strongly critcized the practice of NPR reporters appearing as "analysts" on cable news channels.) But don't believe me - read his stuff for yourself: http://www.npr.org/yourturn/ombudsman/index.html When I want to hear truly slanted news, my preference is for the stuff on American Family Radio or, to a lesser extent, the USA Radio Network. No pretensions to "fair and balanced" on those networks - and I'd contend that AFR, in particular, enjoys a massive federal subsidy in the form of the thousands of licenses it's been granted around the country without even being required to have a local studio presence, as well as in the tax-exempt status it enjoys, which in effect amounts to an involuntary subsidy of AFA by every American taxpayer. NPR, at least, owns no radio stations outright, which makes it at least somewhat responsible to the hundreds of LOCAL licensees who support its programming and provide a strong local component to accompany NPR's national programming. (If NPR has strayed anywhere from its mission, I'd contend that it's here - it was never intended to be such a centralized program service, but rather a clearinghouse for local stations to exchange programming. Too many NPR stations these days fill their schedules with national content to the exclusion of the local programming that should be at the heart of their mission.) As a journalist who covers the FCC and the business of broadcasting, I don't think it's possible to understand how American broadcasting functions in the 21st century without getting into politics somewhere along the line. As other posters (Phil Alexander, most cogently) have observed in the IBOC threads, there is no longer any strong base of engineering know-how in any position of power at the FCC. The decisions being made there, whether they concern IBOC or DTV or ownership limits or (obviously) BPL, are being made on largely political grounds. Like it or not, that's the reality of the FCC today. All the "good old days" posting - or Clear Channel-bashing - in the world isn't going to bring back the way things were in that respect. Over on the professional broadcasters' side of things, I think Barry Mishkind and Dave Biondi have the right idea with their pair of mailing lists over at broadcast.net. Dave's "radio-tech" list is focused narrowly on the technical aspects of broadcast engineering - if you're looking for a replacement Svetlana tube for your Continental transmitter, that list is the place to go. Barry's "broadcast" list is much broader in scope, addressing everything from programming to history to, yup, politics. And from time to time, things get a little heated over there. I'd hardly call it a "meltdown"; some people killfile some threads and the rest of us move on (Scott Fybush, NRC-AM via DXLD) ** U S A. A BIT OF FRESH AIR FOR PUBLIC RADIO NETWORK -- Rodney Ho, Staff, Saturday, January 3, 2004, Atlanta Journal Constitution GPB Radio, the public radio network heard on 15 noncommercial FM stations in Georgia, has added "The Tavis Smiley Show" and "Fresh Air" to its lineup starting Monday, two of several programming changes at the network. "Talk of the Nation," Neal Conan's midday news-talk show, gets cut back an hour to 2 to 3 p.m. weekdays. The change accommodates "Fresh Air" with Terry Gross, which provides in-depth interviews with cultural and entertainment figures and will run 3-4 p.m. (WABE-FM 90.1 in Atlanta already airs "Fresh Air" at the same time.) "Fresh Air," a Philadelphia-based show that National Public Radio began syndicating in 1987, "is in demand," said Chuck Miller, director of GPB Radio. Smiley's show, a one-hour magazine program heard in metro Atlanta on WCLK-FM (91.9) at 9 a.m. weekdays, is the first NPR program targeting African-Americans. The Georgia Public Radio network will run it at 7 p.m. weekdays, taking over for a variety of weekly classical music shows such as "Harmonia" and "Classical Guitar Alive." "We're looking for more voices for information and opinions," Miller said. "Tavis will bring some fresh and active radio to our schedule." (Smiley is also starting his own weekday 30-minute TV talk show Monday, seen at midnight and 1 p.m. on WPBA.) At 8 p.m., a local classical show, "Studio GPR," has been expanded and will run Monday through Thursday under the name "Studio GPB." Syndicated shows such as "Minnesota Orchestra" are nixed. "We wanted to create something that reflects Georgia a bit more," Miller said. He will add local music from the likes of the Albany Symphony and Macon Symphony. The station also dropped an overnight weekday classical music service in favor of a jazz format. "Just as a hunch, we think we'll be able to serve a larger audience with the jazz than classical," Miller said. While WABE-FM covers metro Atlanta, Georgia Public Radio can be heard on several stations surrounding the city. That includes WNGU-FM 89.5 out of Dahlonega, WUGA-FM 91.7 in Athens, WUWG-FM 90.7 in Carrollton, WDCO-FM 89.7 in Macon and WJSP-FM 88.1 out of Columbus. For scheduling info: http://www.gpb.org/gpr/schedule (via Mike Cooper, DXLD) ** VENEZUELA. 5000. YVTO, about even with WWV, maybe even a little better, at 2320 Dec 31, voice announcements every minute (Jerry Berg, MA, NASWA Flashsheet via DXLD) I`ve been noticing them too, Spanish announcements detracting from WWV; but time matches now (gh, OK, DXLD) ** VENEZUELA. 4830.08, R. Táchira, San Cristóbal, fair in Spanish 29/12 with talk 1156; was hoping for the Cam [?]; 4829.08 30/12 1145 (Sam Dellit, Tamborine, Qld, Drake R8B & SPR4, Icom IC-746, beverages 400m 3m 10degT, 150m 3m 50degT, 750m 6/3m 100degT, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** VIETNAM [non]. Re CHINA [non], 6280 mixing product from Sackville: Hi Glenn. You explain it very clearly. Another example of this I heard couple of days ago. At 1903 heard a station in Vietnamese (VOV) on 6355. Another very weak station was heard under it. Scanning the band, noted parallel Vietnamese on 5955. Then it was easy to calculate that this was mixing product from Moosbrunn, Austria 5955/6155. As 6155 minus 5955 is 200. And 6155 plus 200 is 6355. Another mixing product was on 5755. And as you say, the 5955 program was stronger on 6355 and the 6155 program was stronger on 5755. 73 (Jari Savolainen, Kuusankoski, Finland, Jan 5, DX LISTENING DIGEST) see also JAPAN non ** VIETNAM [non]. GERMANY, 9585, (via Javoradio Sweden) Chan Troi Moi service for Vietnam. 