DX LISTENING DIGEST 5-143, August 22, 2005 Incorporating REVIEW OF INTERNATIONAL BROADCASTING 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 2005 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 1284: Mon 1800 WOR RFPI [repeated 4-hourly thru Tue 1400] Tue 1600 WOR WBCQ after hours [stream has been down] Tue 2330 WOR WBCQ 7415 [usually lately] Wed 0930 WOR WWCR 9985 Wed 1600 WOR WBCQ after hours [stream has been down] Latest edition of this schedule version, with hotlinks to station sites and audio, is at: http://www.worldofradio.com/radioskd.html WRN ON DEMAND: http://new.wrn.org/listeners/stations/station.php?StationID=24 OUR ONDEMAND AUDIO [also CONTINENT OF MEDIA, MUNDO RADIAL]: http://www.worldofradio.com/audiomid.html WORLD OF RADIO 1284 (high version): (stream) http://www.w4uvh.net/wor1284h.ram (download) http://www.w4uvh.net/wor1284h.rm WORLD OF RADIO 1284 (low version): (stream) http://www.w4uvh.net/wor1284.ram (download) http://www.w4uvh.net/wor1284.rm (summary) http://www.worldofradio.com/wor1284.html WORLD OF RADIO 1284 in true SW sound of Alex`s mp3: (stream) http://www.dxprograms.net/worldofradio_08-17-05.m3u (download) http://www.dxprograms.net/worldofradio_08-17-05.mp3 WORLD OF RADIO 1284 downloads in studio-quality mp3: (high) http://www.obriensweb.com/wor1284h.mp3 (low) http://www.obriensweb.com/wor1284.mp3 WORLD OF RADIO PODCAST: www.obriensweb.com/wor.xml (1277, Extra 57, 1278, 1279, 1280, Extra 58, 1281, 1282, 1283, Extra 59, 1284) ** AFGHANISTAN [non]. Re 5-136, report of Salaam Watandaar on 15550, presumed by Liangas. Wolfgang Büschel in BC-DX Aug 18 implies it is supposed to be on 15500, Rampisham, 500 kW, 95 degrees in Persian & Dari, but in 5-133, Observer, Bulgaria said it is supposed to be on 15550 and not heard Aug 7-8. Confusing enough? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ALASKA. 9555, KNLS, 1402-1420, Aug. 15, English, Program hilites in progress. Cover of Supertramp's "Give a little bit". Full ID at 1406 then usual news magazine format mixed with testimonials and AOR/pop music. Fair (Scott R. Barbour, Jr., Intervale, NH, R75, 200' Beverage antennas, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ANTARCTICA. LRA36, Arcángel San Gabriel, Antarktis-15476. Snyggt ``Certificada de Recepción`` i stort kuvert med vackra frimärken på, v/s: Marcos Ramirez. 10 m (Björn Fransson, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21 via DXLD) ** ARGENTINA. 6214.15, (Tentative), R. Baluarte, signal battered by QRN but signal strength better than usual at 0715 Aug 18. Back-to-back light vocals, seemingly in Portuguese but hard to tell because audio was a little muddy. Same at 0650 Aug 19. I don't recall running across them at this hour before, and this would be the best time of day to hear them (Jerry Berg, MA, NASWA Flashsheet via DXLD) ** ARGENTINA. Me gustaría saber hasta qué punto se puede escuchar hoy en día el himno nacional en la radio argentina. Antaño, escucharlo era signo de que se había producido un golpe de estado o algo por el estilo (Henrik Klemetz, Aug 20, condiglist via DXLD) Buena pregunta, Henrik! Y es exactamente así --- antes, escuchar el Himno Nacional en las radios de nuestro país era un preanuncio de que un nuevo golpe de estado se había iniciado. Nada más cierto. Hoy día es habitual escucharlo a medianoche local, cuando empieza el nuevo día. Hay una ley nacional que así lo ordena. Empero, no todas las radios lo cumplen, pero la mayoría sí. Un abrazo (Arnaldo Salen, Argentina, condiglist via DXLD) Henrik, Las emisoras tienen la obligación de transmitir el Himno Nacional a las 00:00 horas todos los días. Por suerte ya hace algunas décadas que no se escucha el Himno durante el día como prolegómeno de un golpe de estado. Saludos cordiales a todos, (Jorge Enrique Knüll, ibid.) ** BANGLADESH. 7185, 13.8 1745, Bangladesh Betar quite good some 15 minutes with Voice of Islam. At 1800 heavy disturbances. 3 CB (Christer Brunström, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) 7185, Bangladesh Betar, 16 Aug, 1815, in English. Bad splash from 7190 kHz, where CRI transmits in German to Europe. 42442. News with good audio till 1825, followed by awfully unreadable comment and a song (Dmitry Mezin, Kazan, Russia, Signal via DXLD) ** BELARUS. During several years already, Radio Hrodna transmits programs in Polish. They go out every Monday at 1500-1540. SW frequencies are 6040 and 7110 kHz, 5 kW (open_dx - Sergey Alekseychik, Hrodna, Belarus via Signal via DXLD) 15 Aug, 0430, 11735 kHz, 1st program of Belarussian Radio, SINPO: 45544 (open_dx - Ivan Zelenyi, Nizhnevartovsk, Russia, ibid.) ** BERMUDA. ``B-Jazz 98.1,`` with correct calls probably ZJAZ, with a jazz format. Parameters, stereo status unknown (Bruce Elving, July- August FMedia! via DXLD) ** CANADA. Not sure when they returned but over the past few weeks they were off the air. CFRX 6070. (Relays CFRB 1010) (Steve Lare, Holland, MI USA, 1248 UT Aug 19, swl at qth.net via DXLD) Yes, I noticed them about 24 hours later; does not hold up thru the daytime here (Glenn Hauser, Enid, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CANADA. BC, Vancouver, CFMW, 93.1, 2800 h, 672 m, d-a, $, e. South Asian Broadcasting Corp., Inc. Kulwinder Sanghera of SABC said, ``It`s not my victory; it`s our South Asian community`s victory. The canvas of today`s Vancouver is a colorful mosaic representing many ethnic cultures. CFMW 93.1 FM shall be a local reflection of our ethnic diversity.`` Programming Director Bijoy Samuel said, ``CFMW 93.1 FM will provide a high standard of programming directed predominantly at Vancouver`s South Asian communities. CFMW 93.1 FM is committed to operating an ethnic radio station that would provide programming to at least 15 ethnic groups and in a minimum of 15 languages.`` ON, Ottawa, 88.5 (no calls assigned), Live 88-5, pr format, $, with listeners themselves the announcers. ``We are going to hire music lovers to host the shows. DJs are not allowed to apply,`` said Rob Mise, operations manager of co-owned Hot 89.9, CIHT. ``Live 88-5 will succeed where its predecessor 101.1 XFM (CKBY 101.1 Smiths Falls ON, earlier XIOX [sic – CIOX??]) failed because the new station will pay more attention to its listeners and offer them the alternative music that they wanted to hear.`` (Bruce Elving, July-August FMedia! via DXLD) ** CANADA. Se você for ouvir o programa Canadá Direto hoje e amanhã, às 2200 UT, sintonize a freqüência de 15455 kHz. Devido aos problemas trabalhistas na CBC de língua inglesa, a freqüência de 11825 kHz foi desligada. A informação foi dada pelo Hector Vilar na emissão ao vivo do Canadá Direto de sexta-feira. O programa também apresenta entrevista com Antônio Avelino da Silva, de Gravatá (PE). 73s! (Célio Romais, Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil, radioescutas via DXLD) ** CANADA. More on CBC Calgary staff plans http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/CalgarySun/News/2005/08/20/1181032-sun.html CBC LOCKOUT CAN'T STOP SHOW --- By CHRIS GERRITSEN, CALGARY SUN You can lock them out, but you can't keep them from being heard. A dozen locked-out CBC Calgary broadcasters, producers and technicians will appear on CJSW, the U of C's Students' Association radio station, Monday mornings to air their own brand of news and current affairs. The CBC locked out 5,500 of its workers last Monday over a contract dispute between the broadcaster and the Canadian Media Guild. Monday's on-air launch will be the start of an hour-long program to be heard once a week at 90.9 FM from 11 a.m. to noon [MDT = 1700-1800 UT]. The show will feature contributions from Calgary-based Kathleen Petty of CBC Newsworld, Doug Dirks of CBC Television, and Judy Aldous, Jennifer Keene and Jim Brown of CBC Radio. "We hope to bring CBC-level journalism back to faithful CBC Calgary listeners," said Canadian Media Guild member Fred Youngs, the executive producer of CBC Newsworld in Calgary. "One of the stories we hope to cover is our own: What is happening at the CBC and why." (...) (Rest of article is unrelated to CBC.) (via Ricky Leong, AB, Aug 20, DXLD) http://www.cjsw.com has Real stream, but temporarily down (gh) ** CANADA. WHAT'S ON TV, EH? NOT MUCH THAT IS CANADIAN By Ian Austen The New York Times SATURDAY, AUGUST 20, 2005 OTTAWA The million or so Canadians who watch the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.'s flagship evening news program, "The National," were treated to something a little different this past week. After the lockout of about 5,300 of its employees, the broadcaster offered a BBC newscast instead of "The National." Light on Canadian content, the BBC World program offered, among other things, an in- depth look at an unusually large number of dolphins frolicking off the coast of Wales. Since the lockout began Monday, the CBC has replaced all its English- language services, including two radio networks, a television network, cable channels, Web sites and local stations, with a mix of reruns, elegiac classical music and sometimes less-than-relevant foreign programming. "Traditional CBC viewers who don't have access to BBC World on digital will find the BBC news a novelty for - perhaps - a few minutes," wrote John Doyle, the television critic of The Toronto Globe and Mail. "But as soon as the reports about soccer and cricket start, they are bound to be alienated and frustrated. They will probably turn to some other news service to find out what is actually going on in Canada." While viewers of "The National" may be faintly amused, others are watching more anxiously. The government-owned Canadian Broadcasting Corp. has many programs that attract significant, sometimes market- leading, audiences. News and sports programming, particularly hockey, on CBC Television are important advertising outlets for many leading Canadian companies that are now reassessing where to spend their money. "Our clients who have CBC News as part of their campaigns are looking for compensation," said Sunni Boot, president and chief executive of ZenithOptimedia Canada, an ad-buying house with headquarters in Toronto. "While it can have international content, news has to be domestic. Dolphins off the coast of Wales - forget it." The contract dispute between the CBC and the Canadian Media Guild centers on the broadcaster's desire to expand the number of jobs that can be filled by contract employees, rather than permanent workers. Currently about 28 percent of the CBC's English-service employees are on contract or in temporary and freelance positions. (Employees at the CBC's Quebec operation are covered by separate labor agreements and remain at work.) Jason MacDonald, a spokesman at the CBC's head office in Ottawa, said that pressure on traditional broadcasting from the Internet means that the broadcaster must have greater labor flexibility. "This isn't about eliminating a permanent work force," MacDonald said. "We recognize that the majority of our employees will be permanent. It's about addressing a changing broadcasting world. With new, experimental shows that may not work out, does it make sense to have a permanent employee for whom you have no work?" But Arnold Amber, president of the CBC branch of the Canadian Media Guild, said that a contract negotiated in 1996 already gives the CBC the ability to use contract workers initially on new projects. Amber contends that before negotiations collapsed Sunday night, a negotiating proposal from the CBC had the potential to convert half the jobs held by union members into contract positions. "We believe that people working together, doing the same job, should have the same rights and privileges," Amber said from Toronto, the CBC's English broadcasting base. "The health of public broadcasting rests on people actually being able to build a career." "We wouldn't be asking what we're asking for if the contract gave us the flexibility we need," MacDonald said. While it was the CBC's decision to disrupt its own operations, the lockout comes at a difficult time for the broadcaster. It lost 20 million Canadian