"Doug Smith W9WI" wrote in message
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tommyknocker wrote:
Doug Smith W9WI wrote:
understanding, and cooperation. Any program solely intended for and
directed to an audience in the continental United States does not meet
the requirements for this service.

That would make nearly all private SW broadcasts in the US illegal,
since they are clearly for a domestic audience. There are a couple
religious stations which broadcast in Spanish for Latinoamerica but most
private SW in the US is not only in English but deals with topics of
interest to only US listeners.

Do note that the regulation says "...an audience in the continental
United States..." - it says nothing about the citizenship or national
origin of the listeners in foreign countries.

In other words, Americans traveling abroad would be an acceptable target
audience. Certainly with regard to Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean
(the primary places U.S.-based SW stations claim to target) you could
make a case that there are enough Americans visiting the target areas to
justify the programming. In fact, many SW broadcast stations in other
countries DO specify their own nationals travelling abroad as a target
audience.

Of course we'd still know who the REAL target audience is...

I was led to think that the rules dated from the early days of the Cold
War and were designed to avoid "propagandizing" broadcasts.

I've heard that suggested elsewhere. I'm having a hard time believing
they really thought a US-based international pro-Communist station could
have found enough support to get off the ground. (especially with the
massive opposition they would have faced at all levels of American
society at the time)

And I'm having a hard time figuring out why they'd *want* to stop an
anti-Communist station.

Given the political history of the domestic clear channels, I think the
"competition to domestic stations" explanation makes more sense.
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Exactly right on the "competition to domestic stations" point. A look at
the history of the regulation and the arguments for and against it make that
pretty clear. Also, there is the matter of efficient use of the spectrum.
Shortwave is (well "was" now, I guess) valuable primarly, as everybody here
knows, for long distance transmission, and it was felt that the use of the
spectrum by U.S. broadcasters for domestic transmission was a wasteful and
inefficient use of spectrum space compromising efficient international use
of frequencies.


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Don Forsling

"Iowa--Gateway to Those Big Rectangular States"