1402 Jan 2 with what sounded like news read by man and woman in Vietnamese. Interlude of Mozart and then giving address in Osaka, Japan and their email address. Then long speech by man in Vietnamese. I still cannot access their website, but I have noticed that you can hear some of their programming via the site. Such as http://www.radioctm.com/program/1207quyetnghi_mlnq.ram Reception was fine in Sweden (Hans Johnson, FL, Cumbre DX via DXLD) As far as I understand it, they do not have a "real" website; they use their server only to store audio files plus for their email accounts (Bernd Trutenau, Lithuania, ibid.) ** WESTERN SAHARA [non]. CLANDESTINE from ALGERIA to MOROCCO, 7460, Radio SADR, 2258 Jan 2, Arabic music till ID in Arabic at 2302. Then heard in Spanish. Signal was decent and I couldn't detect any jamming (Hans Johnson, Naples FL, Drake R8 50' longwire, Cumbre DX via DXLD) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ LANGUAGE LESSONS ++++++++++++++++ STREAMS OF CONSCIOUSNESS What is it with foreign language lessons on shortwave? There have been a score or more of these on the air over the years. `Starting Finnish` (Radio Finland), `A Language Without Bounds` (Radio Exterior de España), `Auf Deutsch Gesagt` (Deutsche Welle), `Let`s Learn Chinese` (Radio Taiwan International), `Let`s Learn Japanese` (Radio Japan), `Dutch by Radio` (Radio Nederland), `Russian by Radio` (Voice of Russia/Radio Moscow) are just some of the program titles. Some have even offered printed texts to accompany the programs. But has anyone actually ever learned how to usefully speak a new language this way? In fairness, some listeners have given personal accounts of how they learned English through a combination of the BBC`s `English by Radio` and the VOA`s `Special English` broadcasts and regular, attentive listening to their news and everyday programs. But I have to believe that these are rare occurrences owing more to intense personal commitment rather than the innate genius of this particular program genre. The intent is certainly admirable. However, it appears (at least to this observer) that the effort is almost fatally flawed from the start. The medium itself can be a tremendous obstacle when reception is degraded. And are one or two five or ten minute programs a week really enough to teach anything significant? If anything, any such effort needs to pay attention to those anecdotal accounts mentioned earlier. They ought to focus on making it possible for the listener to gain an increasing amount of information and enjoyment from the broadcaster’s home language service. This approach would be infinitely more practical than teaching one how to ask for directions to the rest room. Beginners could be given a daily newscast at slower speaking speed. Advanced learners could move on to the regular service. Makes sense to me anyway (John Figliozzi, Programming Spotlight, January MONITORING TIMES via DXLD) I followed some of these courses, and another one, from Radio Budapest, which gave me a grounding at least in Hungarian orthography and pronunciation, along with printed material and has served me well ever since, unlike countless other English-speaking broadcasters I hear. As I recently pointed out CRI is running Chinese lessons at :55 into many if not all English transmissions (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) LANGUAGE LESSONS BY SHORTWAVE MAKE A COMEBACK There was a time when just about every international broadcaster devoted some of its airtime to language lessons - Radio Netherlands included. But in the age of satellite broadcasting and the Internet, most of the shortwave language courses have disappeared. Now Radio Singapore International (RSI) is set to introduce English lessons for its Indonesian listeners later this year. Sixteen trainees from the Indonesian province of Riau are currently attending a two-week conversational English Language Course, organised by RSI. More than 400 people applied for the course, which started on Monday. The customised course will be adapted into a series of English language learning programmes and broadcast on the RSI Indonesian Service. The radio series will then be turned into a book, containing the language course and snapshots of Singapore, marking RSI's 10th anniversary. The course is funded by the Technical Co-operation programme from the Singapore Ministry of Foreign Affairs. # posted by Andy @ 17:05 UT Jan 5 (Media Network blog via DXLD) POWERLINE COMMUNICATIONS ++++++++++++++++++++++++ CROSSED SIGNALS --- By WILL RODGERS, Jan 5, 2004, Tampa Tribune LAKELAND - Evans F. Mitchell often uses e-mail to contact people, but when it's time to talk to them, he turns to an older method of communication. Mitchell, an amateur radio operator, lets other ham operators know by e-mail the time and radio frequency where the two can carry on a conversation over airwaves. ``It is a proven system of communication,'' Mitchell said recently about using a two-way radio. But that almost century-old method of communicating appears on a collision course with a relatively new technology that allows people to access the Internet at high speeds through electrical wires in their house, business and community. The Federal Communications Commission, which licenses radio operations, is studying broadband over power line, or BPL, because electrical wires reach nearly every U.S. household. The FCC believes allowing utilities to provide high-speed Internet access over their wires could quickly expand broadband to communities not reached by cable and digital subscriber lines. The five-person commission is expected to draw up rules in two or three months for power companies to roll out commercial use of the technology, said Fred Thomas, chief of staff of the FCC's office of engineering and technology. Utility officials hail BPL as a boon for their companies and their customers. The service gives consumers - especially those who live in rural America - high-speed access to the information highway. At the same time, it allows power companies to tap into another revenue source and gain data to better control the electrical system. But people who communicate by radio - from amateur operators to federal agencies - say the widespread deployment of BPL will be a bust in the United States because radiation in the high-frequency and very- high-frequency broadcast spectrums will interfere with critical radio communications during disaster recovery and from emergency, police and fire agencies, among others. ``Personally, I don't think it should be allowed,'' Mitchell said. The American Radio Relay League, which represents 681,000 ham radio operators, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency are among those seeking to block broadband from traveling over power lines. FEMA and amateur radio operators have written the FCC, arguing that BPL is a threat to radio communications. While