dollars, or $16.4 million, from the lockout by the National Hockey League last year, which took away the CBC's single- biggest generator of ads and audience from October to June, the length of the hockey season. The CBC receives about two-thirds of its budget from the federal government, which substantially cut its contribution a decade ago. While there are no immediate plans to extend domestic news beyond limited headline reports, the CBC still plans to broadcast games of the Canadian Football League and the National Hockey League. The coverage, however, is unlikely to resemble traditional game broadcasts. This week, the CBC said that rather than turn its managers into amateur announcers, it would broadcast only the audio its microphones picked up off the field or the rink. Some viewers might actually welcome the absence of running commentary. Chris McCracken, the senior director of broadcasting for the Canadian Football League, however, said the league found the idea unacceptable and was negotiating with the broadcaster to provide some sort of commentary for a game this weekend (via Andy O`Brien, dxldyg via DXLD) ** CANADA. LOCKED-OUT CBC`S FUTURE DIM Vancouver Province; 2005 Aug 22; Page Number: A12 KNOWLTON NASH: `The implications are very dangerous . . . ` --- CanWest News Service [caption] OTTAWA --- As the CBC limps into the second week of a lockout with its unionized employees, the future of the taxpayer-supported broadcaster is looking increasingly fragile. Disgruntled viewers and listeners, upset at CBC`s apparent lack of preparation for massive program disruptions its own management ultimately precipitated, are being forced to look and listen elsewhere for news, information and entertainment. ``The implications are very dangerous for the whole future of public broadcasting, and particularly for CBC television,`` said former CBC TV executive and national news anchor Knowlton Nash. ``It`s a shame for radio because it has been doing very well in terms of audience size, but TV is in a much tougher situation. Once you lose an audience it`s very difficult to get them back. ``The whole purpose of public broadcasting, which is to provide a service to the public, means the public is being shortchanged by the lockout.`` The main sticking point is CBC`s insistence that a greater number of new employees be hired on contract rather than as permanent employees. Union leaders representing the 5,500 employees currently locked out say contract workers would have no job security. The lockout comes after Hockey Night in Canada was cancelled last season because of the National Hockey League lockout, as well as the loss of rights to broadcast the Olympics and top-flight curling competition. More important are the continuous complaints from viewers outside Canada`s largest cities that CBC`s reflection of regions in its daily programming is so inadequate that the broadcaster is not fulfilling its mandate to taxpayers. CBC executives --- who slashed regional programming following a series of government-imposed budget cuts five years ago --- told a House of Commons committee earlier this year they will re-establish TV and radio in the regions if the Liberal government delivers an extra $80 million over three years. The government has yet to come up with additional funding. Currently, taxpayers contribute about $900 million to the CBC`s $1.3-billion annual budget. The longer the CBC dispute continues, the more damage it will do to the network, says Nash. ``We`re losing the work of a lot of good journalists,`` he says. ``They aren`t being heard. People say the dispute won`t bite into any big events until mid-September, but that`s a long time to have people on the street.`` (via Bruce MacGibbon, OR, DXLD) ** CAYMAN ISLANDS. TWO FM STATIONS BACK ON FULL POWER Two FM radio stations in the Cayman Islands that were completely destroyed by Hurricane Ivan are back on the air at full power after using temporary facilities. Z99 and Rooster 101, operated by Hurley’s Entertainment, are broadcasting with an ERP of around 10,000 watts from an antenna 260 feet above sea level. The signals cover Grand Cayman, its territorial waters as well as a considerable distance offshore. (Source: Cayman Net News) # posted by Andy @ 09:49 UT Aug 22 (Media Network blog via DXLD) ** CHILE. 6090, Radio Esperanza, Temuco, 1050-1100, August 20, Spanish, Local ads: "Taller...reparación de instrumentos de cuerdas... en Temuco", "Carnicería Ñielol... la mejor carne de vacuno y cerdo, las encuentra en Carnicería Ñielol, atendida por su dueño... en Temuco", "Óptica... una empresa regional a su servicio... frente a la plaza". ID: "Ésta es Radio Esperanza", 33422 (Arnaldo Slaen, Argentina, HCDX via DXLD) ** CHINA. 15390, Chinese jamming of VoA Uzbek Service, 17 Aug, 1507- 1530*, 44444. One of CNR domestic programs was used. No signal of VoA, even in the deep background (Dmitry Mezin, Kazan, Russia, Signal via DXLD) ** CHINA. CRI TO BE RENAMED CHINA BROADCAST NETWORK The subject says it all, really. I don't know if it's affecting the Chinese name or not --- I doubt it --- but at least the English service will be renamed China Broadcasting Network. I imagine they will re-image the top and bottom of the hour promos too while they are at it. The new name goes well with their web-address, http://chinabroadcast.cn (Connor Walsh, ex-CRI, Aug 21, dxing.info via DXLD) ** COSTA RICA. 5054.6, (Presumed), Faro del Caribe, 0943-1004, Spanish, Aug. 15, Ballads and talks by various announcers. "Ode to Joy" after (Presumed) ID at 1000. Fair/poor, fading by ToH (Scott R. Barbour, Jr., Intervale, NH, R75, 200' Beverage antennas, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CUBA. Pres. Hugo Chávez of Venezuela is on his umpteenth visit to Cuba, for a medical school graduation and it is such a remarkable event that RHC blows away its normal programming for all-Bolivarian- Venezuela-all-the-time, including when DX program ``En Contacto`` is supposed to appear, Sunday Aug 21 at 1335 on 9550, 11760, 11800, 12000. After 1400, 11670 and 11875 were also on with parallel programming rather than split for ``Aló, Presidente`` as usual (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CUBA. The website of Radiocuba, the national transmitter network operator (which a.o. provides the SW facilities for Radio Habana) now contains contact info for the enterprise's three international transmitting centers in Bauta, Bejucal and Quivican: http://www.radiocuba.cu/Nosotros/NuestrasDivisiones/tabid/76/Default.aspx (Bernd Trutenau, Lithuania, Aug 22, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CUBA [non]. AIRBORNE MARTÍ ROCKIN' FOR A CHANGE 530 kc/s carrier up at 2159 GMT, 2200 audio (Martí signature tune), ID, an announcement (I missed it -- but ***thought*** they were announcing channel 3 now for TV Martí -- I could have missed it, but it was an "important" announcement --- maybe it was just channel "13" and I heard it wrong as I was entering the room; unfortunately, the URL http://www.martinoticias.com/frequencies.htm is not totally up-to- date, i.e. presuming the aerostat at Cudjoe Key is still not replaced with a new one). First time in a couple weeks that Martí has been up to the usual local level signal here, a warm welcome according to my NRD-535. Absolutely local level as I send this e-mail, 2230 August 20th (Terry L Krueger, Clearwater, Florida, USA, 27.55.83 N, 82.46.08 W, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Olá amigos, boa noite. Gostaria de saber se algum de vocês já conseguiu confirmar a Rádio Marti e se possui algum endereço postal ou de Internet para envio de informe. Estou ouvindo a emissora neste momento e foi informado que hoje um avião estará emitindo para Cuba com a TV Marti no canal 13; será que para quem está no litoral e com boa antena é viável a captação deste sinal? Um abraço a todos (Daniel Picoloto Bernardini, Bento Gonçalves RS, Aug 20, radioescutas yg via DXLD) ** EGYPT. Egyptian Overseas Radio has released a new web site - unfortunately with pop-ups with these two URLS: http://www.overseas-radio.listen.to http://listen.to/overseas-radio They were mentioned in tonight`s 'In the Mailbag' at 22 UT. 73, (Erik Køie in Copenhagen, Aug 22, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** FINLAND. 6170, 13.8 0745 SWR, Finland up and down with Finnish ``Ruletti`` with Alpo Heininen. S 2-3. BEFF. 11720, 12.8 2145, SWR, Finland up very strong for a while and then vanished completely. Never heard on 1602! S 1-3. BEFF (Björn Fransson, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** GERMANY. 6005 (Berlin) , Deutschland Radio, 2359-0022 Aug 17, man in German with announcement and ID followed by three short and one long time pip at top of the hour and news. English rock/pop music program at 0005 hosted by a woman announcer. Poor to fair. 6190, (Berlin) , Deutschlandfunk, 0024-0106 Aug 18, classical piano music followed by brief announcement in German by a woman announcer in German at 0027. More classical music up to 0059 ID and announcements by the woman followed by three short and one long time pip and news. Poor to fair (Rich D'Angelo, PA, NASWA Flashsheet via DXLD) I suspect these logs were consecutive, the first one being Aug 17 into UT Aug 18 (gh, DXLD) ** GERMANY. In DXLD 5-126 you had this: ``Mr. Wolfram Hess, a popular German shortwave hobbyist, also a former moderator of a shortwave magazine in the former radio station "RIAS Berlin" [or was it RBI? -- gh]``: Well, both, but not at the same time of course. Wolfram Heß had a DX show on RBI's English service. After the closure of RBI he launched a German-language DX show on mediumwave transmitters of the remaining domestic service of what was previously GDR radio. This show was called DX-Aktuell, and it managed to survive three drastic changes. First time: The shut-down of the entire mediumwave network of Radio Aktuell (the former Radio DDR 1) in spring 1991. DX-Aktuell continued on longwave 177, otherwise used by Deutschlandsender (DS) Kultur. Second time: The final wind-up of GDR radio (now called ``Funkhaus Berlin``) by the end of 1991. DS Kultur station continued on a preliminary status, kept 177 (the longwave transmitter was actually supposed to either go dark or to be used by Deutschlandfunk) and also the DX-Aktuell show. Third time: DS Kultur and RIAS Berlin merged to Deutschlandradio Berlin as of 1994. DX-Aktuell continued -- however, only until September 1994 when Deutschlandradio Berlin finally cancelled the show, together with various other former DS Kultur and RIAS programs. The 177 transmitter provides only poor coverage in parts of Germany. So Wolfram Heß tried to get DX-Aktuell on RIAS as well. They agreed to air a DX show on 855 and 6005, but not to relay the original DS Kultur program. So instead a separate show called DX-Report was produced for RIAS. Pictures: http://www.radiotreff.de/rias2/rias2_sehen_funkhaus_innen.htm In the lower half of the page are some shots from a DX-Aktuell production session at Deutschlandradio Berlin, in the former RIAS 2 on-air studio, in 1994. At the bottom of the page a picture of the separate RIAS DX show in 1992. Audio: http://www.radioeins.de/_/meta/sendungen/apparat/050820_a1.ram The opening of the DX-Aktuell show on December 31 1993, the last day of DS Kultur. Don`t be surprised about the audio quality: 177 was also used for data transmissions by the GDR shipping company. The AM of the program audio interfered with the phase modulation of the data (the ancient transmitter was unable to separate them sufficiently, so would today not be DRM-capable as well ...), and this problem was solved by putting a 200 Hz highpass filter into the audio chain, effectively ruining any music reproduction of course. All the best, (Kai Ludwig, Germany, Aug 22, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** GERMANY. Since Friday around 1200 the vast majority of the public radio stations in Germany is on air via Astra 1H, 12.266 GHz H --- details see http://www.lyngsat.com/astra1h.html --- using an unusually high bitrate of 320 kbps for