7 ms·

Shortwave radio: can you hear me now?

ggeorgovassilis 5y ago
The post is about recent calls for reviving shortwave radio in order to reach Ukrainians and Russians. > In other words, shortwave was great but it’s not the option you’re looking for. The audience won’t be there. The audience left because it was, at the time, interested in commercial and cultural content. Times have changed...
- mbakke 5y ago
  A technology that has been at a stand-still for decades can't be expected to grab a foothold in todays always-connected world.
  - mingus88 5y ago
    I feel like the antithesis of this whole discussion I recently bought a shortwave receiver for the first time in my life. I specifically wanted something useful for when the "always-connected" stuff fails. I completely embraced being online ever since BBSes of the early 90s. Been watching it become consolidated and controlled by an ever shrinking list of ever growing corporate influence. The internet of today is garbage compared to what we had in the late 90s. I think there's massive potential for a resurgence of shortwave in the 2020s, a medium that can't be controlled, can reach across borders, and has become so obscure that there's no real risk of corporatization
FerretFred 5y ago
Interesting article, and as someone who regularly listened to SW radio broadcasts back in the 70s and 80s, in some ways I'm not surprised that people have "moved on". I recently resurrected my Sony ICF-SW100 and found the airwaves dominated by Russia and China, but no surprise there really. However, I still think there's potential for a SW service in certain scenarios: if there was a major international disaster, short wave would probably be able to reach a large number of listeners, whereas the report author's FM transmitters would almost certainly not.
- FerretFred 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_shortwave_radio_broadcasters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_shortwave_radio_broadc...
hilbert42 5y ago
I've always been an advocate of shortwave radio since I was a kid. Back then I'd come home from school and often listen to Radio Moscow and Radio Peking trying to outcompete each other on shortwave. I wasn't interested in the propaganda per se but rather the fact that it was so transparent and hyped up as to be absolutely hilarious. What was not lost on me was how truly effective shortwave actually was as a communications medium. Radio Moscow was the quintessential example of this, almost everywhere one tuned across the various shortwave bands one could hear a 5/9+ signal almost as clearly as a local AM broadcast station. By comparion, VOA (Voice of America) was a minnow. For years I've said that it would be foolhardy to discard shortwave on strategic grounds and the Ukraine situation has clearly demonstrated that. I think we underestimate both AM and shortwave radio because they're old technology but we mustn't forget how truly effective they can be. In the end they will get the message through when all else has failed - the internet down, submarine cables cut and satellites out. Not only is AM/SW radio effective but we also shouldn't forget that it's simple technology that we can fall back upon at any time. In an emergency, we can have services up and running almost overnight. I've always reckoned that AM radio was one of the greatest inventions of all time. Sometimes we overlook the true worth of old and or familiar tech and that can be to our serious disadvantage.
- donthellbanme 5y ago
  I try to always have a portable am radio with me. My favorite two radios are the Sony SRF-M37W (a favorite among blue collar workers, like electricians. It fits in the overalls.), and CC pocket radio. I've had a problem with anxiety, and loneliness, over the years. I just need something in the background. I miss the old time radio programs, and Art Bell. If had money I'd buy up any AM radio frequency, and put out new material. Even as a kid, I preferred AM old time theater to tv.
  - JKCalhoun 5y ago
    AM does seem preferable to FM (jumping back to the VOA discussion) since, if you had to, you could make an AM radio out of almost anything. (In this regard though I am not thinking about Ukrainians or Russians but rather 3rd world countries.)
outsomnia 5y ago
This is a case where you really have to read the (single) comment visible below the article, which negates the whole article.
- JackFr 5y ago
  Indeed. For a guy who spends quite a few words trashing others, it’s pretty damning to be shown to have no idea what he’s talking about. (There are a couple of comments now - including the author’s response - but it was pretty clear which one you meant. )
  - _wldu 5y ago
    Yes. Anyone who has listened to a FM radio station in a car traveling down the highway would understand that FM stations (while clear and abundant) quickly fade away as you drive out of range.
topspin 5y ago
I can't imagine why reaching Ukrainians is a motivation; Ukraine appears to be on plane wrt current events and the state of the world. Aside from the traditional Eurocentric sources they've been accustomed to consuming and which remains available to them, Starlink has pumped 5000 terminals into Ukraine, so Russia can't cut them off unless it starts destroying satellites. Russians, however, are clearing living in opposite world. Intercepted calls to family from 'special operation' soldiers show that Russians have no clue at all what has been happening. They argue with their soldiers about the state of the invasion, astonished and confused when told that Ukraine hasn't been overrun and denazified yet. The only solution here is time. A year from now and 100,000 dead Russian solders will eventually start raising questions in the minds of these people. Until then any attempt to convey reality to them, via shortwave or otherwise, will be dismissed as enemy propaganda. They're that far gone.
- hilbert42 5y ago
  "Until then any attempt to convey reality to them, via shortwave or otherwise, will be dismissed as enemy propaganda. They're that far gone." Perhaps so, but even if they dismiss such messages as enemy propaganda now they don't forget them. Later, after events change, that latent information can come to the fore and be relevant. Radio, especially low-tech AM radio, has been one of the most effective propaganda mediums of all time. One should never forget how truly and horribly effective Goebbels' propaganda was in the 1930s and during the War at galvanizing the German people. As that lesson taught us radio propaganda works and works par excellence if done well. All that's need this instant is people who understand that and who can put the medium to work forthwith.