amateur radio is largely a hobby, many ham operators serve as part of the nation's emergency and military communication systems, radio operators said. The loss of radio communication could affect the economy because of its importance to national security, emergency preparedness and recovery, maritime shipping and the military, among others, some radio operators contend. Alan R. Shark, president and chief executive officer of the Power Line Communications Association, thinks broadband over power line will reach between 750,000 and 1 million customers by the end of 2004. He said there are no solid figures for what utilities have invested in BPL because no single business model has emerged for financing the venture. Progress Energy Inc., the parent company of Progress Energy Florida in St. Petersburg, has conducted a BPL trial. The company still must decide whether it will invest in BPL and, if so, whether to do it through a partnership or on its own. TECO Energy Inc., which serves portions of the Tampa Bay area, says it isn't considering BPL. Shark called complaints from radio operators hysteria based on flawed studies. He also said claims that BPL will disrupt radio communications among typical emergency services - fire, police and emergency medical services - are untrue because those operations broadcast at higher frequencies. ``The good news is the FCC is literally checking this,'' Shark said. ``I like to believe science and reason will prevail over politics.'' How BPL Works BPL, which transmits a communication signal through electrical lines to connect computers to the Internet, operates in the high-frequency, or HF, and very-high-frequency, or VHF, spectrums, the same used for communication by operators of shortwave, amateur, citizens' band, aeronautical, government and military radios. A spectrum represents a range of frequencies used for radio communications. ``Interference is a problem, of course,'' said Jim Haynie, president of the radio league. ``But what everyone is concerned about is spectrum pollution, and that's what [BPL] is going to be. You reach a point where the spectrum becomes unusable.'' The FCC recognizes the finiteness of a spectrum for the transmission of sound, data and video, so the agency and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration work to protect against interference while encouraging efficient use of a spectrum, according to the FCC's Web site. Thomas, the FCC chief of staff, said it's too early to determine what will be recommended to commissioners. But the FCC will try to balance the ability of radio operators to broadcast with allowing utilities to pursue BPL. ``It's important to protect incumbents and come up with an outlet for BPL,'' Thomas said. ``That's essentially what we'll be trying to address in the rule-making.'' No date is set for commissioners to discuss and decide on broadband over power line, Thomas said. Disallowing BPL would cut off a pipeline to new revenue that would help some electric utilities looking for financial renewal in 2004. Broadband over power line trials in some states have proved successful for utilities, promising future unregulated revenues. Increases in orders for communications equipment also would boost the telecommunications industry, which has been in a slump like the power industry, Shark said. League Battling BPL While there would be no direct monetary impact on radio operators if BPL goes forward, the ultimate effects might be realized if the two technologies cannot coexist, Haynie said. ``I can see how any [chief executive officer] would have to take a look at this,'' he said. ``Our complaint is not BPL. It's whether there is interference.'' Ed Hare, laboratory manager for the radio league, reported in a November 2002 study that BPL ``will probably result in severe local harmful interference over a wide area.'' In its battle to halt the march of broadband onto electrical wires, the radio league has devoted several pages of its Web site to making its argument, citing studies about radio interference and providing information about FCC rules, broadband and amateur radio. Under the headline, Broadband Over Power Line (BPL) and Amateur Radio, the Web site says: ``Stop the assault on ham radio!'' Mitchell, the Polk County ham operator, said the FCC should understand that an additional method of high-speed Internet access is unnecessary. Broadband is available to many through cable, DSL, satellite and fiber-to-the-home, he said. But those in the utility industry argue that power lines are virtually everywhere, giving people broadband in rural communities where cable, DSL and fiber optic cable aren't and where satellite access can cost $70 a month. In comparison, the average price of cable broadband is about $40 a month; DSL costs $30 to $35; and BPL is expected to be about $30 a month. The United Power Line Council is an alliance of electric utilities and technology companies pushing the development and adoption of BPL. Brett Kilbourne, the council's associate counsel and director of regulatory services, called claims by radio operators unfounded and unwarranted. He said utilities are prohibited from interfering with other communications devices, and claims of interference from broadband over power line are based on conjecture and abstract theory, not hard science. If BPL were to block out radio signals, the utilities would be responsible for clearing the interference, Kilbourne said. ``We're fairly confident we comply with the FCC's rules,'' he said. ``We haven't found any wide-scale interference issues. We haven't seen any evidence that suggest we couldn't coexist.'' This story can be found at: http://www.tampatrib.com/Business/MGALZEAO1PD.html (via Terry L Krueger, Clearwater, Florida, DXLD) RADIO EQUIPMENT FORUM +++++++++++++++++++++ IBOC THREAD FROM NRC CONTINUES: There appears to be a slight kink that the children of the FM age forgot, or conveniently tried to overlook - MW night time skywave! It took the first night time tests to show what a disaster the interim hybrid version of IBOC would be during the 12 - 15 year transition that was originally envisioned. The early IBOC descriptions that I read mentioned folding the digital sidebands into the channel once there was no need (read after the cut- off date) for analog transmissions. Supposedly, this would allow power increases that could (in theory) extend the range of the stations and fill in the areas where the temporary dual system "blended" to analog. The problem is skywave seems to prevent night time use of adjacent channels because there is a HUGE difference between analog first adjacent "splatter" (actually high