stereo programs, also in regard of a possible use of these signals as STL and for other professional purposes. This service will be officially launched on August 29, until then these transmissions are considered as tests. A disappointment are so far the RBB programmes from Potsdam-Babelsberg (Antenne Brandenburg, Radio Eins and Fritz): Hardly any audio above 10 kHz and lots of dynamics compression, very similar to FM (where the Optimods are placed at the transmitters, so it is not just the FM feed that goes out via DVB satellite). Zehlendorf 177 will be switched off on Sep 22 0930-1800 and on Sep 23 0930-1900 "to ensure the DRM transmissions", so DRM tests (plus open carrier / test tones) can be expected during these times. Reportedly 177 and Berlin-Britz 855 will be used for DRM presentations during the IFA. It remains to be seen what will happen with these frequencies afterwards, since they are still provided for special broadcasts (the upcoming transmitter work apparently starts not earlier than 0930 out of consideration for sea weather forecasts at 0905), cf. http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/sendungen/dkultur-mw-lw/ (Kai Ludwig, Germany, Aug 20, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** GREECE. During the entire 0000-0400 UT period to North America last night, Avlis 3 on 9420 kHz was silent (katakourasmenoV? -- this is what is in my dictionary as dead-beat, I say overworked!). I hope it is not dead (nekroV). This makes it the third day in a row that it has not been on the air (John Babbis, Silver Spring MD, Aug 21, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** GUINEA. GUINEAN PRESIDENT SETS CONDITIONS FOR CREATING PRIVATE BROADCAST MEDIA | Text of report by French news agency AFP Conakry, 21 August: Guinean President Lansana Conte has signed a decree setting "the conditions for creating and operating (private) radio and TV stations" in his country, where, until now, the state had a monopoly on radio and television, AFP learned from an official source in Conakry on Sunday [21 August]. The presidential decree, issued on Saturday and of which AFP obtained a copy on Sunday, states that "any citizen enjoying civil rights or any legal entity in Guinea, apart from political parties and religious denominations, can create, own and operate a private radio and/or TV station in Guinea (...) [agency ellipsis]". According to the text, "nobody can own more than one radio and/or TV station at a time". Moreover no foreigner can own, directly or indirectly, over 30 per cent of the social capital or right to vote in the broadcasting sector if they don't meet a number of conditions defined in an international agreement. The authorization to create and operate a radio station or TV channel will be issued by the Information Ministry on advice from the National Council of Communication (CNC), which will have "a right of control on the programmes" of these stations. There has not been any official explanation on the reasons behind the presidential decision, which is regarded by many as a significant step towards the liberalization of broadcasting in Guinea. Moreover, the text does not give any details on a possible starting date for applications and a date when those who have been granted authorization can start broadcasting. The liberalization of Guinean media, which began in the early 1990s, had not concerned broadcasting media until now, despite many calls from several international institutions and press freedom organizations. Source: AFP news agency, Paris, in French 1643 gmt 21 Aug 05 (via BBCM via DXLD) ** GUINEA BISSAU. A dream, or....? It is Sept 24. In all DX-Sweden there is a feverish activity. Is it NorDX or what causes DX-ers from all over to watch Shortwave for 2 hours? Soon it is time! A weak signal can be heard on 7423 kHz. In the middle of the noise you can separate the characteristic interval signal earlier announced in forums and mailing lists all over the world. Finally the much longed-for call can be hard weakly: ``Good evening everybody, you are tuned to a special broadcast from the independent republic of Guinea-Bissau``. Then some local music and speech from the president Henrique Rosa and the program continues. In the capital of Bissau, in an office belonging to the national energy company Eletricidade e Aguas de Guiné Bissau, the radio team with participants from the Nordic coutries can take a breath. Telephone contact with monitors in Sweden have said that the tiny 150- watt transmitter in fact was heard but very weak. The Internet contact is very unstable but mail from listeners already begins to drop in as well as telephone messages and faxes. What is happening? An utopia? A fantastic dream? Or is it a vision that can be a reality? Guinea-Bissau has for a long time been a ``dead`` radio country. Just like Cabo Verde, Liechtenstein, Tristan da Cunha and many more. Is it possible to ``reactivate`` a radio country with an intermediate license or in collaboration with a local agent? This has happened before. St. Helena and Radio Syd-Gambia are two good examples. The possibilities are many. I got those thoughts the first time from a discussion with an old friend, Ullmar Quick, at the DX-parliament in Västerås. For radio amateurs it is a natural thing whenever possible to activate stations in exotic places to get new radio countries. So why can't the ordinary DX community activate a station in a forgotten DX country? Who can take part in such a fantastic project? Someone who dare say ``it is not possible`` (Ronny Forslund, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21, summary translation by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** HAWAII. FMakings --- Honolulu, KIPO, *89.3, 25000 h,v; 635 m, at a closer site, one that overlooks the city, Tantalus Ridge. The cost of about $400,000 would be funded by proceeds of Hawaii Public Radio`s sale of KIPO 1380 Pearl City. It could be completed by early 2006, pending FCC approval (Bruce Elving, July-August FMedia! via DXLD) ** ICELAND. Ríkisútvarpið (Icelandic National Broadcasting Service) heard here at 1841 s/on on 13865. Broadcast is in Icelandic. Broadcast ended at 1909. And oddly enough popped back on again at 1913 --- and off again at 1915. I suspect some transmitter adjustments being performed (Steve Lare, Holland, MI, Aug 20, swl at qth.net via DXLD) Wondering what the root language is for Icelandic? (Duane B. Fischer, MI, ibid.) Old Norse. Yes, really, Old Norse (Mike Andrews, W5EGO, ibid.) It was 1414 Aug. 20 and checked around the 21 mb and found on 13865 USB a station with phone audio. The word "Reykjavík" was among the talking after some rhythmic instrumental music. Is it Iceland? Signal was clear with 35443, so you see in my case there was no splash from Radio Farda. Only thing remarkable is that faded out too soon between 1414 and 1430 (Raúl Saavedra, Costa Rica, dxldyg via DXLD) Iceland is audible on 13865 USB but at poor strength and with much splash from Radio Farda 13870. 73s (Noel R. Green [NW England], ibid.) ISLANDIA --- 12115 Ríkisútvarpið, 1546-1558, escuchada el 14 de Agosto a locutora con comentarios en boletín de noticias, cuña de la emisora con música de fondo y locutor con comentarios, sintonía con la música de la película "La guerra de los mundos", música folklorica local, SINPO 44443 (José Miguel Romero, Sacañet (Castellón), España, SANGEAN ATS 909, Antena hilo de siete metros, Noticias DX via DXLD) Not supposed to be on the air at this hour on either frequency. Is anything else on 12115 at 1546? Yes, per EiBi A-05: 12115 1400-1600 USA Radio Liberty KG CAs /CLN 12120 That would be Kyrgyz via Sri Lanka, a far cry from Icelandic from Iceland (gh, DXLD) A sched via Dino Bloise appeared in DXLD dated 250705 as follows: To Europe & N America: 1755-1825 & 2300-2335 on 12115 and 1215-1300, 1410-1440 & 1835-1905 on 13865. 73s from (Noel R. Green [N.W. England], Aug 20, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INDIA. Dear Glenn, Please refer DX Listening Digest 5-132 August 7: no such incident happened this year. This is a repeat news of last year theft. Either the news published too late or the news alert came to the subscriber too late. I am copying a mail from Mr. PS Goswami of same Siliguri city. 73, (Swopan Chakroborty, Kolkata, India, DX LISTENING DIGEST) DATE: Thu, 18 Aug 2005 01:17:11 +0530 SUBJECT: Re: AIR Siliguri back on air after theft Dear DXers, The report is not true at all, the website by mistake or fakely reproduced the last year`s incident. The report is same as last year. No thieving occurred in AIR Siliguri as said the website. The November incident was first and last known thieving incident at AIR Siliguri. Regards, Partha Sarathi Goswami Siliguri, Dist.- Darjeeling (via Swopan Chakroborty, India, Aug 21, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Tnx, Swopan; we also had this debunked shortly after the item first appeared (gh, DXLD) ** INDONESIA. 4871.05, (Presumed), RRI Sorong, 1007-1019, Aug. 20, Whisper quiet vocal ballads under static. Poor with het (Wamena?) just below 4871. 9525, VOI, 2036-2100*, Aug. 15, Vernacular, OM and YL with banter, music bits. ID at 2055 over music, then open carrier until R. Budapest IS at 2100. Where'd the English service go? Fair/poor (Scott R. Barbour, Jr., Intervale, NH, R75, 200' Beverage antennas, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INTERNATIONAL INTERNET. There are a lot of new recordings in my True Sounds audio archive. Come and listen at: http://dxsignal.info/listen_eng.htm (Dmitry Mezin, Kazan, Russia, Signal via DXLD) ** INTERNATIONAL WATERS. Efter en vår med mycket skogsarbete (Gudrun!) och en lång skön sommar utan särskilt mycket radioaktivitet är det väl dags att börja kolla banden igen. Lite inspiration kom via ett QSL från Coalition Maritime Forces – R One på 9133 kHz med brev från v/s K Auten, Captain. Adressen uppges vara: US Naval Forces Central Command, Deputy Chief of Staff for Operation/Plans, FPO AE 09501-6008, USA. Rapporten sändes för 4 månader sedan via e-post matthew.wilson @ me.navy.mil Stationen påstår sig vara i luften 24 h /dygn. (Stefan Björn, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21 via DXLD) ** ITALY [non]. 15725.3, 13.8 0850, Radio Mi Amigo via IRRS noticed when I was looking for something else. Nice music and pop talk. S 3-4. BEFF (Björn Fransson, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** KENYA. Re 5-141: Glenn, Well, the 250 kW Koma Rock transmitters must have been on the air. I heard just the local domestic service in English, from Nairobi, on the 9 MHz band, from around 1400 to 1600 GMT. This was in the Spring of 1985. Apparently, these transmitters were only fired up for a few months or years(?) and the intended Kenyan external service programs never saw the light of day. Too bad because Kenya seems to have evolved into a very hard to hear county from North America. Thank you for refreshing my memory on the Koma Rock site (Artie Bigley, ex-TX, Aug 22, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** KOREA NORTH. D.P.R. 3959.74, KCBS Kanggye at 1144-1154 UT Aug 12. Korean choral music \\ 2850.02 kHz, both frequencies fair (John Wilkins, CO, DXplorer Aug 14 via BCDX via DXLD) ** LATVIA. 9290, 14.8 0858, Alice's Restaurant via Ulbroka, Latvia, with sign-on and many IDs, rock-music, said they started as a radio pirate in London. Mentioned http://www.rockradio.eu.com as Internet address. 44444 BV (Bjarke Vestesen, Denmark, SW Bulletin Aug 21, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) 9290, 14.8 1330, Alice`s Restaurant Rock Radio via Latvia with endless rock-jazz tunes on the disk. S 2-3. For some reason this transmitter is always weak on Gotland. 