"Paul Dwerryhouse" wrote in message
...
David writes:

How do you use this thing if you're a step away from Strip Mall
America..; or out in the middle of Africa, out on a lake or up in the
hills..
- or just taking a walk !

You are totally chained to the nearest low powered repeater..
else the thing is an expensive paperweight

Eventually broadband over mobile phone networks will be cheap enough so
that
listening to internet radio on portable devices will be practical.

Actually, it will be WiMax which seemed to be coming fast till the Sprint
and Clearwire deal fell apart. For the moment, there is neither the range
nor bandwidth needed for every American to listen to the average 17 to 18
hours a week of "radio" that is the norm.

Obviously, this is unlikely to solve the "listening in the middle of
Africa"
problem, but then, let's face it, there isn't much to listen to out there
on a portable radio anyway.

There are towns in Burkina Faso (one example) that don't appear on most
large scale maps that have 7 to 12 FMs, a combination of local and national
services. Except for a couple of very restrictive regimes, there are
actually too many stations to listen to in most places... and all are on FM.