7 ms·

It's a moot point in the UK at least, sadly we're binning off even the mighty Radio 4 longwave signal in a year or so as part of the latest round of cost-cuttin

It's a moot point in the UK at least, sadly we're binning off even the mighty Radio 4 longwave signal in a year or so as part of the latest round of cost-cutting measures at the BBC. Most of the British stations have already shut down their AM output with Absolute Radio being the latest to pull the plug. What I'd love to see is the top part of the medium wave band being opened to broadcasting hobbyists along similar lines to radio amateurs on the technical side and internet radio stations (who can get a licence for small-scale music streaming here) on the copyright side. You can hear a few pirates on AM today mostly from the Netherlands but a minority from the UK around and just over the top of MW. If there's no more state nor commercial use of AM I think legitimising these hobbyist stations would be a good use of that spectrum which isn't going to be useful for much else given how full of interference it is anyway. It would be nice from a reducing e-waste angle, not to mention the 'living history' aspect of keeping old radios working. Lots of hobbyist interests could converge here. There might even be limited mainstream appeal, weirder things have happened with even cassettes getting a limited revival in some circles.

fredoralive 4y ago
With regards to the BBC Radio 4 Longwave service going away, I really hope that they've told the Royal Navy about it, otherwise we could end up with the lamest cause for a nuclear apocalypse ever.
- knodi123 4y ago
  Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. But I say idiotic bureaucracy.
dylan604 4y ago
>What I'd love to see is the top part of the medium wave band But why? These are only discoverable by people making "small movies Ellie, small moves". It would be much more beneficial to wannabe pirate radio types to just create a channel via internet. You can still be a pirate by not joining Spotify et al, and just have a set of rogue servers that people can connect to pull the stream. The point of pirate radio was to get music to the masses that regular stations wouldn't broadcast. Why? Because that's where the audience was. If there's no audience, why expend the energy? Go to where the audience is.
- ElevenLathe 4y ago
  Why have amateur radio at all, if we could all just chat on Zoom or Discord?
  - dylan604 4y ago
    what? it has nothing to do with zoom or discord or whatever social darling you want to talk about next that has nothing to do with the price of tea in china.
    - Eisenstein 4y ago
      Do you have issues with abstract thinking? I am not trying to insult you, but the way you responded to this comment and mine make me immediately suspect you only conceptualize things in concrete terms. Do you honestly not realize that the person you replied to was referencing that 'why' is a pointless question when the point is non-conformity and not literally asking why people don't just use Zoom or discord?
      - dylan604 4y ago
        because zoom and discord has nothing in line with the experience of the anonymous radio signal being tuned in by anonymous listeners. that's the one true thing that separates a OTA broadcast vs even the pirate streaming radio signal i proposed. once it's networked, logs are every where. sure, the broadcaster can turn off logging blah blah, but that's still not the same as tuning in OTA. social platforms involve invites, permission to join, etc. how that even closely relates is still beyond me and maybe beyond your vaulted abstract thinking skills as well?
        ElevenLathe 4y ago
        This was my point (though apparently I've expressed it in a non-obvious way): even for the the same result (having a voice conversation with someone distant, or listening to some rock music selected by a DJ), the method (a 40 meter ham rag chew instead of a Zoom call, or an AM broadcast band transmission instead of a shoutcast station) matters and colors the experience.
mhh__ 4y ago
The phrase "sell your own grandmother" is often bandied around without real justification but the current generation of Tories in the British government at the moment really would. Regardless of the virtues of preserving culture and tradition, from a "purely" analytical (well, heuristical) perspective: What happens when you sell off, i.e. throw away, one too many things? It's the opposite of Lindy.

fredoralive 4y ago

With regards to the BBC Radio 4 Longwave service going away, I really hope that they've told the Royal Navy about it, otherwise we could end up with the lamest cause for a nuclear apocalypse ever.

knodi123 4y ago
Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. But I say idiotic bureaucracy.

dylan604 4y ago

>What I'd love to see is the top part of the medium wave band But why? These are only discoverable by people making "small movies Ellie, small moves". It would be much more beneficial to wannabe pirate radio types to just create a channel via internet. You can still be a pirate by not joining Spotify et al, and just have a set of rogue servers that people can connect to pull the stream. The point of pirate radio was to get music to the masses that regular stations wouldn't broadcast. Why? Because that's where the audience was. If there's no audience, why expend the energy? Go to where the audience is.

ElevenLathe 4y ago
Why have amateur radio at all, if we could all just chat on Zoom or Discord?
- dylan604 4y ago
  what? it has nothing to do with zoom or discord or whatever social darling you want to talk about next that has nothing to do with the price of tea in china.
  - Eisenstein 4y ago
    Do you have issues with abstract thinking? I am not trying to insult you, but the way you responded to this comment and mine make me immediately suspect you only conceptualize things in concrete terms. Do you honestly not realize that the person you replied to was referencing that 'why' is a pointless question when the point is non-conformity and not literally asking why people don't just use Zoom or discord?
    - dylan604 4y ago
      because zoom and discord has nothing in line with the experience of the anonymous radio signal being tuned in by anonymous listeners. that's the one true thing that separates a OTA broadcast vs even the pirate streaming radio signal i proposed. once it's networked, logs are every where. sure, the broadcaster can turn off logging blah blah, but that's still not the same as tuning in OTA. social platforms involve invites, permission to join, etc. how that even closely relates is still beyond me and maybe beyond your vaulted abstract thinking skills as well?
      - ElevenLathe 4y ago
        This was my point (though apparently I've expressed it in a non-obvious way): even for the the same result (having a voice conversation with someone distant, or listening to some rock music selected by a DJ), the method (a 40 meter ham rag chew instead of a Zoom call, or an AM broadcast band transmission instead of a shoutcast station) matters and colors the experience.

mhh__ 4y ago

The phrase "sell your own grandmother" is often bandied around without real justification but the current generation of Tories in the British government at the moment really would. Regardless of the virtues of preserving culture and tradition, from a "purely" analytical (well, heuristical) perspective: What happens when you sell off, i.e. throw away, one too many things? It's the opposite of Lindy.