1350 on the contrary very strong and 945 often also good. BEFF (Björn Fransson, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) Probably too close for good 9 MHz first hop aimed at Brazil (gh, DXLD) ** MEXICO [and non]. New FM station granted; Veracruz, Huayacocotla, SW of Álamo, NW of Poza Rica, XHTAN, 101.3, 4940 h,v, RTV Veracruz, Radio Mas. [no relation to XEJN 2390, I assume --- gh] CL, Villa Acuña, XERF, 1570, is on with a new 100 kW Harris transmitter, after years of languishing at low power or not on at all. It had been 150 kW during the days of Wolfman Jack. It`s owned by IMER, the government educational agency, and plans to program to immigrant workers in TX and adjoining states – people who have been in the US less than five years. This is estimated to be two million people (Bruce Elving, July-August FMedia! via DXLD) ** NEPAL. RADIO NEPAL EXTENDS TRANSMISSION TIME | Text of report in English by Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union website on 22 August Radio Nepal will extend its transmission time to 18 hours a day starting 21 August. Transmissions will run continuously from 11:15 p.m. to 5:15 p.m. daily. [gmt, 05:00 to 23:00 local time] {a strange way to express it, so UT is 2315-1715 --- gh} The additional hours will include news bulletins and a variety of lively, entertaining, informative and educative programmes especially aimed at young listeners. The transmission hours were extended to compete with the commercial FM stations, which were recently given the green light by the Nepali Supreme Court to continue broadcasting news bulletins despite government attempts to ban them from carrying news. The executive director of Radio Nepal, Tapa Nath Shukla, said he believed Radio Nepal would emerge as a popular radio station among the youths after the additional transmission service. Currently, informational and educational programmes constitute 42 per cent of Radio Nepal's total programming while entertainment, including commercials, make up the remaining 58 per cent. Source: Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union website, Kuala Lumpur, in English 22 Aug 05 (via BBCM via DXLD) ** NEWFOUNDLAND. St. John`s Marine Communications and Traffic Services Centre, VON, Canada, 2598 kHz. Brev och broschyrer från v/s: Wayde Butler. 3 m (Björn Fransson, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21 via DXLD) ** NEW ZEALAND. Adrian Sainsbury informed that there will be a new frequency from RNZI English from September 4. 9520 will replace 9885 from 1100 to 1300. This change is to improve reception in Papua New Guinea and Indonesia area (T. R. Rajeesh, VU3PIK, Kerala, India, World DX Club via Mike Barraclough, DXLD) Viz.: Hi Glenn, Here is the latest Radio NZ International Schedule Schedule: 04 SEPTEMBER - 30 OCTOBER 2005 UTC kHz Primary Target 1300 - 1650 6095 All Pacific 1651 - 1750 6095 NE Pacific, Niue, Fiji, Samoa, Cook Islands 1751 - 1850 9630 NE Pacific, Niue, Fiji, Samoa, Cook Islands 1851 - 2050 11725 All Pacific 2051 - 0459 15720 All Pacific, also heard West Coast Canada & USA 0500 - 0705 11820 All Pacific, also heard Europe, and mid-west USA 0706 - 1059 9885 All Pacific, also heard mid-west USA 1100 - 1259 9520 NW Pacific, Bougainville, PNG, Timor, Asia (Mark Nicholls, Ed., NZ DX Times, NZ Radio DX League, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** NIGERIA. 7275, R. Nigeria, Abuja, Aug 21, 0548-0559, in English, detailed program schedule, giving times, days and frequencies of programs ("-every Tuesday at 2:30 in the afternoon on - - kHz in the medium wave band and FM -"), ToH: ``National Service,`` drums, 0605 several IDs: ``Radio Nigeria – for the Millennium`` and singing jingle. Weak (Ron Howard, Monterey, CA, RX340, with T2FD antenna, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** OKLAHOMA. I just watched a very strange quiz show on KOCO-TV, Oklahoma Petroleum Challenge, sponsored by the Oklahoma Energy Resources Board, with commercials for Devon and other petro companies. In the final round, three high school girls were fed a series of very specialized questions relating to the petroleum industry. The setup was whoever turns a light on atop her oil derrick first gets to answer. One of the girls NEVER beat the others. The other two were in a race, and the one who was behind overtook the initial leader by the finish. Since speed at pressing the button was a major factor, most of the questions were interrupted before they could be completed --- in many cases so soon that I cannot imagine how the contestant could have known what the answer was, let alone the question --- unless she had seen all the questions before and memorized the answers. Reminded me of an old SCTV skit. Of the two who did reply, hardly any answers were wrong. Something really fishy here. The show was obviously edited, and perhaps any pauses for thought were removed, or even wrong answers if given. It was more like a primer on the oil biz for the viewers (Glenn Hauser, Enid, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** OKLAHOMA. OK, Enid, KUAL-LP, *104.7 --- petition to deny filed by ``Chisholm Trail`` (Bruce Elving, July-August FMedia! via DXLD) To deny what? Station has already changed calls, and ownership? Chisholm Trial = Hiram Champlin`s KCRC/KXLS/KNID/KFXY group of local commercial stations, perhaps fed up with KUAL running commercials taking away his business (Glenn Hauser, Enid, DX LISTENING DIGEST) FMakings: OK, Waukoma, 106.3A proposed. This would require the downgrading to C0 (from C) of KYQQ 106.5 Arkansas City KS (Bruce Elving, July-August FMedia! via DXLD) Should be Waukomis, the next town south of Enid, where there once was a gospel huxter translator on 106.3 (Glenn Hauser, Enid, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PAPUA NEW GUINEA. 7120, Wantok R. Light, 1015-1032, Aug. 16, English, Interview at tune-in between OM and YL in English tho couldn't fully catch the topic. YL at 1026 with "..end of our program... thanks too... Goodbye and God Bless..." ID in passing at 1027!! OM at 1028 with religious talks. Poor, best listening in USB. Nice to get a positive ID! Is this really running the listed 1 kW? (Scott R. Barbour, Jr., Intervale, NH, R75, 200' Beverage antennas, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) Congrats! (gh, DXLD) ** PARAGUAY. En las últimas noches he observado que Radio Nacional Del Paraguay en los 9737 kHz ha mejorado notablemente en su modulación. Creo que casi nunca la he oído con un audio tan bueno como la tiene ahora, ni siquiera en su onda media. ¿Transmite ahora las 24 horas en O.C.? Hace unos tiempos atrás se anunció que la emisora iba a emitir las 24 horas. Pero en la onda corta no la pasó a hacer. Hoy sin embargo la escuché después de la media noche hora local PY, es decir la escuché a las 0450 UT en los 9737 kHz (Captación realizada por [el paraguayo] Levi Iversen desde Noruega, Conexión Digital Aug 20 via DXLD) 9737, 8.8 2205, Radio Nacional del Paraguay ]Internacional[ with the program "Fiscales". In this "La Historia de la Semana" taking up Walter Cáceres Cardozo who was in the business of robbing offices. After having threatened the victim by pistol and taken the money he forced the victim to undress. Some of them he sexually touched and others he forced to touch each other. He is now sentenced to 18 years in prison. Psychologists have stated that the "good" man Walter suffers from some severe psychological problem. What can not be heard on Shortwave! 3-4 CB (Christer Brunström, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PERU. 9504.73, Radio Tacna, Tacna, 1124-1129, August 20, Spanish, National news by male and female, talk about local politicals. TC: "las 6 de la mañana con 27 minutos", Very interesting announcement & ID as: "Tacna Canta!!!!... gran concurso con motivo del Aniversario de Radio Tacna... Radio Tacna... tradición e historia", 23422 (Arnaldo Slaen, Argentina, HCDX via DXLD) ** PORTUGAL. Dear Glenn, I read with interest both your Friday & Saturday DXLD issues, and was very pleased to find your remark on the RDPi's audio - I had phoned them yesterday precisely about this, and just as you say, the problems continue! Coincidentally, I even made a small recording at 1920 UT on Friday, and sent them immediately to show what I tried to describe over the phone. Also, I took the liberty of sending a copy of your bulletin to the respective RDP department so that they stick in their minds someone else is also noticing the same silly phenomenon, which probably originates in the audio control centre here in Lisbon, not at the HF centre, because all transmitters seem to be sending the same bloody audio. It was a pity and dumb thing to happen precisely when all the four 300 kW transmitters were put into service yesterday, 19/9! I refrain myself to comment further on what happens at times with them. 73, (Carlos Gonçalves, Portugal, Aug 20, DX LISTENING DIGEST) No complaints about RDPi's audio quality this morning at around 0900 UT, both from Lisboan and Sines sites. Audio signal is very clear! (Wolfgang Büschel, Germany, Aug 21, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** RUSSIA. I wonder if the Russian transmitter you logged on 13855 with spurs is the same one that is used during the day on 13665. That also has spurs. Or maybe there is a fault at the station that produces spurs when operating on 13 MHz (Noel R. Green, UK, wwdxc BC-DX Aug 16 via DXLD) ** SAUDI ARABIA. Second program in Arabic: 0300-0855 9675 and 0856- 1655 11855 (but not heard 9580); Call of Islam (not "Voice of Islam") 1500-1700 15315, 15435. Three (maybe more) central bulletins of news of BSKSA in Arabic observed 1130-1145 11935, 17615, 17805, 21495, 21705 1400-1408 17895, 21460, 21505, 21640 1800-1815 9555, 9870, 11740, 11820, 11915. (Rumen Pankov, Bulgaria, wwdxc BC-DX Aug 6-11 via DXLD) Propagation has been awful on many mornings but I noticed an improvement today. There was a nice signal coming from Saudi on 9675 which is 100% \\ with 11855 kHz - this was also audible but with low modulation at 0630 UT. So Rumen Pankov has got it wrong somehow. And today I could also hear the ARS Kor`an programme on 9715 - weak but \\ 15380 kHz (Noel R. Green, UK, wwdxc BC-DX Aug 16, via DXLD) ** SAUDI ARABIA. 927 kHz, talks in Arabic at 1930, 13 Aug, QRM by Iran, 33222. WRTH suggests a 20 kW transmitter of BSKSA 2nd program in Aflaj. It was this station, indeed - parallel channel was found on 783 kHz (but be careful: besides Sa`udi Arabia, Syria is also heard on the latter frequency). There's no mention of this Saudi transmitter in the latest EMWG (Dmitry Mezin, Kazan, Russia, Signal via DXLD) ** SENEGAL [non]. 17555, 20.8 0800, The West Africa Democracy Radio, WADR, with test transmission, 30 minutes in English and 30 minutes French. All of it very nice and friendly! The program was obviously produced in Dakar, Senegal and asked for reports to wadr @ wadr.org S 4! BEFF (Björn Fransson, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) Tried to record a digital file of 17555 RMP WADR, West Africa Democracy Radio towards W Africa at 0800-0900 UT today. But signal is very, very poor and thiny. I could only recognize an English announcement. My angle from UK is just 95degrees off Rampisham. Direction angle from RMP to W Africa is about 170 to 190 degrees. So, I would suggest dear Carlos to try record that station in Portugal instead; the angle towards Lisbon is about 195 degrees from Rampisham. And first hop will spread out some signal towards your area most days. 73 (Wolfgang Büschel, Germany, Aug 21, DX LISTENING DIGEST) West Africa Democracy Radio - WADR website at http://www.wadr.org is under construction and "should be available by Sep 20, 2005" (Jari Savolainen, Finland, Aug 22, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) QRX, QRX Hi, I got the following nice e-mail QSL from West Africa Democracy Radio (WADR) tonight. They had attached two articles, containing info about the project and the programmes: ``Dear Bjorn, My name is Abdou LÔ. I am the Bilingual (French-English) Researcher of WADR and occasionally producer and journaliste. We would like to thank you for your interest in WADR and your so complete Reception Report. It is so professional. I have shown it to everybody here. Well, as you may guess WADR's transmitter is located in UK. For your magazine, please find here some documents attached. I will send you as soon as possible our transmission schedule and all the informations you may need. Best regards, Abdou. PS : Please keep in touch. My WADR e-mail address should be available by tomorrow.