  - scottLobster 5y ago
    Keep in mind that was when Radio was THE mass communication medium for the masses. People don't gather 'round the radio after dinner these days. I'm not sure what the radio userbase in Russia looks like, but I imagine smart phones and TV dominates just like everywhere else. In fact that's the entire point of the article: "In other words, shortwave was great but it’s not the option you’re looking for. The audience won’t be there. " That isn't to say we shouldn't try short-wave, but expectations should be tempered.
yeetsfromhellL2 5y ago
Something I've been kind of playing with the idea of is setting up an Low Power FM[1] station to reach my local community. Since around 2000 the FCC has let people get licenses for a non-commercial 1-100W FM radio station. Some of these have some really interesting formats; one lets listeners call in and leave a voicemail describing their dreams. If it's interesting, they'll air it. [1]: https://www.fcc.gov/media/radio/lpfm https://www.fcc.gov/media/radio/lpfm
- nullc 5y ago
  Have things changed? A decade ago LPFM was more fiction than reality, with very few licenses granted.
  - yeetsfromhellL2 5y ago
    From what I remember reading when I dug into it, there's a group (or groups) dedicated solely to helping people get their permit for this. The FCC does not make it easy by any means, but when you know all the invisible hoops to jump through it can be done.
    - sidewndr46 5y ago
      Can you run one of the new digital radio standards or are you required to broadcast the wideband FM signal?
      - nullc 5y ago
        The patent licensing for hdradio is rather expensive!
        sidewndr46 5y ago
        Hmm, so is that why almost no public radio stations have moved over to it? Everyone is waiting on the patents to expire first?
- 5y ago
jhoechtl 5y ago
Shortwave is easily received in the Ukraine from the BBC (broadcasted from Woofferton UK after a 20? years hiatus), Radio Romania International RRI (even in Ukrainian language) Austria Shortwave (only German, not very helpful) and China Radio International CRI. There are a few others but with limited utility. Imagine yourself sitting in the bomb shelter. You need a strong signal there for reception not the Mickey-Mouse attempt relying VOA via WMRI from lake Okeechobee. Apparently VOA doesn't think it's worth the effort.
zafiro17 5y ago
This article feels like it written specifically for me. I have a strong nostalgia and affection for shortwave radio while sadly also forcing myself to come to grips with the fact that it's a dead medium. I was a volunteer in rural Central America from 1998-2000 and shortwave radio was an important news source for me (but already a VERY niche medium, even then). Nights I dialed in VOA and then found a lot of other interesting things too, from Cuba to broadcasts from Spain, Germany, and Indonesia. It was all fun and exciting. Ten years later I began a decade of work overseas in rural West Africa. I dutifully brought my shortwave with me, only this time I found close to nothing on the airwaves. Some crazy religious broadcasts here and there, but nothing. I looked around and can confirm that in ten years of living in Africa (with a lot of West African friends and colleagues) not a single one of them had or used shortwave, or even really had any awareness that it existed. The number one media source even then was FM radio tuned in over cheap Chinese FM radios or over FM radio apps on cell phones. I've still got a shortwave and occasionally scan the frequencies from my hammock here in North Carolina. But there is really not much there (religious stuff still being one exception). I ask myself, if rural West Africans aren't listening to shortwave anymore, really who is? This article answers it: a few pockets remain, like Nigeria and Myanmar. But the shortwave era ended: everyone who left shortwave never came back, even when newer methods failed. Guess it was fun while it lasted :)
- bobochan 5y ago
  I was in Central Africa (CAR and Chad) in the early 90s and shortwave was a lifeline. The BBC was on in the background almost all day, with the exception of switching to the VOA once in a while to check on sports scores. Beyond news, shortwave was how things like evacuation and security reports were shared. My shortwave broke in transit home, but I picked up a new one around 2000, just in time for the BBC to end its broadcasts to North America. That really signaled the beginning of the end as other broadcasters cut back or eliminated their broadcasts.
user3939382 5y ago
I think if the FCC changed the rules around encryption we could get a resurgence in the use of shortwave. There's cool IP stuff you could do, but this rule severely handicaps it. I totally get why the rule was there, and it still has merit, but the context has changed. It's really crappy that we have all this spectrum and all of it goes to these multibillion dollar telecoms while the citizens get less than crumbs.
- Johnythree 5y ago
  Five minutes after encryption was allowed, the SW bands would be saturated in commercial digital services, and would be completely unusable. Just one wide-band digital service would take up most of the SW spectrum, leaving nothing for ships, aircraft, broadcasting, amateur radio, etc. The one thing which keeps the "multibillion dollar telecoms" out of the SW bands in that encryption is not allowed. And how would your "citizens" even be able to listen to the new digital services if they were encrypted? Whatever, these frequency bands are so narrow that it makes wide-band digital services utterly impractical. Needless to say there are a group of trolls who are constantly pushing this idea on behalf of the greedy commercial players.
  - user3939382 5y ago
    We could have a rule that forbids using encryption or shortwave in general for commercial purposes. I’m mainly contemplating encrypted IP over shortwave though there are other uses.
    - Johnythree 5y ago
      But if it was encrypted, how would you know if it were legal or not?