frequency modulation that spills into the adjacent intermittently) and the digital sub-carriers that are constantly present even if they are 26 dB below the analog carrier. Remember that the buzzsaw of the subs remains even when the IBOC station transmits dead air! Thus, an IBOC hybrid signal can be within the NRSC-2 limits for radiation on adjacent channels as set BEFORE IBOC and still rip a weak adjacent station's signal to shreds. On paper, this looked like a minor problem because it met the Rules. In practice one only needed to listen to the WLW tests anywhere in the Western US to know it was a REAL problem that no amount of "spin" would cure. In the case of 50 KW Class A stations, it affects the listenability of protected coverage although it complies with rules written with no thought of CONTINUOUS SUB-CARRIERS. And there's the problem in a nutshell. These business plan ignoramuses (or is it ignorami? |g|) have been thumped along side the head by mother nature in the guise of physics. Seeing the political problems approval of an unworkable system, the FCC bowed to the inevitable and did not authorize night time IBOC MW transmissions. So, the question is, how do you fold digital into a vacant space left by analog when you must keep analog at night? Unless there is a solution for that, phase II becomes impossible and we are stuck with this phase I hybrid nonsense for who knows how many years. That's why I wonder if the forced conversion is really a part of the future. Notice that Ibiquity will lose its ability to call the shots as its funding dries up, and that may be happening as major groups DON'T jump on the IBOC bandwagon in large numbers. I may be an incurable optimist, but given a genuine grass roots squawk about the system that can't, and a drying up of funding, Ibiquity is not a stock I'd put my money on right now. It's something to consider. Just my 2¢. . . . If the stink gets too strong, some of the politicos may distance themselves from it. Another thing that encourages me is Ibiquity's apparent disregard for their adjacency problems they conflict with "fixing" their codecs. If the exciter/generator has to be PERFECTLY adjusted to stay inside the NRSC masks, IMO, there's nobody left at Ibiquity who cares. So the adjacent radiation is "a little bit" above the mask limit - that MUST be a propagation problem, or station engineers who can't do it right - couldn't be an Ibiquity problem caused by making the codec sound almost listenable, could it? My guess, and it's only a guess, is that we'll be lucky to have adjacent sidebands 20 db below in the real world to overcome the constant "blending" problem. BTW "blending" is IMHO, another problem that may need work in the real world ... thanks to digital latency. There is no question this will have great impact on DX, because the FCC deems anything except "protected" coverage to be useless stray signals. Whereas there have been many openings for listening in the past, if we accept night time IBOC as a fact of life, the future looks like a world populated by jamming noise EXCEPT in areas where frequencies have protected coverage, according to FCC definitions. That means the noise floor will be higher than anyone can imagine in their worst nightmare. Unless someone develops an antenna with at least 2 adjustable azimuth nulls, AM DX may become a topic of good memories, but no new catches. :-( (FM MAY be a different story thanks to ducting, but noise floor will still be a factor (Phil Alexander, CSRE, Broadcast Engineering Services and Technology, (Indianapolis - where we get WLW and WSAI on groundwave), ibid.) IBOC Nighttime --- I don't know about reports, but I sure know what WSAI sounds like with IBOC on at night. When it's off, there is absolutely no sideband splatter. As soon as the IBOC comes on, 1520 and 1540 sound like a TV tuned to a blank channel. When WSAI fades, the IBOC hiss seems to raise and lower in pitch. I sent a recording to WSAI back in August at about 10:00 PM when they were running night time IBOC. 1520 had a very faint signal under the hash, and KZMP was fighting with the hash on 1540. WSAI had some Spanish interference and was fading in and out (Adam Myrow, Memphis, ibid.) Protection is a complex issue in AM, but the essential point is that the present rules give 26 dB desired/undesired ratio for co-channel interference, so when the made up the preliminary rules for IBOC they allowed the same ratio. HOWEVER, the maximum interference was in the form of a 0 to 40 Hz heterodyne plus audio 26 dB below signal before IBOC. NOW it's a constant buzzsaw running 26 dB below, CONSTANTLY. This is the part the FCC lawyers and non-technical types just don't get. One is tolerable, the other is useless disaster, but the numbers are the same. The light dawns when you first hear it. It's a classic apples and oranges situation. | I am located 35 or so miles FURTHER from WBZ than 1st adjacent WIBG- 1020 in NJ is, and the IBOC hash covers WIBG (which was weak before that) during the day! | On adjacent channels, what you really have is one IBOC sideband of the undesired station covering the same frequencies as the desired analog modulation of the other station. IBOC sidebands are continuous subcarriers that are IN the adjacent upper and lower channels, so what we are calling adjacent interference is not adjacent at all. It's co- channel that just happens to be coming from a station whose analog signal is on the adjacent channel. To put it more simply, suppose somebody fired up a jammer on either side of an IBOC station and the signal of the jammer was 26 dB below their analog carrier. Picking up anything on either side becomes an impossibility unless you can null the signal with a good antenna. And, consider that you will probably have to null more than one azimuth. That's going to be the problem if they ever let IBOC loose at night, and as Powell says, sooner or later that may very well happen (Phil Alexander, CSRE, ibid.) I'll ask again --- is anyone seeing any coverage in the Radio-TV sections of their papers about IBOC? I was hoping someone had news from Boston about WBZ. (I doubt this even makes the archived or online versions on papers' websites). But, no one has remarked on this, AFAIK. I really find it hard to believe no Boston paper has run with this, re WBZ. Possible reasons: --Radio-TV columnists don't cover radio news. ("unimportant") --Radio-TV columnists don't know of IBOC developments. (assuming they DO run radio news) --Columnists DO know of IBOC news but don't think it matters. --Columnists are pro-IBOC and don't want to print bad news about it. --Columnists are too lazy to do any digging but