`` (via Björn Fransson, Sweden, Aug 22, HCDX via DXLD) ** SOLOMON ISLANDS. 5019v, (Tentative), SIBC, 1008-1100, Aug. 15, Vernacular/English, YL with news and soundbites; numerous mentions of Solomon Islands. Ad/PSA at 1023 in English, "..for more info call us at..". Ballad then OM at 1032 in English, "Welcome to the broadcast today.." and devotional sounding program. Brief YL at 1045, then ballads until YL again at 1100. Fair at tune-in, fading under increasing Rebelde-5025 slop by ToH which also made finding the exact frequency difficult. First log here in quite some time. Power increase or good propagation? (Scott R. Barbour, Jr., Intervale, NH, R75, 200' Beverage antennas, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SUDAN [non]. R. Nile, via Madagascar, 15320, G, Sun Aug 21 at 0450 with lively morning show, M&W, hilife music, heavily accented English hard to understand here; 0454 closed English but then announcements in other languages, and Arabic in progress when cut to open carrier at 0457 and off a few seconds later. After all this time, someone should inform them in the studio that the transmissions ends at :27, no matter what. If R. Nile ever monitored their own broadcast, they might have noticed this already (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SUDAN. Re 5-142: Hi all, My nice QSL card from NDA, "Voice of Sudan", dated 17th April 1998 on 8000 kHz says: "Transmitting from Liberated Areas (Sudan)". 73 from (Björn Fransson, DX-ing on the island of Gotland, Sweden, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** SYRIA. SYRIAN MINISTER QUOTED ON MEDIA DEVELOPMENT PLAN | Text of report by Ziyad Haydar entitled "Syrian steps towards developing the media; integration between public, private sectors", published on Lebanese newspaper Al-Safir website on 16 August There has been renewed discussion regarding the development of the media in Syria. Much of the discussion of the Ba'th Party's 10th Regional Conference, which called for the establishment of a higher media council, focused on the subject. However, this notion has yet to be implemented due to the "non-existence of a real and practical vision of this council". Nevertheless, during a general workshop held by Syria's Information Ministry on developing the media in Syria, Talib Qadi Amin, assistant information minister, told Al-Safir that a strategy for media development has been presented in the form of an integrated project to the State Planning Commission, in order to be approved within the government's 10th five-year plan. He added that the strategy was based on creating a state of integration between public and private media outlets in Syria by modernizing media regulations and laws in all sectors based on suitable implementation techniques. According to Amin, the structuring of the Syrian media is intended to turn government media organizations into financially and administratively independent organizations to be run by a board of directors. He added that the role of the Information Ministry would be to provide supervision and guidance. He explained that in the meantime, a new media law would be drafted. He also said that the law would "regulate" electronic media, an issue that has caused worry over the possibility that this could mean putting obstacles in the way of electronic publishing, as expressed by some journalists. However, Amin explained that "the goal is to set some regulations based on the propositions of website owners, in addition to locating the persons responsible for published material on these sites, taking into consideration the fact that the existing state of chaos serves no-one and needs to be controlled and regulated". The assistant information minister also spoke of the mechanism according to which media organizations will achieve independence within the five-year plan. He said that "this plan includes five organizations. Foremost among them is the General Syrian Authority for Radio and Television with its five subsidiaries: the Syrian Satellite Channel, the Youth and Sports Channel, Channel One, the radio sector and the television production sector. Secondly, there are organizations in among the printed media, including Al-Wihdah and Tishrin establishments and the Establishment for the Distribution of Publications, which has been merged under the name of Al-Wihdah Corporation for Press, Printing, Publishing and Distribution. As for the third organization, it is the Syrian Arab News Agency SANA. Work is currently under way to turn it into a news agency with video capability, along the lines of the world news agencies." Syrian Information Minister Mahdi Dakhlallah called for the use of less exaggerated words and expressions such as ambitions, challenges, confrontation, defiance, and down to the ground. At the same time, the minister indicated that the state's present inclination was to put an end to monopolization, which was half the problem, while the other half was the private individuals' ability to participate in the process and in the preparation of the legal instrument that governs this participation. He wanted the government not to be always seen as being under constant accusation until proven innocent. Head of the Syrian Media Centre in London Yahya Al-Uraydi said that the messages that the centre addresses to Western media fall on deaf ears. He indicated that it was difficult to penetrate Western media outlets, which are mostly owned by the United States and Europe. In answer to a question about whether or not he receives from official Syrian quarters a periodic review of the declared Syrian position on the ongoing developments in order to promote this position, Al-Uraydi said that he did not. He added that he relied on the telephone calls to the information minister and the director of SANA. Al-Uraydi chose not to go into detail of the budget allocated for this centre, yet he indicated that the Israelis have opened a similar centre not too long ago and allocated to it an annual budget of 20m dollars. Source: Al- Safir web site, Beirut, in Arabic 16 Aug 05 (via BBCM via DXLD) ** SYRIA [non]. USA/SYRIA: REFORM PARTY OF SYRIA LAUNCHES WEBLOG | Text of press release by Washington DC-based Reform Party of Syria on 21 August The Reform Party of Syria is announcing the official launch of its weblog (blog) "Syria Comment PLUS". The blog will be dedicated to the representation of the full spectrum of diversity within the Syrian nation and the promotion of the overthrow of Bashar al-Asad's oppressive Ba'th regime. The Reform Party of Syria's blog is the first ever Syrian-run blog explicitly calling for the total dismantlement of the corrupt and impotent Ba'th ruling cabal. Through a network of writers inside Syria and the international Syrian diaspora, Syria Comment PLUS will shed light on Ba'th oppressive measures and crimes committed against Syrian dissidents and ethnic minorities. "Freedom of speech remains a right alien to the vast majority of Syrians; Bashar al-Asad and his cronies are deathly afraid of what might result if the people that they have so assiduously terrorized throughout the years dare to speak out. We hope to play a small role in realizing those fears for Mr Asad and Co," said Reform Party of Syria's US spokesman Oubai Shahbandar. Syria Comment PLUS is dedicated to becoming an invaluable tool to an international audience often lacking on-the-ground perspectives of the real situation inside this closed country. Source: Reform Party of Syria website, Washington DC, in English 21 Aug 05 (via BBCM via DXLD) What`s the URL? I see that http://www.clandestineradio.com links to http://www.reformsyria.com/ but that page cannot be found. It`s the sponsor of `R. Free Syria``; see 5-066. Is that distinct from V. of Free Syria, which RMI had on 9495 via Germany last year, not mentioned by CRW? (gh, DXLD) ** TAIWAN. 11940, (Presumed), Trans World Broadcasting Ministry, 1326- 1400*, Aug. 15, Mandarin/English, Continuous format of brief talks by OM between musical bits. Beginning at 1344 I noted the music bits were from the "Jesus Christ Superstar" soundtrack, in English. Brief OM at 1354 then instrumental music until 1400. No discernible ID noted. Poor with adjacent channel slop (Scott R. Barbour, Jr., Intervale, NH, R75, 200' Beverage antennas, dxldyg via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** TURKS & CAICOS [and non]. Re T&C 1320 kHz: This is one of several allotments made by the British government in various British-governed Caribbean locations at the behest of the US government for VOA/IBB use back 25 or 30 years ago. There is one in Grand Cayman, and I think 1580 Antigua was one too, as it predates independence, if my memory is correct. There may be one or two more, but as I am in Oregon farming this weekend I don't have the ability to look it up in my list at the moment. Prior to the Region II agreement there were really quite "flexible" standards about protection to and among countries south of the NARBA agreement. But subsequently, even those countries that are not signatory get protection IF the frequencies are in the ITU Master Frequency Register/List. They get protection based on the technical standards of IFRB (now ITU-R) Circular Letter 662, not on Region II standards. In fact, that's how we protect Cuba, as it and the DR are in that situation --- not signatory to the Rio Agreement, but whose allotments are registered with ITU. I could spend the next hour giving examples of what a total disaster this is with respect to Cuba, but I think everyone knows the situation. When the Region II agreement was first in place, we used to ignore Cuban allotments that were inconsistent with it (or in flagrant violation of it and Circular Letter 662), but that changed a few years later, as the result of decisions I was told came from State Dept. not FCC. And it is not uncommon for new or changed allotments to create interference under the standards of the Rio agreement or one of the bilaterals and have it accepted on a negotiated basis. We've done that any number of times, as recently as within the last year (Benj. F. Dawson III, P.E., Hatfield & Dawson Consulting Engineeers, LLC, 9500 Greenwood Avenue North, Seattle, WA 98103 USA, Aug 20, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U K. Radio 4 Today interview on Al Tajdeed Radio --- Re DXLD 5-141: Is it still there? (gh) Yes: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/listenagain/zthursday_20050818.shtml (Mike Barraclough, UK, Aug 20, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Re Radio Al-Tajdeed: When checking tonight around 1600 their Hotbird 6 slot still existed in the respective multiplex (12.577 GHz H) but did not contain any modulation, i.e. also no test tones as reported. All the best, (Kai Ludwig, Germany, Aug 20, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. WORLD OF RADIO confirmed on WRMI 7385 at new time of 2100 UT Sat Aug 20, in quick check amid T-storms here. Ought to be listenable lacking same, and can only improve at this hour as autumn approaches. New schedule also shows it Sunday 1400; and DX Partyline: Sat 2130, Sun 1330 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. WRMI Radio Miami International - Broadcast and Program Schedule - August 22, 2005 [from a spreadsheet and jpg, converted by gh, and times converted to UT]: SATURDAY SUNDAY 0400 7 The Overcomer Ministry 7 The Overcomer Ministry 0900 9 Radio República 9 Radio República 1000 9 Radio Vaticano 9 Church of Christ 1015 9 Hijos de Bayamo 9 Fountain of Truth 1030 9 Entérete 9 Verdad para el Mundo 1045 9 Hijos de Bayamo 1100 9 Parole de Vie 9 Creciendo en Gracia 1115 9 Truth for the World 1130 9 Reality in Jesus 9 Entérete 1200 9 Radio República 9 Radio República 1300 7 RTE Ireland [WRN] 7 Banner of Truth 1315 7 Anointed Connection 1330 7 DX Party Line 1400 7 Voices of Our World [WRN] 7 World of Radio 1430 7 R. Sweden [WRN] 7 Reflexiones del Alma 1500 7 R. Romania Int`l [WRN] 7 Prophecy Talk 1530 7 KBS World Radio [WRN] 1600 9 Radio República 9 Radio República 2000 7 Jack Van Impe 7 Jack Van Impe 2030 7 Viva Miami 7 Church of Christ 2045 7 Radio Naciones Unidas 2100 7 World of Radio 7 Viva Miami 2130 7 DX Party Line 7 Cruising 2145 7 Harvest Time 2200 9 Reflexiones del Alma 9 Fountain of Truth 2215 9 Hijos de Bayamo 2230 9 La Voz del Escambray 9 Entérete 2300 9 Entérete 9 Trova Libre 2330 9 Anointed Connection 9 Banner of Truth 2345 9 Hijos de Bayamo 9 Mundo Radial UT SUNDAY UT MONDAY 0000 9 Conversando 9 Radio Logos Network 0015 entre Cubanos 9 Truth for the World 0030 9 R. Fuerza Democrática 9 Radio Oriente Libre 0045 9 Verdad para el Mundo 0100 9 Prophecy Talk 0130 9 Conversando entre Cubanos 0200 9 Radio República 9 Radio República MONDAY-FRIDAY 0400-0900 7 The Overcomer Ministry 0900-1300 9 Radio República 1300-1400 7 The Overcomer Ministry 1400-1600 7 Christian Media Network 1600-2000 9 Radio República 2000-0400 7 Christian Media Network 7=7385 kHz to North America 9=9955 kHz to Caribbean and Latin America [Note that some English programs are on 9 and some Spanish on 7] Transmitter Site: Miami, Florida, USA. Power: 50,000 watts (5,000 watts auxiliary). (Jeff White, WRMI, Aug 22, edited and reformatted by Glenn Hauser, also adding WRN specifics, for DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. 