John Byrns wrote:

Why do those millions of Americans need a nighttime AM service, which is
probably pretty poor anyway, when there is ubiquitous nighttime FM service
available?


Because I am in a typical area I will comment. The local AM stations
spend virtually all their time on sports or if not inane political talk.
The FM stations abound in country music and every variation of rock that
can be found except for the NPR stations which are either classical
music (not objectionable as far as I'm concerned) or jazz.

The intelligent talk comes from former class I-A clear channel stations
via sky wave from other markets. I particularly like Milt Rosenberg on
WGN in Chicago.

I've heard the tests of IBOC. I understand that the military will not
relinquish the 1500 mHz spectrum area that other countries are using for
Eureka, but there will be a lot of high UHF spectrum available with the
DTV conversion. It's been said that the NAB has killed the idea of
Eureka because it would give everyone an equal playing field whether
you are a 250 watt peashooter or a 50kw blowtorch. I'm not exactly sure
of the working of Eureka but possibly an antenna height difference could
be built in to give the present higher power stations an advantage.

Just my humble opinion.

Charlie