just wait for the next handout from iBiquity. And then run it verbatim. (Anyone with any knowledge of the scandal with SCO vs. Open-Source, and how the lazy financial reporters run SCO's PR material unchallenged, will understand this) (see Slashdot and Groklaw archives for details) --Columnists HAVE run this and no DXer has picked up on it and run it here. Why is it so hard to get a thread going on this On-topic ?? (Bob Foxworth, Tampa, Florida, Jan 3, NRC-AM via DXLD) I don't. I've been covering radio and TV news in Boston for ten years (yup, NERW hits the big 1-0 in 2004, hard to believe), and the Boston papers are notoriously clueless when it comes to radio. The Globe generally ignores radio completely, which is actually a good thing, since they almost always get call letters, frequencies and even bands wrong when they do. The Herald is marginally better, but only marginally. And Boston is the rule, not the exception. The NY Daily News and NY Post both have adequate radio columns, as do the Fort Worth Star-Telegram (or, per the Krumudgeon, the "Startlegram") and a handful of other papers. The best of the bunch is the Chicago Sun- Times' Robert Feder, who really "gets it" in a way most newspaper folk don't. Most papers in smaller towns, like the insipid rag that is my local Gannett paper (and I say that even though Mrs. Fybush is employed there as a copy editor) are so understaffed that they can barely cover "important" news. There is simply NO coverage of radio in the Rochester paper, and the only reason the list of radio stations in the back of the Sunday TV supplement is reasonably accurate is because Mrs. F. got good and tired of hearing me whine about how inaccurate it was and finally agreed to hand-deliver a corrected list from me to the overworked copy editor who was responsible for said listing. And even then it took a few weeks. None of the above. The radio-TV columnists still extant out there cover programming and ONLY programming. I doubt that any full-time newspaper radio-TV columnist in the country (even my buddy Feder) knows what "IBOC" is, much less has an opinion about it. And from the point of view of the average Joe who reads their column, it DOESN'T matter yet. Once they can buy radios in the stores, there will be articles about them (probably not in the radio-TV columns but in the lifestyle or business sections), which will be barely accurate and highly incomplete. But the beautiful thing about this age of the Internet is that there are plenty of trade publications and mailing lists out there that cover the relevant issues accurately and relatively completely. Some are even free, like http://www.rwonline.com from my colleagues at Radio World, or Radio Guide http://www.radio-guide.com which will even send a free paper subscription to pretty much anyone who asks, as long as they have some plausible connection to radio. Mailing lists like this one, the broadcast@broadcast.net list and the Radio-Tech list (also hosted at broadcast.net) are full of engineers discussing the issues. It's just not a topic of any particular interest to the mass media (Scott Fybush, NY, NRC-AM via DXLD) | Why is it so hard to get a thread going on this On-topic ?? Because the public does not understand what is happening. When my wife and I drove out to North Dakota over a year ago, we had interference to WGN-720 from WOR-710 in Indiana. We were listening for weather and traffic info for Chicago as we drove across Indiana. Her reaction was that we were getting power line and atmospheric noise, or that WGN was "just not coming in good." Having been a DXer and radio listener all my life, and having worked with RF since 68, I knew that the problem was not as she thought but that of WOR's IBOC. I suspect that the general public thinks the same as she does. It's just a problem that is unique to transmissions of AM. Bob, it's like the myth that AM can't sound good. Anyone who has heard some of my tests know that while the AM frequency response can not technically achieve that of the FM broadcast spectrum, it still can sound a lot better than 99% of the commercial stations on the air. However the public does not know that. And that's why the myth continues. The way to battle IBOC interference is to write to stations that are being interfered and say something like; "I used to listen to you for weather and traffic advisories, but I wasn't able to hear you last weekend. The station in ______ was causing too much interference to you. Have they changed something you didn't know about?" This letter should go to the station management, with a CC to the FCC and your Congressman. If nothing is done, a second letter can be written to the station, Attn: Pubic File restating the problem, and asking what measures the station will take to fix the problem so you can hear them again. The station is obligated to respond to your letter, and it would be interesting to see how they address it. The FCC and broadcasters don't care about DXers. Sorry, guys, but that is reality. Station management/licensees are the only ones that can evoke a reaction. I suspect that nothing will really get rolling until such a time as a station files a law suit against another station for interference from IBOC. However, to get that started, the station must feel a threat. And as long as they don't feel threatened, and think they have the same coverage they have always had, life and IBOC will move forward, and you won't see anything in the press. I've written a few letters; has anyone else? (Fred Vobbe, OH, NRC-AM via DXLD) I've written a few letters. I've commented in RM 99-325 in case anyone wants to read them and commented to stations directly. It's amazing how little the stations staff knows about IBOC. Case in point is WUSF 89-7 NPR University of So. Florida station in Tampa. They are running IBOC and I'm about 45 miles or so from their transmitter. I used to listen to a station on 89.9 out of Cape Coral which is about 40 miles south of me. the 89.9 can no longer be heard here. But instead of the classic digital noise you hear on AM, my car radio just mutes. It appears it sees the digital hash as AM noise and like most FM receivers, it doesn`t show up in the audio. I can hear the hash from 89.7 on my ICF2010 when tuning off frequency just a bit. I called the 89.9 station and spoke to their manager. She had received several complaints about reception problems from people mostly north of her and had their contract engineer see if the station was putting out the signal it should be. It was. The manager never considered that the problem was coming from IBOC from the adjacent channel station in Tampa. The problem though