5745, 8.8 2330, WWRB with "La Palabra de Vida". Thought it might be something more interesting so here I was wasting 30 minutes for nothing. Very weak in the beginning. 1-3 CB (Christer Brunström, Sweden, SW Bulletin Aug 21, translated by editor Thomas Nilsson for DX LISTENING DIGEST) At first I thought this would not be WWRB, because I did not know they had anything in Spanish, but indeed this matches their posted 5745 schedule at http://www.wwrb.org/schedules/scac/schedule.html for Mondays, in fractured Spanish: 07.00 PM (2300 UTC): Dios Cudia De Ti 07.30 PM (2330 UTC): La Pala Vra De Vi Da And there are a few other Spanish programs at various times on this frequency (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. Radio Veronica (US) --- Hi all, Here's a quick commercial :-) Thought you might like to know that I finally have my "micro-radio station" fully operational on the internet. It's called Radio Veronica (those of you who know about off-shore broadcasting in Europe in the 1960s will most likely recognize the name). The actual radio transmission is very low power and can only be heard in our small community. It's been on the air for several months. Now you can now receive it anywhere in the world via the internet. Check out http://www.radioveronica.us Most of the time we play hits of the 50s, 60s, and 70s, but also broadcast some nationally syndicated news and public affairs programming, as well as some religious programming. (See our programs page). Hope you enjoy, and let me know what you think. 73, (Rene' F. Tetro, Chief Engineer, Salem Communications - Philadelphia WNTP- AM/WFIL-AM, 117 Ridge Pike, Lafayette Hill, PA 19444, Voice: 610-941- 9560 Extension 41, Fax: 610-828-8879, Email: rtetro @ pobox.com Aug 18, NRC-AM via DXLD) 106.5 FM West Point PA. Public affairs programming is of the `progressive` variety! (gh, DXLD) Well, "Little GTO" and "A Groovy Kind of Love" aren't bad for the first two songs I've heard. I know the next record but don't know the name. Great jingle too. OK, now The Four Seasons, this is something I could listen to, this one's stereo too. [Later:] I've been listening now for a half an hour and haven't head a bad song song, great station, this is my now better informed opinion, haha! (Bob Young, Millbury, MA, NRC-AM via DXLD) I appreciate all comments. I'm obviously programming it out of my house and have spent quite a bit of time putting the library together. I'm still adding music. Thanks again (René Tetro, ibid.) So, what are you using for the automation system? (Powell E. Way, ibid.) Powell, It's a small program I bought about four years ago called Virtual DJ Player Pro. If I remember, at the time it cost about $200. For a small program it has a lot of features; like I can set up individual hourly clocks, music rotations, program element categories, etc. It also contains an editor by which I can go into an hour's playlist and make changes. For what it is, it's pretty snazzy. And it has worked flawlessly for several years. When I was General Manager of WABN in Abingdon, VA a couple of years back, we even used it down there for a couple of years with no problems, with commercials, live programming, etc. The one drawback: It doesn't have GUI closures to operate with Satellite receiver and network programming. So, if there's a program that I run, I download it from the internet and edit it into the log. Podcasting has made this much easier, since on some of the programs I run are fed automatically using XML. I don't even have to worry about downloading it. I am completing negotiations with a radio network to run news at some hours. I will be using Total Recorder to automatically record the news and playback a few minutes later. 73, (Rene' Tetro, Lansdale, PA, ibid.) ** U S A. New FM stations granted [or not, in the first case]: CA, Rio Vista, KRVH, *101.5, 10 watts horizontal only, 31 meters, $, r, ``Radio Rio,`` River Delta Unified School District, reinstated. Says D.B. of the FCC: ``Not sure what to tell you about Rio Vista. They don`t really have any authority to be on 101.5 MHz, as best I can tell. At some point, and probably sooner rather than later, this may turn ugly for the station.`` NM, El Prado (transmitter west of Taos Pueblo reservation), KRDR-1, *90.1, 390 watts vertical only, direxional antenna, with 100% power at 0 degrees. Booster of Red River station [on same frequency] NM, Farmington, KUSW, *89.7, 500 v, 183 m, KUTE, Inc. NM, Gallup, KKNM, *88.1, 30000 h,v; -4 m, Broadcasting for the Challenged in a settlement agreement. NM, Questa, 103.7, 51000 h,v; -64m; West Waves, Inc., Auction 37 winner. NM, Taos, 95.9, 4000 h,v; -192 m, DMC Broadcasting, Inc., Auction 37 winner Facilities Changes Granted: NM, Las Vegas, KEDP, *91.1, -61 m (72 watts h) On Air --- Real stations and Pirates (selected): CA, Los Ángeles, KKLA, 99.5, celebrates 20 years of ownership by Salem Media. This is a different KKLA from the station the late Gene Scott owned, and who turned in his license rather than reveal financial details. It was the first station in the L.Á. market and the second nationally to stream audio on the Internet, in late 1995, according to NRB magazine. It`s owned with ``The Fish``, KFSH 95.9 Anaheim, and three AMs. They take up almost the entire fifth floor of the headquarters building in Glendale, with 11 studios, along with offices in Orange County and the ``Inland Empire`` FL, Kissimmee, WLAZ, *89.1 --- this Spanish Christian contemporary station fined $10,000 for broadcasting advertising in violation of FCC rules. One ad for a shirt company said it has ``the biggest variety of undershirts, polos, short and long sleeve oxford shirts [and they are] the people that know most about embroidery and printing.`` This was a no-no because it implies qualitative and comparative references that make the announcements promotional instead of merely identifying. The station acknowledged this, but said the company had donated T-shirts bearing the WLAZ logo and it was the station`s decision to run the announcements. The FCC, however, ruled that it was not necessary to find that WLAZ was contractually obligated to air the announcements. Because they were aired in exchange for consideration (the free T- shirts), the announcements must follow the rules of permissible underwriting language. It is irrelevant that WLAZ was airing the announcements voluntarily. The fine was as large as it was because there were 1,671 airings of the ads over a 6-month period. The typical FCC fine is $2,000 per instance, but the FCC felt that a fine of $3,342,000 would be excessive. It also does not matter that the forbidden announcements were broadcast in Spanish. A problem for WBUR Boston MA is Rhode Island. That state`s attorney general said he will continue to look into the management of co-owned WRNI 1290, even though the sale from Boston University did not go ahead. There`s talk now of a ``hidden agenda`` to take away WRNI and WXNI 1230. Off Air: FL, Panama City Beach, 92.5 --- an illegal station interfered with WPAP 92.5 Panama City, a Clear Channel station. The signal was traced to the studios of Double O Radio Corp., home of four local stations, including WRBA 95.9 Springfield-Panama City. Using direction-finding equipment, CC`s local director of engineering, Charles Wooten, traced the signal. Upon gaining access to the studio, a 250-watt transmitter in an equipment rack was found to be operating on 92.5. The unlicensed station knocked out the WPAP signal to 10,000 people. Another 15,000 to 20,000 potential listeners may have been affected. WPAP is asking the FCC to investigate. Double O Radio released a statement to the Panama City News Herald saying it is conducting an internal investigation, ``involving a single, brief, technical malfunxion involving a backup transmitter used only during emergencies.`` Other Double O stations in the market are WAKT 103.5 Callaway-Panama City, WASJ 105.1 Panama City Beach, WPFM -FM107.9 Panama City. Thanks to John A. Torgan of Panama City for sending the news clipping. NonIDs, Not Just Slogans: MN, Sleepy Eye, KNUJ-FM, 107.3 Sam (``simply about music``, from ``Brat 107.3``). Still r, with music from the 70s through today. FMakings: ID, Dubois, 105.1A. The FCC dismissed a more complex plan that would have created three more Salt Lake City rimshots. OR, Dallas, *98.3C --- the FCC reversed itself and made the channel noncommercial. Its reasoning: KOAC *550 AM Corvallis could become commercial. Similarly, the FCC ruled that *107.1A Pima AZ can be noncommercial, despite the presence of KFLT 830 [gospel huxter] and KUAZ 1550 Tucson [public radio]. Selected AM Happenings: NY, New York --- 1440 Broadway is no longer the address of WOR 710 AM. It resided there 80 years, and became history after Joey Reynolds` nighttime shift ended recently. Its main studio was where many of the Twentieth Century`s best musicians played. Reynolds said the architecture and acoustics, designed for a full band, was awesome, but from an earlier era. The move to a new address will only help make the station sound better, according to staffers who wanted to downplay talk of any possible format change. TX, Dallas-Fort Worth has seen some recent upgrades between 1100 and 1200 kHz. KBIS highland Park, the old KVIL, resided on 1150 for several hears, but having only 1 kW day and 6 watts at night. It was able to get KCLE Cleburne TX to move from 1140 to 1110, and then get KBIS moved to 1160 from 1150, where it`s now 35000 day, 1000 watts night. But it has to use separate day and night tower sites on opposite sides of Fort Worth. First Broadcasting, owner, is also acquiring KFXR Dallas, the original KLIF at 1190, from Clear Channel, and changing its format to oldies according to the M Street Journal online. VA, Arlington, WQBY206, 1700 kHz, applies for 100 watts, rising above the usual 10 watts for a TIStation, for homeland security purposes. Reply comments at the FCC by Aug. 18. USA --- According to new legislation, DST is to be extended by four more weeks starting in 2007. Who loses? Some 700 AM daytimers, who will have to sign on an hour later, losing up to an hour drive time in each of those weeks (Bruce Elving, July-August FMedia! via DXLD) [This is but a tiny fraxion of all the material in this double issue of FMM, which gh found of particular interest] ** VENEZUELA. COMMUNITY RADIO STATION TAKEN OFF AIR |Text of report by Venezuelan newspaper El Nacional website on 19 August Caracas, 19 August: Once again Mérida makes the news because of revolutionary process contradictions. Since 1900 last night, without any explanation and following a telephone order received by María Cristina González, president of the YVKE National Network, radio station 1040 AM was taken off the air. The radio station's personnel reported that Julio Carrillo, the station's director, was dismissed, also by telephone, according to a report appearing on the http://Aporrea.org web page. The station served as a collection centre during February's flash floods, and also became a community station with information for About Face Mission cooperatives. The community responded to the measure and beginning tomorrow it will rally at the studios of the 1040 AM radio station to express its disagreement, Aporrea stated. Source: El Nacional website, Caracas, in Spanish 19 Aug 05 (via BBCM via DXLD) ** ZIMBABWE [and non]. Voice of the People, 7120 jammed from 1700 sign on 22 Aug, extremely severe. This is not the recycler jammer in use but a severely stronger tone block jammer. Earlier this year both variants of these Chinese jammers were in use from within Zimbabwe, the tone block one most effective at wiping out a frequency with no audio getting through. These jammers were first used back in March 2005. The tone jammer, severe S+++, and not decent on the ears. And my radio is OK! (David Pringle-Wood, Harare, Aug 22, DX LISTENING DIGEST) UNIDENTIFIED. Can anybody hear ANYthing on 9170.010 kHz? Unid faded in 1730, still ON at 1850z (at noise-floor level). Theoretical chances have been increased since CNR6 closed (-1800*). But seems they're just chances, not more ;) I think it's very likely an harmonic from MW (east Asia?). (Vlad Titarev, Ukraine, DXplorer Aug 17 via BC-DX via DXLD) Nothing heard here Aug 18 at 1801 UT, after CNR (S=4-5 fair signal) closed, wb (Wolfgang Büschel, ibid.) