5 ms·

Yeah to me, it seems like FM radio + internet audio over cellular is a great mix of choices, and "digital radio" is pointless. If you want to do digital radio,

Yeah to me, it seems like FM radio + internet audio over cellular is a great mix of choices, and "digital radio" is pointless. If you want to do digital radio, make a carplay/android app.

TylerE 2y ago
Digital radio allows for far more efficient use of spectrum than FM
- randomdata 2y ago
  Imagine: Instead of three radio stations all playing the same song, you could have 100 stations all playing the same song!
  - crote 2y ago
    Or perhaps they could play different songs! In my country DAB has station dedicated to playing classical music, jazz, youth-oriented pop music, current affairs, religion, rock music - not to mention dozens of local radio stations! FM allows for only a very limited number of stations, which means it ends up in a bidding war between the large commercial stations - who in turn have to play fairly generic music to attract a large number of listeners. With DAB there's plenty of space left over for niche stations, as they can transmit essentially for free.
    - randomdata 2y ago
      Once you get beyond the cities, there is still plenty of open FM spectrum. Getting a frequency isn't the real hurdle. Human effort and licensing are the much greater challenges. Especially licensing. Even on commercial radio you can regularly catch them playing "10 second" clips of different songs, to stay within fair use, that they wish to play but cannot legally do so. The college stations are more brazen about it and will flat out tell you that they can't play different jobs for legal reasons. Indeed, commercial radio does have to appeal to an audience, but that audience would unquestionably enjoy other music – at least within the same genre. But playing it for them opens up a huge legal minefield. It is a lot easier to pick a small catalog that you can properly audit and disallow anything beyond that.
- bayindirh 2y ago
  Using the spectrum more efficiently doesn’t make a system automatically better. I don’t think Switzerland is crowded enough to have 10x more radio stations sustainably.
  - TylerE 2y ago
    It's not to have more radio stations, it's to have more bandwidth to allocate to things that AREN'T commercial radio.
    - martinald 2y ago
      Genuinely interested - what is using the FM frequency instead?
      - TylerE 2y ago
        Well, nothing right now because it's still allocated for FM.
        georgeplusplus 2y ago
        I believe he was saying what else could that portion of the spectrum be used for, if not for FM radio?
        martinald 2y ago
        Correct. I don't see a huge amount of use for ~20MHz (probably less) of very long range spectrum. Potentially for smart meters and other IOT stuff, but current cellular networks deal with that pretty well (and there are other alternatives available). Plus I don't know much equipment that could use it at least out of the box so it is going to be fairly custom and very expensive.
        TylerE 2y ago
        It’s valuable precisely because it’s relatively low frequency, which means it works for things that need to punch through buildings.
- asdefghyk 2y ago
  apparently, digital radio has less range than FM
  - TylerE 2y ago
    You get a lot of that back because you can have all the repeaters for a given station on The same frequency.
    - wkat4242 2y ago
      You can do the same on FM with transmitter synchronisation. It's used a lot for analog amateur repeaters too. It's pretty easy to do with modern tech.
- JohnFen 2y ago
  Same with digital TV, but digital TV also brought a significantly worse viewing experience, at least in my area.
  - vel0city 2y ago
    Digital TV brought massively better viewing experience in every area I've lived in.
    - JohnFen 2y ago
      I've heard others say similar things. Apparently, how good or bad it was depends a great deal on where you are. Around here, following the digital switchover, most people could no longer receive all stations, but which ones depended on exactly where they were. And those that can be received are of exceedingly low quality. Very heavily compressed and relatively low resolution. But each station now provides multiple streams. On the positive side, that did help me finally stop watching TV entirely!
ale42 2y ago
> If you want to do digital radio, make a carplay/android app. Rather a streaming service with an open protocol, and then users use whatever they want to listen. Fine if there's also an app for those who want, but I don't want to install an app to listen to a specific audio stream. I have VLC and it's enough. The other problem is people without cellular data and/or cellular phone, and those with limited data plans. But if most radio stations stay also on FM, that's basically a non-issue.
- pdntspa 2y ago
  > Fine if there's also an app for those who want, but I don't want to install an app to listen to a specific audio stream. I have VLC and it's enough. "But muh branding!!!" - Every marketer and UX designer everywhere

Yeah to me, it seems like FM radio + internet audio over cellular is a great mix of choices, and "digital radio" is pointless. If you want to do digital radio, make a carplay/android app.

