John Smith wrote:

running dog:

That still sounds like I pay a hundred bucks for a 19.99 radio so they
can donate a 1.98 radio to someone in foreign land so they can listen to
American propaganda...

More or less. These things must only cost a few bucks to make in China,
and the SW on the first generation Freeplays was pretty much useless for
North American purposes. Like I said, these radios must be godsends for
poor African farmers living on 50 cents a day, but for Americans, who
have access to cheap batteries and who don't have the stress demands on
these radios that the average African would, a $50 Degen or Tecsun would
be a better choice. The Freeplay Lifelines that the VOA gives out don't
look like they're frequency fixed, but I doubt they're good for much
more than listening to a few major stations (DW and Radio France have
major African operations) and the small, local SW stations operated by
local govt's.

.... frankly, giving the wino on the street a couple of bucks for a
bottle sounds like better use of the money...

Thunderbird is made by Gallo Wines. Buy a bottle of good wine with that
money.


Warmest regards,
John

"running dogg" wrote in message
...
Telamon wrote:

In article ,
(Michael Black) wrote:

running dogg ) writes:
I recieved something that I ordered over the net from C. Crane,
and
was flipping through the catalog they included when I noticed, on
page 25, a Freeplay Lifeline radio. It says that this radio is
made
for humanitarian projects in the third world and is sold to
Americans exclusively by C. Crane. It appears to be a four band
radio, with FM, AM, and two SW bands covering 3.5-10 and 10-18
Mhz.
The ad has a picture of an African boy working in a field while
listening to this radio, but that radio appears to be
different-it
has a red and white dial instead of a blue and white dial. I was
wondering if anybody owns a Freeplay Lifeline and can comment on
it. I assume that the SW bands are good only for regional
reception, so in the US you'd only hear bible thumpers. At $99.95
it's quite expensive, I don't see how they can afford to give
them
away to people in Africa. Page 78 of the catalog shows a Rwandan
girl with a Lifeline, and it IS different-the dial is marked with
the Voice of America logo.

I have no idea, but when the Baygen first came out, much was said
about how it was invented for the African market, and the radios
were
then also sold to Europe and North America at a greater price to
help
fund the African project. It's expensive here, given the
relatively
crummy radio (the real hook is the windup generator) because the
profits are paying for the production of the radios for the
intended
end users, the Africans.

Don't miss the point that even in NA that radio will work without
batteries when the power goes out. It a good emergency radio, which
is
how they are marketed here.

I have a first generation Freeplay S360, one of the ones that used the
actual Bayliss Generator, and I was underwhelmed with its performance.
It requires a LOT of cranking (66 turns of the crank two or three
times)
in order to get 15 or 30 minutes (can't remember exactly) of playing
time, and the reception is crummy-local stations only, although you
can
hear some AM skywave at night. But I suppose that if you lived in the
jungles or bush of Africa and had no access to batteries that it would
be a godsend. Batteries are very expensive in the non Western world,
and
hard to get too-that's why Degen radios come with rechargeable
batteries, even in China batteries are costly and scarce. In Africa
most
people live on less than $1 a day, so paying for batteries is out of
the
question. The C. Crane catalog does mention that for every Freeplay
Lifeline purchased in America the company donates one of the VOA
Lifelines to Africa.


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