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ PUBLICATIONS ++++++++++++ FM ATLAS, 20TH EDITION Is at the printer! The 264-page manuscript was mailed to our printer in Benton Harbor, MI on August 8. Will have more pages than the last book, 264, and revised maps along with all of the rest of the material that you depend on Bruce Elving to deliver. This issue features a new print file, and the use of an extra HP printer similar to the model we used before. Hopefully the quality of reproduction in both the book and the newsletter will have improved. Best of all, the price is slightly lower. $19.95 + $2.05 for shipping for a total of $22.00. The book should be back here and ready to ship out in late August. Please remit $22.00 for each book; two or more copies at $17.95 each +2.50 for shipping. Check, Money Order, Visa, MC, Amex, to FM Atlas, P O Box 336, Esko MN 55733-0336 (FMedia and News Flash from Bruce Elving, DX LISTENING DIGEST) DIGITAL BROADCASTING ++++++++++++++++++++ HD RADIO UPDATE MN, Minneapolis, KSJN, *99.5 adds experimental HD radio subchannels. Those include talk and world music, besides the main channel classical. They are simply audio loops played endlessly for demonstration purposes. It is doubtful any meaningful programming will soon come about. The high cost of home receivers is a limiting factor. ``The devices are so rare that Best Buy doesn`t even carry them. We probably won`t have them for another year, if ever,`` said store employee Brian Lucas. ``We try to carry the latest and greatest cutting-edge products. But you`d have to be a very early adapter [sic] to seek these out.`` Stations known to be using a subchannel of the digital `HD Radio`` include: WJMK 104.3 Chicago. ``WJMK-HD2`` uses some personalities from the main channel. WRAL-HD2 on 101.5 Raleigh NC is supposedly on with unannounced programming. Noncommercial stations WMUB *88.5 Oxford OH and KPLU *88.5 Tacoma-Seattle have launched so-called HD radio subcarriers with jazz. This is probably an effort to infuse life into the HD system by offering separate programming. Public broadcasters hve come up with the name ``multicasting`` to describe the secondary program possible with digital audio broadcasting. A classical audio stream will be offered stations. This will originate at KUSC Los Ángeles and co-produced by Colorado Public Radio. A folk channel will focus on artists like Arlo Guthrie, Bob Dylan, John Prine and Lucy Kaplansky. Jazz and Triple A formats are evolving. WFAE *90.7 Charlotte, for example, is dividing its channels into one main one at 64 kbps and two at 16 kbps each. It is thought that 16 kbps is the minimum to support decent audio quality, as reported in Current newspaper. NC, Raleigh, WCPE, *89.7, has digital FM to think about, and more practically, aging guy wires. Deborah Proctor, GM, writes in the station`s Quarter Notes publication: ``In the mix is the guy wire replacement; we must do this work sometime in the next two years. We project we will do this work in the early spring of 2006, and complete it before the hurricane season begins. The cost estimate is $180,000 but we should budget 15 percent more for last minute ``surprises.`` One person said that we should have started saving for this earlier, but statistically the guy lines should have had ten more years of useful life. I can only speculate that there`s a lot more salt air at the 1,000 plus foot level than predicted. When we replace them, we`ll specify a more durable anti-corrosion coating.`` What`s with IBOC and the problem of adjacent channel slop-over? Engineer Barry McLarnon examined it in the pages of Radio Guide magazine. He found that the more expensive FM tuners exhibited the effects of adjacent channel IBOC interference more so than the cheaper FM portables. Seems the portables already suffered more from analog adjacent-channel interference than the deluxe sets, including car radios from Delphi and Pioneer. ``The interference from the digital sideband will be significant in the more `bulletproof` receivers, but it will be buried under analog interference in the low-end receivers. In other words, the presence of IBOC tends to level off the top end of performance, those receivers that were capable of excellent performance at the [FCC] protected contour D/U (desired/undesired) of 6 dB now deliver mediocre SNR (signal-noise ratio). . . When IBOC is added to a second-adjacent signal, a new source of digital interference appears on the first adjacent channel. Whether or not this adds significantly to the overall interference level is again very dependent on the selectivity characteristics of a particular receiver.`` Another engineer, Barry Mishkind, notes the real-world situation encountered by Greg Jablonski, owner of WHMI 93.5 Howell MI. He`s confronted by adjacent-channel interference from WBCT 93.7, a super- powered Class B stations in Grand Rapids MI. His station was selected by the Michigan Association of Broadcasters as ``station of the year`` for its emphasis on localism and community service. His station is already receiving analog interference from the 320-kW station, whose transmitter is between Grand Rapids and Kalamazoo. That interference exits in 26.3 percent of the are inside its protected contour. The percentage would rise to 87.4, assuming WBCT went digital with just a 3.2 kW transmitter. Jablonski`s solution is for the FCC to require grandfathered super- power stations to begin at or below their class limits as a prerequisite to IBOC operations. Additional studies may identify other stations, even among ``normally powered`` stations where interference could be encountered. In a letter to the Commission, Jablonski points out that ``digital technology shows promise to improve radio broadcasting as a whole. But there is no justification for allowing stations that have been grandfathered at extra high power or height in the analog world to carry over that grandfathering into the new digital environment at the expense of other stations.`` (Bruce Elving, July-August FMedia! via DXLD) On Aug 19, QRDRM from 15370-15380 on Holy Qur`an Station again at 1336, but the DRM, presumably HCJB, was not on when tuned by a few minutes earlier (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) RADIO EQUIPMENT FORUM +++++++++++++++++++++ GRUNDIG S350 REPORT by Mark Durenberger August 19, 2005 I thought I'd chime in on this very good dialogue. Several months ago I bought two of the Grundig S350's at a local Radio Shack, because I was intrigued by the full-page ad by Eton importers that appeared in a USA Today. These radios have since been on several road trips, carried through high-noise environments and were part of a recent DX- Pedition, on the end of a 2800-foot Beverage antenna. My comments are directed ONLY to Medium-Wave AM listening, and are not necessarily in order of importance: 1. FIRST IMPRESSIONS: The packaging is great; the box itself has lots of info. The manual's a bit light on technical details, but should serve most casual users quite well. But the detailed technical specs themselves seem to be carefully guarded. I couldn't Google any actual technical data, beyond those specifications provided in the manual. 2. AT A GLANCE: Good tactile feedback on front panel controls; should be fairly easy to operate by non-sighted folks. However the volume control is not located in an intuitive place; it really should be where the RF gain control is located. When I want to turn down the radio volume, I find myself reaching for the RF gain control. 3. NOISE REDUCTION: There appears to be dynamic noise-reduction ("DNR"); most likely because that's now a function of most low-cost large-scale receiver chips. Unless my ears are deceiving me, this evidences itself as high-end audio roll-off, and it's most obvious when the RF signal is reduced. As you lower the RF gain, you can actually hear the high-end response of the audio going away. This feature could be a no-no for long-form recording, when deep fades are occurring. But I know I'm nit-picking, and the idea of DNR is laudable for casual listening. 4. DRIFT: We know about frequency drift from the great posts you've seen here recently. Yes, it's there, and it's almost immediately apparent. AND it's independent of the frequency readout. On both of my radios, regardless of MW frequency, the actual center frequency is found 3 or 4 khz higher in the "wide" mode (and about 1 khz higher in the "narrow" mode). I've simply learned to set the radio 3 khz high (i.e. 1503 for a 1500 signal in "wide" mode), and let the station drift toward "center," as the radio warms up. 5. BANDWIDTH: The "wide/narrow" switch is way cool and it really works. BUT the center frequency changes between settings; in other words, if the real center for 1500 is at 1503 in "wide" mode, it's found at 1501 in narrow. That's a function of scaling, but it IS disconcerting, because if you switch between "wide" and "narrow" a lot, you'll find yourself retuning each time. 6. Sensitivity and selectivity are quite good for a box at this price level. The "Signal Strength Indicator" bar-graph display follows the RF gain control nicely, but the radio can be overloaded--to actual shutdown --- by a strong signal. I first discovered this when placing the radio near an external tuned-loop antenna; it simply swamped the radio --- regardless of the setting of the RF gain control. An indicator that it's about to happen is when the "Signal Strength" reading approaches full-scale. 