TylerE 2y ago

Digital radio allows for far more efficient use of spectrum than FM

randomdata 2y ago
Imagine: Instead of three radio stations all playing the same song, you could have 100 stations all playing the same song!
- crote 2y ago
  Or perhaps they could play different songs! In my country DAB has station dedicated to playing classical music, jazz, youth-oriented pop music, current affairs, religion, rock music - not to mention dozens of local radio stations! FM allows for only a very limited number of stations, which means it ends up in a bidding war between the large commercial stations - who in turn have to play fairly generic music to attract a large number of listeners. With DAB there's plenty of space left over for niche stations, as they can transmit essentially for free.
  - randomdata 2y ago
    Once you get beyond the cities, there is still plenty of open FM spectrum. Getting a frequency isn't the real hurdle. Human effort and licensing are the much greater challenges. Especially licensing. Even on commercial radio you can regularly catch them playing "10 second" clips of different songs, to stay within fair use, that they wish to play but cannot legally do so. The college stations are more brazen about it and will flat out tell you that they can't play different jobs for legal reasons. Indeed, commercial radio does have to appeal to an audience, but that audience would unquestionably enjoy other music – at least within the same genre. But playing it for them opens up a huge legal minefield. It is a lot easier to pick a small catalog that you can properly audit and disallow anything beyond that.
bayindirh 2y ago
Using the spectrum more efficiently doesn’t make a system automatically better. I don’t think Switzerland is crowded enough to have 10x more radio stations sustainably.
- TylerE 2y ago
  It's not to have more radio stations, it's to have more bandwidth to allocate to things that AREN'T commercial radio.
  - martinald 2y ago
    Genuinely interested - what is using the FM frequency instead?
    - TylerE 2y ago
      Well, nothing right now because it's still allocated for FM.
      - georgeplusplus 2y ago
        I believe he was saying what else could that portion of the spectrum be used for, if not for FM radio?
        martinald 2y ago
        Correct. I don't see a huge amount of use for ~20MHz (probably less) of very long range spectrum. Potentially for smart meters and other IOT stuff, but current cellular networks deal with that pretty well (and there are other alternatives available). Plus I don't know much equipment that could use it at least out of the box so it is going to be fairly custom and very expensive.
        TylerE 2y ago
        It’s valuable precisely because it’s relatively low frequency, which means it works for things that need to punch through buildings.
asdefghyk 2y ago
apparently, digital radio has less range than FM
- TylerE 2y ago
  You get a lot of that back because you can have all the repeaters for a given station on The same frequency.
  - wkat4242 2y ago
    You can do the same on FM with transmitter synchronisation. It's used a lot for analog amateur repeaters too. It's pretty easy to do with modern tech.
JohnFen 2y ago
Same with digital TV, but digital TV also brought a significantly worse viewing experience, at least in my area.
- vel0city 2y ago
  Digital TV brought massively better viewing experience in every area I've lived in.
  - JohnFen 2y ago
    I've heard others say similar things. Apparently, how good or bad it was depends a great deal on where you are. Around here, following the digital switchover, most people could no longer receive all stations, but which ones depended on exactly where they were. And those that can be received are of exceedingly low quality. Very heavily compressed and relatively low resolution. But each station now provides multiple streams. On the positive side, that did help me finally stop watching TV entirely!

ale42 2y ago

> If you want to do digital radio, make a carplay/android app. Rather a streaming service with an open protocol, and then users use whatever they want to listen. Fine if there's also an app for those who want, but I don't want to install an app to listen to a specific audio stream. I have VLC and it's enough. The other problem is people without cellular data and/or cellular phone, and those with limited data plans. But if most radio stations stay also on FM, that's basically a non-issue.

pdntspa 2y ago
> Fine if there's also an app for those who want, but I don't want to install an app to listen to a specific audio stream. I have VLC and it's enough. "But muh branding!!!" - Every marketer and UX designer everywhere