Steve wrote:

"Mike Terry" wrote in message
...
"Lance Storm" wrote in message
news:0sLld.96248$R05.40249@attbi_s53...

What will become of the shorwave bands?


Lance,

Its sad but it does allow weaker power dx stations to be heard on sw. The
internet is fast taking over from sw radio. That's progress I suppose...

Mike

Good point...it does allow weaker stations to be heard, which is a
good thing.

Broadcasters will come and go, whether they broadcast over shortwave
or any other medium. I for one see no grounds for pessimism here.

Sometimes I have the sense that when people talk about the "future of
shortwave", what they really mean is the future of whatever large
broadcast stations they listen to on a regular basis--not the future
of the shortwave bands themselves. I see some reasons to be
pessimistic about (some of) the former (depending on their goals and
program content). I see no reason to be pessimistic about the latter.

Steve

I'll tell everybody what I honestly see happening to shortwave. There
will be 4-5 Big Boys, major stations that broadcast in every major
language and can be heard almost anywhere, like Radio China and Radio
Netherlands. Then there will be a zillion Little Guys, small regional
stations that broadcast only to a relatively local audience and almost
none of which will be in English-but in local languages and dialects.
This will mean the death of QSLing, since Big Boys will have paid
monitors and Little Guys won't have the money or language skills to
answer their reception reports. But if you're not a QSL hog, it will
mean wonderful opportunities for DX, since a lot of the blowtorch
stations that characterized the Cold War will be gone or on the air
under different names and reduced power (think Radio Kiev, which is now
Ukraine Radio International and is hard to hear, or Radio Tirana, which
used to be infamous for its bizarre rants but is now almost inaudible)
opening up opportunities to hear signals that during the Cold War were
blanked by the blowtorches. I've never sent for a QSL in my life, so I'm
not concerned about reception reports, but I'll be listening for the
small Sam Neua station in Laos that Passport talked about in the 2005
edition as long as their transmitter doesn't burn the station down. Most
of the world's population can't afford internet access or satellite
radio and will not be able to in the foreseeable future. A lot of those
people live outside the range of existing AM and FM stations. So
shortwave radio will be around for a while, just not in the form that it
was during the Cold War.



----== Posted via Newsfeeds.Com - Unlimited-Uncensored-Secure Usenet News==----
http://www.newsfeeds.com The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! 100,000 Newsgroups
---= East/West-Coast Server Farms - Total Privacy via Encryption =---