7. As noted, the dual-concentric tuning knob is nicely tactile; however there's not a great deal of difference between the two knobs in tuning "speed". I think the 'fine' tuning knob action could be a bit "slower" than the outside "fast" knob. 8. As expected, IBOC hash tends to fully occupy the TWO adjacent channels on either side in the "wide" mode, but it's obvious only in the FIRST adjacent channels in 'narrow' mode. It's a real plus. 9. OTHER FEATURES: The external antenna connection does not disable the internal loop. This can be a "gotcha." The simple solution is to place a loop antenna near the back of the radio but, as noted, you can overload the radio. WHAT ELSE? The radio's a little heavy (3.5 lbs), mostly because of the 4 D-cells required. They're not cheap, but they do provide looooong life. There's an active "battery condition" LED display. One nice feature you won't find on some radios: You can press a button and read the time while the radio's on. The shared LEDs go momentarily from "FREQ" to "Time Of Day" and then drop back to frequency. I can't do that on a couple of my Sonys. And I haven't yet found a way to disable the "Auto shut-down" although I suppose it's there somewhere. When you turn the radio on, you have a choice of time until it shuts itself off. 90 minutes is as long as you can get. Maybe someone knows how to disable this? Finally: another nice feature: The audio jacks are NOT affected by the settings of the volume or tone controls. This means you can get a constant recording level, regardless of whether you have the speaker turned up. The output, by the way, is "line-level" which means it's not directly compatible with the "mike" input on recorders. You'll need an attenuator to record from line-level outputs to a mike input. My bottom line: A great radio for the price! I don't use it as my primary radios (actually they're my receivers # 9 and #10). But they do a good job, they sound good, and if you can accept the limitations we've described and you've read about in previous posts, it's a good radio for the $99 investment (Mark Durenberger, For the DX Audio Service, NRC-AM via DXLD) On earlier versions of the radio the 90 minute auto off timer could not be disabled. But on the newer version all you have to do is hold the red POWER/SLEEP in for 3 seconds when first turning on the radio. Yes, I forgot to mention that the AM antenna input jack does not disable the internal loopstick antenna. 73 & GUD DX, (Thomas F. Giella, KN4LF, Plant City, FL, USA, ibid.) MAPPING YOUR DX LOG OK, folks, I've spent entirely too much time having fun with the new Google Earth program http://earth.google.com/ I know we've already discussed Google Maps, and how you can pop in an address or lon/lat, and it will map the location, and allow you to display a satellite picture of the location. Really cool stuff. But I've found something even cooler. Google Earth is a PC based application, which has the whole satellite picture database loaded. You can zoom in & out, tilt the angle so that it looks like you're flying towards a location, and even look at real 3D views of certain places that they have captured in 3D. With street names, city boundaries, and all kinds of other stuff overlaid on the screen. I normally keep my log in Excel, so it's easy to convert that to a CSV file. I found a site which had a PHP script, that can take a CSV file, and convert it to Google Earth's KML format. This is a really powerful XML based language, that allows you to load all kinds of data into Google Earth, like places, paths, GPS data and more. What I've been able to do here, is really quite simple. I modified the PHP script to match the format of my data, and put it up on a PHP enabled web server that we have here. Now, whenever you go to the URL, it will spit out my entire log in KML format. What makes this so nice, is that you can then add a "Network Link" in Google Earth, that specifies the URL for the log, and Google Earth will happily load all of those items right into the program. You can then zoom right in on any one of the items, and see the transmitter site. Of course you can zoom out, and see all of the stations you've logged, spread out over a satellite view of the area. If anyone's interested in seeing how this works, feel free to create a network link in your copy of Google Earth, pointing to http://www.pack613.org/DX/gedxlog.php You'll see all of the stations that I've logged (please don't laugh at the paltry number of loggings - I'm a busy guy these days, and I've only returned to DXing for a couple of years). By the way, if you just click on that link, you'll be presented with the actual KML code representing the log. It's really quite elegant, and I'm sure this could be extended in many ways. Now that I've seen the power of this program, I'm seriously considering moving my log into a MySQL database, so that I can dynamically update my log right from a web page, and have it instantly reflected in Google Earth. Maybe I should set up a server, where people can upload their loggings into their own database, and then everyone could see everyone else's loggings. The possibilities are endless! Oh, by the way, did I mention that Google Earth is free? Have fun! (Brian Leyton, Valley Village, CA, DX-398 / RS Loop, ABDX via DXLD) [Later:] If you click on any station (or click the link in my first email), you'll see pretty much everything that's in the file. Name, date/time, city, state, format, quality, distance, bearing, power, antenna & notes. Lon/Lat is in there too, in decimal format. I already enter that into my Excel log. I'm nowhere near being able to set up a general purpose website yet, but it doesn't seem like it would be too difficult. There are some great PHP/MySQL tools out there, like PHPMyAdmin that make it really easy to maintain the database. And it seems like it should be pretty easy to modify the existing script to pull the data from a database, rather than a .csv file. The only tricky part is duplicating the functions that I use for calculating distance & bearing from the station's lon/lat to my home location. Currently I use an Excel add-in that gives me those functions. I guess I'd have to find a PHP equivalent, or build my own. There is a configuration item under Tools-Options for the size of the icon, but even the "Small" size isn't really small enough. There might be a way to customize this though (Brian Leyton, Valley Village, CA DX-398 / RS Loop / 18" Box Loop, ibid.) As I was playing with the Google Earth I noticed that it gives in real time the coordinates of wherever the pointer is on the screen. This should be a quick way to get coordinates, and then distances, to DX cities. Anyone else tried this? (Chris Black, Cape Cod, NRC-AM via DXLD) Another thing I've noticed, is if you use 100000watts.com, you can just copy the coordinates listed for a station, paste them into Google Maps, and it will display the satellite view or map for the location. Google Earth doesn't seem to like the degree symbol used by 100000watts.com - you have to replace that with a "d", with a space in front of it. Then it will work (Brian Leyton, Valley Village, CA, ibid.) Another very cool thing Google Earth will do is, in the search box, accommodate some countries' postal code systems. Thus, if you input only your zip code, it should zoom in to your neighborhood. I worked a British ham on 80 meters last week and, for the life of me, could not locate his community using the name he gave me. I looked him up on QRZ.COM, threw his UK 7-digit postal code into Google Earth, and it zoomed right to his street on the map --- amazing (Brent Taylor, VE1JH Doaktown, NB, ibid.) CLEAR CHANNEL TO ARBITRON: CHANGE YOUR WAYS NOW! http://www.forbes.com/2005/08/17/clear-channe-arbitron-ratings-cx_pak_0817arbitron_print.html Digital Media --- A Seismic Shift In Rating Radio Peter Kafka, 08.17.05, 6:00 AM ET The country's biggest radio conglomerate has a message to the company in charge of keeping tabs on the country's radio listeners: Hurry up and change. Or else. Clear Channel Communication's radio division will announce this week that it expects to receive up to 30 proposals to dislodge radio ratings kingpin Arbitron, which has been tracking listeners for 40 years. The problem, says Clear Channel radio boss John Hogan, is that Arbitron is still using the same technology it used back when it first started --- pen and paper. The rating company pays a panel of listeners in every radio market it measures to keep a weekly diary of their radio listening habits, and jot down which station they listened to and for how long. Not good enough, says Hogan, who issued a request for proposals for an alternate measurement system in May, and says he expects to have more than 20 for consideration by mid-December. There's no reason, he says, that radio can't at least be as accurately measured as television, which once used the same methodology but eventually switched to electronic measurement. Taken at face value, this should have Arbitron officials sweating. Clear Channel, which owns 1,200 stations in the U.S., is the company's biggest customer. Last year it accounted for 21% of Arbitron's $297 million in sales. Viacom's Infinity unit is the next-biggest customer, accounting for 10% of revenue. And though Clear Channel signed a contract last December that extends through 2008, Hogan says he would start paying a competitor "immediately" if there were a viable one. But Arbitron says it's well on its way to giving Clear Channel exactly what it has been asking for. The company has spent several years developing a "portable people meter" --- a cell-phone-sized device that panelists could carry with them and automatically record not only radio signals but television sound and even such other acoustic sources as music piped in at a grocery store. The device recognizes a signal that is "hidden" in a broadcaster's frequency and automatically sends the information back to Arbitron every night. Aribtron believes the new system is likely to hurt ratings of power- house drivetime stations during morning commuting hours. On the other hand, it will likely show that listeners are tuning in to more stations than they say they are and could give a lift to smaller, niche players. Arbitron officials tested the system last year in Philadelphia and are conducting another test in Houston. It expects to announce preliminary results of the newest survey next month. If everything goes well, they say, they could begin rolling out the system next year, starting in Houston. Not fast enough, says Hogan, who says creating a new system shouldn't be rocket science. "Look at iPod technology," he says. "That was developed and rolled out very, very quickly. There are industries that are being developed much more quickly than Arbitron is moving." Clear Channel's impatience is due at least in part to the company's frustration with the radio ad market, which enjoyed explosive growth in the mid- and late-'90s but has grown stagnant. A more accurate measuring system, Hogan argues, would give advertisers the confidence to spend more on radio. Arbitron officials agree with Clear Channel on this point--a study the company commissioned this year said 25% of marketers surveyed said radio ad spending would increase if the new meters were put in place, while 8% said they would cut spending if the old system sticks around. And Arbitron has its own reasons for wanting to introduce the new measuring system as soon as possible. Company officials say they plan to raise prices by up to 65% when they introduce the new system. "We're thrilled. We're absolutely thrilled that [Hogan is] impatient to go" said Pierre Bouvard, who oversees Arbitron's portable people meter project. "We're impatient to go." At the same time, Bouvard said, installing a new, reliable ratings system will take time, both from a technological standpoint and in terms of getting a methodology that will satisfy advertisers and an industry sanctioning body. Anyone who wanted to take on Arbitron, he said, would be three to five years behind. "There's a difference between having a gizmo and having a ratings service," he said. "Gizmos are easy. The real sweat of having a ratings service is actual implementation." Arbitron officials suggest that Hogan's public saber-rattling is reminiscent of the game of chicken the company played with the Infinity radio chain last year. In June 2004, the Viacom unit announced it wouldn't renew its contract with Arbitron, sending the company's stock price plunging. Two months later, a deal was done. But Hogan says that's the not the case this time, adding Clear Channel will be paying Arbitron though the length of its four-year contract. He simply wants better measurement, faster. "They seem to think that it will take a long, long time to develop anything," he says. "I don't think it's as complex as they say it is. It's a significant undertaking, but it's not complex." (via Kevin Redding, ABDX via DXLD) ###