is that I'm not in their city grade contour. (Paul Smith, W4KNX, Sarasota, FL, ibid.) The criterion I use is the same one Clear Channel (and most big groups) use when they contemplate buying a station: the "nighttime interference-free" contour. As we're learning from IBOC, what really matters (at least where listenable reception of an AM signal is concerned) is not so much the amount of power a given station puts out, or the directionality of its antenna. It's the amount of interference the station has to overcome on its channel. For any given AM frequency and location, it's possible to determine pretty precisely how much skywave interference is being received from other co- and adjacent-channel stations and, consequently, how much signal a listener would need to receive from a local station to overcome that interference by a sufficient ratio to produce a signal that's perceived as "interference-free." For a typical regional (ex- class III) facility that doesn't enjoy a lot of grandfathered protection - like, say, my 1370 here in Rochester - the NIF can be as high as 12 or 15 mV/m. So by plotting the 15 mV/m contour of a station with an "NIF" of 15, you get an excellent approximation of the areas that will be able to hear that signal without appreciable interference at night. For a big 50kw class A facility, NIF levels are very low, in the range of 0.5 mV/m; for a typical graveyarder, NIF is somewhere from 30-40. Needless to say, the 40 mV/m contour of a typical station on 1240 goes out a matter of a mile or two, at best. Where you see huge discrepancies is in the old "class III" regional channels - the best (old) facilities, like a 550 Phoenix or a 570 Dallas, have NIFs as low as 1 or 2, while newer stations squeezed into crowded channels may have NIF levels up in the 20s. This is not a set of data you'll find in the FCC database or on radio-locator.com; the engineers who generate these numbers guard them pretty jealously, because they know that it's really the NIF number that determines whether a facility is a gem or a dog. What's more, if you know your NIFs and you have a station you're trying to upgrade, you can pretty easily identify which stations are the major contributors to that interference level (it's generally just one, two or three major contributors to each station's NIF) and thus begin to pick out possible stations to buy out, shut down or move at the next major AM change window like the one that's coming in a few weeks. And THAT information, in turn, helps determine which stations the savvy group operators try to buy and which ones they avoid like the plague. Take, for instance, the three class III AMs lined up a mile or so to my south. Each is 5 kw, DA-N, on a regional channel (1280, 1370 and 1460, respectively). Each has a decent ND day signal from a tower of similar height in an area of similar ground conductivity. Each has a night pattern that looks pretty much identical on paper (aimed north into Rochester, with significant nulls to the southeast and southwest). But of those three, one is potentially worth MUCH more than the other two simply by virtue of a lower NIF that gives it the potential for facility upgrades that the other two lack. Where IBOC enters into this is as follows: the much higher perceived interference from the high-energy IBOC transmissions will lead to a substantial increase in "effective" NIF levels across the dial. The very savviest of the group operators have already figured this out and are taking it into account in their engineering (as has been hinted repeatedly by other list members). But because IBOC isn't figured into traditional NIF calculations, it'll take some less-savvy stations and owners by surprise (Scott Fybush, Rochester NY, ibid.) [Fred Vobbe related how WOR-710 IBOC from NYC was interfering with WGN-720 as he approached Chicago] If you were in No. Indiana you were probably INSIDE WGN's 0.5 mV contour; and as a Class A 50 KW station, WGN's 0.1 mV contour is considered to have 26 dB protection DAY and NIGHT. That, BTW, is roughly anywhere west of a line between Columbus and Toledo! One thing you can bet on, and that's that Tom Ray is operating WOR legally, so it's not the level of interference, it the character of that interference that makes it so objectionable. To my ears, it sounds almost like the buzzsaw of the Soviet jammers during the cold war, and a 26 dB d/u ratio is not nearly enough. Just to make it clear, you were in an area where you had at least a 30 dB d/u ratio and THAT was not enough. To eliminate the problems IMHO they would need to drop the undesired level 40 to 45 dB below before it would become non-objectionable. However, if that were done, IBOC would blend to analog within sight of the towers of some stations. The hybrid (first) phase of IBOC simply wouldn't work. [FCC Chairman Michael] Powell says the cut-off will come much faster than 12 - 15 years, and I think he is right, but for a different reason. Once over half of the stations begin transmitting IBOC, the DAYTIME interference free coverage will shrink from their 0.5 mV contour to something nearer their 5 mV contour if the WGN example above is any indication. WGN would be lucky to put interference free coverage into Rockford and Milwaukee in that case. When the station GM's begin to realize what's happened to their coverage, they will react and either kill IBOC AM or join it enmass. Either way, there may be significant changes at the FCC. I do hope someone in Congress starts asking the dreaded - HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN - question. Phil Alexander, CSRE, NRC-AM via DXLD) I was driving on US6 on the way to Chicago, and in Plymouth IN we finally shut off the radio. But interference is interference, and what is sort of strange is that proponents seems to pass off the problem as being acceptable under the circumstances. I don't feel it's acceptable for the sole reason that it was not there before and should not be a factor today. If WSB-750, WJR-760, WABC-770, and WBBM-780 all used IBOC, it would render that portion of the dial useless to someone like myself that normally tunes to these stations to get out of town information. Phil, my solution, (if god tapped me on the shoulder and put me in charge), would be the following. IBOC does not work due to the interference issues, directional antenna issues, and coverage issues. Proponents of IBOC state in their arguments that their need is to serve their immediate market. Further, they claim that the quality issues will drive people to make the transition. That's a great argument. Here is Fred's magic solution. Put all digital transmissions using iBiquity's