The post is about recent calls for reviving shortwave radio in order to reach Ukrainians and Russians. > In other words, shortwave was great but it’s not the option you’re looking for. The audience won’t be there. The audience left because it was, at the time, interested in commercial and cultural content. Times have changed...

mbakke 5y ago
A technology that has been at a stand-still for decades can't be expected to grab a foothold in todays always-connected world.
- mingus88 5y ago
  I feel like the antithesis of this whole discussion I recently bought a shortwave receiver for the first time in my life. I specifically wanted something useful for when the "always-connected" stuff fails. I completely embraced being online ever since BBSes of the early 90s. Been watching it become consolidated and controlled by an ever shrinking list of ever growing corporate influence. The internet of today is garbage compared to what we had in the late 90s. I think there's massive potential for a resurgence of shortwave in the 2020s, a medium that can't be controlled, can reach across borders, and has become so obscure that there's no real risk of corporatization

FerretFred 5y ago

Interesting article, and as someone who regularly listened to SW radio broadcasts back in the 70s and 80s, in some ways I'm not surprised that people have "moved on". I recently resurrected my Sony ICF-SW100 and found the airwaves dominated by Russia and China, but no surprise there really. However, I still think there's potential for a SW service in certain scenarios: if there was a major international disaster, short wave would probably be able to reach a large number of listeners, whereas the report author's FM transmitters would almost certainly not.

FerretFred 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_shortwave_radio_broadcasters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_shortwave_radio_broadc...