digital into either the expanded band, or yet a better solution would be to put them in a UHF/VHF band. Since the stations care to only serve their immediate area, and iBiquity can't make the decoding work through propagation, it seems logical to put them in a band where local reception works best. Perhaps TV channels, but above the 220 ham band would not be bad as well. The point is, allow them to have their service, omni- directional, while not causing damage to other stations. Alternatively, I would like to see Leonard Kahn have a shot at trying CAM-D as iBiquity has had with IBOC. From what private tests I've done, CAM-D does not come with all the baggage that IBOC does. It also provides the solution to the choice of the consumer as it sounds better than IBOC in the transition. Powell is a politician, and not someone with a lot of common sense. The FCC has long stated that DTV would take off and I could switch off my analog transmitter in 2006. That date is approaching fast. Sales locally of TV sets showed little reason to get digital, and despite notices asking viewers to call the station for more information on digital, not one call has been received since Christmas. Maybe engineers like me are making the analog look too good! |grin| If the cut off comes early in radio, it will be because the FCC allowed such a high level of interference that it effectively drove analog out. To me, this would be like your neighbors playing Ozzie Ozborne at 125 dB all day and night, and when you move out of your house in disgust to get some quiet, the neighbors proclaim it a victory for the neighborhood! |grin| I'm not sure that the GMs understand all the issues, Phil. The ones I have talked to seem clueless to the potential, and real interference issues. WGN was one such station. The impression I was given was that as long as it did not affect "Chicago", it was of no concern. Therein lies my big argument with the coverage of IBOC. If the GM's are not concerned about Grade-B and beyond, then let's just make the model for digital radio be a local transmission of say 1 kw on 275 MHz (for a rough example). Don't put it in a spread of frequencies where you know you'll cause damage and drive off the neighbors. Same applies for digital TV. My counterparts in other markets have fielded complaints from DTV signals interfering with their analog. The viewers don't know what's happening, and unless you're an engineer you don't know what's happening, all you know is that there is noise and it's driving away viewers. In my own case I get hit with interference on my analog from South Bend IN and Cincinnati OH. When that happens, I spend the morning on the phone with angry people that can't watch our station. Even after explaining to them what the problem is, they still are angry, frustrated, and want a solution (Fred Vobbe, OH, ibid.) The GM's don't, the owners don't, the FCC doesn't and the other politicians pushing it don't, and of course the public doesn't. To me that's a perfect recipe for just what some here have said they can see coming -- an FCC mandate to turn off analog at some point perhaps not too distant. That's particularly scary since the various power-that-be so far don't seem to have been able to comprehend the reality of lack of sales of DTV receivers and still maintain the 2006 deadline there (Russ Edmunds, PA, ibid.) Lo and behold --- here's an article from the Indianapolis Star, of all places, about IBOC. Note that, like most newspaper reporting about radio, there's no real attempt to learn anything about the technology beyond what's in the press release from the station (or, more likely, from Ibiquity.) s (Scott Fybush, NY, ibid.) RADIO STATION GOES DIGITAL --- WICR-FM WILL SEND OUT CLEAR SIGNAL WHEN NEW EQUIPMENT GOES IN OPERATION NEXT MONTH. Star report December 27, 2003 With the expectation that "if we build it, they will come," WICR-FM (88.7) is becoming the first public radio station in Indiana to convert to a high-definition signal. Even though HD radio receivers are not available to consumers, the classical-and-jazz station owned by the University of Indianapolis has begun installing the equipment that will bring CD-quality sound to its 40,000-plus listeners. The equipment also will open the door to new ways of receiving not just audio but data over the radio waves -- once the receivers are available. The new signal is expected to be on the air early next month. "This is a bold move for us," said general manager Scott Uecker, "but we know that our audience would not expect anything less. "HD radio technology is here, and until stations begin broadcasting in high definition and listeners start demanding radios that can receive those signals, the manufacturers have little incentive to produce them. "Our music format is perfect for HD radio, and we think our listeners are ready for the leap in audio quality that this technology provides. "Classical music audiophiles were responsible for the early success of compact discs. Their desire for higher sound quality created the initial demand for CDs. We think they are now ready to embrace digital radio, which will give them the clarity of CDs on the air." The station's need for a new transmitter made the decision to go digital easier, Uecker said. "We had a transmitter that was installed in the early 1980s that needed to be replaced at a cost of about 80 percent of what the upgrade to digital would cost, so it isn't that much more to complete the conversion to digital. The expenses are being covered primarily by listener donations and underwriting." WICR has signed a contract with iBiquity Digital Corp., the nation's only developer of the HD radio technology approved by the Federal Communications Commission as the industry standard. Once iBiquity's system is in place, the station's frequency range will double to span frequencies 88.5 to 88.9 MHz. The current range is 88.6 to 88.8 FM. Listeners can still receive WICR with analog radios on 88.7 FM. The new digital signal also is expected to be more robust and less susceptible to obstructions caused by tall buildings. The blips in signal strength that FM listeners sometimes experience while driving Downtown are expected to go away. HD radio also enables a station to transmit auxiliary digital information on an LCD screen. Existing analog technology allows for stations to transmit basic information such as a song title and an artist's name, but HD radio eventually will be able to include custom weather, traffic reports and breaking news. "That is an area of great potential," Uecker said, "but we're not quite sure yet what we'll do with it." Eventually, second-generation data services will be able to provide more information and allow listeners to pause, store, fast-forward, index or replay programming, as Tivo has done for television. Satellite radio has features and advantages similar to HD radio but can be received only by subscription, which involves a monthly service fee. Also, satellite programming and data services are not local, Uecker noted. In addition to benefits for listeners, WICR's conversion to digital will have a big effect on the way the university educates students for 21st century broadcasting, Uecker said. "Our students will be learning state-of-the-art production techniques that will soon become standard," he said. "iBiquity is introducing HD radio to 11 major media markets, and I don't expect it will be long before they expand to other markets. There already are more than 300 stations in the U.S. in the process of converting." HD radio receivers were introduced at the Consumer Electronics Show in January. Some automakers promised to put the radios in high-end, model-year 2004 cars. How soon receivers are available to consumers in stores is unknown. "Radio stations have to get digital signals on the air," Uecker said. "When we do, manufacturers will follow. "I encourage all of the Indianapolis stations to take a long, hard look at converting to digital in the near future. It's good for our industry. It's good for our listeners. The additional services we will be able to provide are certainly in the public interest." (via Fybush) OK Scott, and you would know this, if it is true that "once iBiquity's system is in place, the station's frequency range will double to span frequencies 88.5 to 88.9 MHz", does it have to comply with spacing as if they were broadcasting on both 88.5 and 88.9? (Rick Shaftan, NJ, ibid.) And here's one from the Washington Times [Moony]. . . http://www.washtimes.com/business/20040104-102923-7133r.htm (BILL in Fort Worth Hale, ibid.) | OK Scott, and you would know this, if it is true that "once iBiquity's system is in place, the station's frequency range will double to span frequencies 88.5 to 88.9 MHz", does it have to comply with spacing as if they were broadcasting on both 88.5 and 88.9? | Nope. The spacing rules don't change with the introduction of IBOC. (Scott Fybush, ibid.) No they don't change or no it doesn't have anything to do with it. Isn't the purpose of spacing rules to insure that WNEW-FM isn't interfering with WMGK's coverage area, for example (102.7 and 102.9) (Rick Shaftan, NJ, ibid.) From my understanding of IBOC-FM, the statement "frequency range will double to span frequencies 88.5 to 88.9 MHz" is wrong. IBOC-FM does *not* spread outside the assigned channel, in WICR's case 88.6-88.8. Like IBOC-AM, what it *does* do is present greater power densities at the outer edges of that channel. The analog signal might have little energy between, say, 88.6 and 88.65 MHz, while the digital signal has plenty of power in this range. If, then, you're trying to listen to an 88.5 station on a radio with 220 kHz filters, it's going to pass 88.39-88.61 and you're going to hear buzz... -- (Doug Smith, TN, ibid.) Functionally, however, depending on distance and power, it does cover the adjacents. The white noise is very much there. At 8 miles from WXTU-92.5, they run from 92.25 thru 92.75 even with the T-80 in the narrowest position (Russ Edmunds, Blue Bell, PA, ibid.) "Much higher perceived interference" IS what it's all about. The shortcoming of all the IBOC tests is that they are basically predicated on engineering done for typical analog interference in the days before modern, high density, audio processing. DJ's talk over MUSIC beds without a problem. Try running a siren sound effect as a bed at the same level. The sound produced by an analog receiver when tuned to an IBOC sub-carrier for an adjacent channel is WORSE than a siren! The human ear does not perceive all sounds equally. The sound of a buzzsaw/siren PENETRATES out of all proportion to its measured acoustic level, and that seems to be a fact of human aural perception. Engineers measure with meters that essentially register voltage or current. The original VI (more commonly called VU) meter was the first attempt at metering more like human hearing, but it and all of its descendants have failed to capture the nuance of the human ear (and "golden ears" - well let's not even think about adding that item to the discussion |g|). When digital bits are coded on multiple sub-carriers the inevitable result on an envelope decoder (analog receiver) sounds like a convention of buzzsaws. The ONLY thing I've ever heard that is similar was Soviet jamming of the SW band in the cold war days. At least to my ears, the level of undesired signal is at least 10 dB more that a meter would lead me to believe it should be; AND it NEVER shuts up. The net result of allowing night time IBOC is that you could multiply those NIF numbers by a factor somewhere between 5 and 10 thanks to human aural perception of an extremely undesirable sound. Now, and this is the part very few seem to get, this interference will go away in the second phase when (if) a transition is made to fully digital MW transmission. That's because, the sub-carriers will be where they belong, in their own channel, not in the adjacents. That will allow substantial power increases to overcome the spotty coverage of the present anemic -26 dB digital signal. So, it COULD be a wonderful world for AM - IF - we could somehow survive the first phase without killing the band for lack of listeners and the consequent lack of revenue. The problem is the radio audience is a drive time audience. From the time radios capable of digital reception begin appearing in new cars it takes over 10 years to modernize the large majority (75-80%) of the passenger car fleet. Solution? - I'm not sure there is a GOOD solution. :( (And, I BTW, was very "gung ho" for IBOC 2 or 3 years ago because AM has been dying for some time, in a general sense.) Maybe if the FCC READ the Communications Act of 1934 (not necessarily as amended in '96) and took it to heart ... but that would be too simple, I suppose. To my way of thinking, IBOC is another good example of what happens when politics tries to do engineering. The real problem here is that physical law is not subject to legislative fiat. And, THAT IS A GOOD THING, IMHO. |g| (Phil Alexander, CSRE, ibid.) FIRST IBOC RECEIVERS GO ON SALE --- In Cedar Rapids, no less; Art Collins is probably spinning in his grave: http://www.radioworld.com/dailynews/one.php?id=4349 http://www.radioink.com/HeadlineEntry.asp?hid=117569&pt=todaysnews (Harry Helms W7HLH, Las Vegas, NV DM26, ibid.) ###