hilbert42 5y ago

I've always been an advocate of shortwave radio since I was a kid. Back then I'd come home from school and often listen to Radio Moscow and Radio Peking trying to outcompete each other on shortwave. I wasn't interested in the propaganda per se but rather the fact that it was so transparent and hyped up as to be absolutely hilarious. What was not lost on me was how truly effective shortwave actually was as a communications medium. Radio Moscow was the quintessential example of this, almost everywhere one tuned across the various shortwave bands one could hear a 5/9+ signal almost as clearly as a local AM broadcast station. By comparion, VOA (Voice of America) was a minnow. For years I've said that it would be foolhardy to discard shortwave on strategic grounds and the Ukraine situation has clearly demonstrated that. I think we underestimate both AM and shortwave radio because they're old technology but we mustn't forget how truly effective they can be. In the end they will get the message through when all else has failed - the internet down, submarine cables cut and satellites out. Not only is AM/SW radio effective but we also shouldn't forget that it's simple technology that we can fall back upon at any time. In an emergency, we can have services up and running almost overnight. I've always reckoned that AM radio was one of the greatest inventions of all time. Sometimes we overlook the true worth of old and or familiar tech and that can be to our serious disadvantage.

donthellbanme 5y ago
I try to always have a portable am radio with me. My favorite two radios are the Sony SRF-M37W (a favorite among blue collar workers, like electricians. It fits in the overalls.), and CC pocket radio. I've had a problem with anxiety, and loneliness, over the years. I just need something in the background. I miss the old time radio programs, and Art Bell. If had money I'd buy up any AM radio frequency, and put out new material. Even as a kid, I preferred AM old time theater to tv.
- JKCalhoun 5y ago
  AM does seem preferable to FM (jumping back to the VOA discussion) since, if you had to, you could make an AM radio out of almost anything. (In this regard though I am not thinking about Ukrainians or Russians but rather 3rd world countries.)

outsomnia 5y ago

This is a case where you really have to read the (single) comment visible below the article, which negates the whole article.

JackFr 5y ago
Indeed. For a guy who spends quite a few words trashing others, it’s pretty damning to be shown to have no idea what he’s talking about. (There are a couple of comments now - including the author’s response - but it was pretty clear which one you meant. )
- _wldu 5y ago
  Yes. Anyone who has listened to a FM radio station in a car traveling down the highway would understand that FM stations (while clear and abundant) quickly fade away as you drive out of range.

topspin 5y ago

I can't imagine why reaching Ukrainians is a motivation; Ukraine appears to be on plane wrt current events and the state of the world. Aside from the traditional Eurocentric sources they've been accustomed to consuming and which remains available to them, Starlink has pumped 5000 terminals into Ukraine, so Russia can't cut them off unless it starts destroying satellites. Russians, however, are clearing living in opposite world. Intercepted calls to family from 'special operation' soldiers show that Russians have no clue at all what has been happening. They argue with their soldiers about the state of the invasion, astonished and confused when told that Ukraine hasn't been overrun and denazified yet. The only solution here is time. A year from now and 100,000 dead Russian solders will eventually start raising questions in the minds of these people. Until then any attempt to convey reality to them, via shortwave or otherwise, will be dismissed as enemy propaganda. They're that far gone.

hilbert42 5y ago
"Until then any attempt to convey reality to them, via shortwave or otherwise, will be dismissed as enemy propaganda. They're that far gone." Perhaps so, but even if they dismiss such messages as enemy propaganda now they don't forget them. Later, after events change, that latent information can come to the fore and be relevant. Radio, especially low-tech AM radio, has been one of the most effective propaganda mediums of all time. One should never forget how truly and horribly effective Goebbels' propaganda was in the 1930s and during the War at galvanizing the German people. As that lesson taught us radio propaganda works and works par excellence if done well. All that's need this instant is people who understand that and who can put the medium to work forthwith.
- scottLobster 5y ago
  Keep in mind that was when Radio was THE mass communication medium for the masses. People don't gather 'round the radio after dinner these days. I'm not sure what the radio userbase in Russia looks like, but I imagine smart phones and TV dominates just like everywhere else. In fact that's the entire point of the article: "In other words, shortwave was great but it’s not the option you’re looking for. The audience won’t be there. " That isn't to say we shouldn't try short-wave, but expectations should be tempered.

yeetsfromhellL2 5y ago

Something I've been kind of playing with the idea of is setting up an Low Power FM[1] station to reach my local community. Since around 2000 the FCC has let people get licenses for a non-commercial 1-100W FM radio station. Some of these have some really interesting formats; one lets listeners call in and leave a voicemail describing their dreams. If it's interesting, they'll air it. [1]: https://www.fcc.gov/media/radio/lpfm https://www.fcc.gov/media/radio/lpfm

nullc 5y ago
Have things changed? A decade ago LPFM was more fiction than reality, with very few licenses granted.
- yeetsfromhellL2 5y ago
  From what I remember reading when I dug into it, there's a group (or groups) dedicated solely to helping people get their permit for this. The FCC does not make it easy by any means, but when you know all the invisible hoops to jump through it can be done.
  - sidewndr46 5y ago
    Can you run one of the new digital radio standards or are you required to broadcast the wideband FM signal?
    - nullc 5y ago
      The patent licensing for hdradio is rather expensive!
      - sidewndr46 5y ago
        Hmm, so is that why almost no public radio stations have moved over to it? Everyone is waiting on the patents to expire first?
5y ago

jhoechtl 5y ago

Shortwave is easily received in the Ukraine from the BBC (broadcasted from Woofferton UK after a 20? years hiatus), Radio Romania International RRI (even in Ukrainian language) Austria Shortwave (only German, not very helpful) and China Radio International CRI. There are a few others but with limited utility. Imagine yourself sitting in the bomb shelter. You need a strong signal there for reception not the Mickey-Mouse attempt relying VOA via WMRI from lake Okeechobee. Apparently VOA doesn't think it's worth the effort.

zafiro17 5y ago

This article feels like it written specifically for me. I have a strong nostalgia and affection for shortwave radio while sadly also forcing myself to come to grips with the fact that it's a dead medium. I was a volunteer in rural Central America from 1998-2000 and shortwave radio was an important news source for me (but already a VERY niche medium, even then). Nights I dialed in VOA and then found a lot of other interesting things too, from Cuba to broadcasts from Spain, Germany, and Indonesia. It was all fun and exciting. Ten years later I began a decade of work overseas in rural West Africa. I dutifully brought my shortwave with me, only this time I found close to nothing on the airwaves. Some crazy religious broadcasts here and there, but nothing. I looked around and can confirm that in ten years of living in Africa (with a lot of West African friends and colleagues) not a single one of them had or used shortwave, or even really had any awareness that it existed. The number one media source even then was FM radio tuned in over cheap Chinese FM radios or over FM radio apps on cell phones. I've still got a shortwave and occasionally scan the frequencies from my hammock here in North Carolina. But there is really not much there (religious stuff still being one exception). I ask myself, if rural West Africans aren't listening to shortwave anymore, really who is? This article answers it: a few pockets remain, like Nigeria and Myanmar. But the shortwave era ended: everyone who left shortwave never came back, even when newer methods failed. Guess it was fun while it lasted :)

bobochan 5y ago
I was in Central Africa (CAR and Chad) in the early 90s and shortwave was a lifeline. The BBC was on in the background almost all day, with the exception of switching to the VOA once in a while to check on sports scores. Beyond news, shortwave was how things like evacuation and security reports were shared. My shortwave broke in transit home, but I picked up a new one around 2000, just in time for the BBC to end its broadcasts to North America. That really signaled the beginning of the end as other broadcasters cut back or eliminated their broadcasts.

user3939382 5y ago

I think if the FCC changed the rules around encryption we could get a resurgence in the use of shortwave. There's cool IP stuff you could do, but this rule severely handicaps it. I totally get why the rule was there, and it still has merit, but the context has changed. It's really crappy that we have all this spectrum and all of it goes to these multibillion dollar telecoms while the citizens get less than crumbs.

Johnythree 5y ago
Five minutes after encryption was allowed, the SW bands would be saturated in commercial digital services, and would be completely unusable. Just one wide-band digital service would take up most of the SW spectrum, leaving nothing for ships, aircraft, broadcasting, amateur radio, etc. The one thing which keeps the "multibillion dollar telecoms" out of the SW bands in that encryption is not allowed. And how would your "citizens" even be able to listen to the new digital services if they were encrypted? Whatever, these frequency bands are so narrow that it makes wide-band digital services utterly impractical. Needless to say there are a group of trolls who are constantly pushing this idea on behalf of the greedy commercial players.
- user3939382 5y ago
  We could have a rule that forbids using encryption or shortwave in general for commercial purposes. I’m mainly contemplating encrypted IP over shortwave though there are other uses.
  - Johnythree 5y ago
    But if it was encrypted, how would you know if it were legal or not?