The "Radio Crazy" is baaaaakkk!

Sadly the "Radio Crazy" predicts that AM IBOC will be
a total "bust" going the way of the horse and buggy,
the shaving cup, Quad FM(circa 1973).

You heard it first here!

73,

Meyer Gottesman, W6GIV
aka Moron Gottesman
aka Maven Gottesman
aka The "Radio Crazy"

PS The RC is not THAT crazy! Former CE for AM in NYC.



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"Meyer Gottesman" wrote in message
...
The "Radio Crazy" is baaaaakkk!

Sadly the "Radio Crazy" predicts that AM IBOC will be
a total "bust" going the way of the horse and buggy,
the shaving cup, Quad FM(circa 1973).

You heard it first here!


IBOC blows! It's NAB's answer to satellite radio. IT AINT GOING TO WORK. XM
& Siruis are kicking your ass with local weather and traffic offerings. So
called "FREE" radio is exactly what you get for your money.
For the narrowminded broadcasters I guess Satellite radio is a fad, yes
sportsfans a "Fad"..just like satellite TV,just like cd's and DVD's.Just
like microwave ovens.
CBS/Infinity/Viacom has it's head squarely up it's ass. At least
Clearchannel has the smarts to get involved in satellite delivery, Mel
Karmazin was a complete joke! turning his back on the newest form of
broadcasting,AND forbidding streaming audio from ANY CBS stations.

On 10 Jul 2004 04:09:49 GMT, wrote:

IBOC blows! It's NAB's answer to satellite radio. IT AINT GOING TO WORK. XM
& Siruis are kicking your ass with local weather and traffic offerings. So
called "FREE" radio is exactly what you get for your money.

I always thought "kicking ass" meant you were a leader in a market.
Since both XM and SIRIUS combined have fewer subscribers than most
major market stations have listeners I don't see how "kicking ass"
applies here. Especially since the 2.6 million total subscribers are
spread over more than 200 channels. That would leave 130,000 listeners
per channel if all had equal audiences. The traffic and weather
channels would further reduce the number of listeners because they're
specific to fewer than 25 markets. I believe there's only one market
in all of New England (Boston) that's covered by their traffic
services. The rest of us have no option other than terrestrial radio.

I also doubt a full-time traffic and weather station would be
economically viable even in New York or Los Angeles.

CBS/Infinity/Viacom has it's head squarely up it's ass. At least
Clearchannel has the smarts to get involved in satellite delivery, Mel
Karmazin was a complete joke! turning his back on the newest form of
broadcasting,AND forbidding streaming audio from ANY CBS stations.

Clear Channel has significantly reduced its interest in XM and
Infinity is doing very well without the tiny, unsalable streaming
audience. Local advertisers don't care about coverage in Bombay and
the same products have different names in different countries. It also
makes an advertiser's desire to black out certain markets where
advertised sales are not happening impossible unless the station uses
a commerial insertion service to avoid streaming spots where agencies
haven't paid the talent for use in outside markets or for streaming in
their home market.

I'm sure Mel Karmazin is sobbing uncontrollably knowing you don't
approve of his business strategies. I'm also sure his and Viacom's
bank accounts will show he's been pretty effective.

I think you just like satellite radio and are giving it much more
influence than it really has. Reports of radio's death and the
influence of satellite radio are greatly exaggerated, at least at this
point in time.

I have both XM and SIRIUS. 4 subscriptions total. I live in New
England and have serious (no pun) problems with dropouts because many
roads are covered by overhanging trees and there are no repeaters in
the area. I also lose GPS signals. The other night I was driving in
the country in a torrential downpour. I lost all satellite signals.
Wet leaves are even worse. The radio goes dead silent every 30 seconds
or so, depending on the foliage.

Rich

wrote in message
...

"Meyer Gottesman" wrote in message
...
The "Radio Crazy" is baaaaakkk!

Sadly the "Radio Crazy" predicts that AM IBOC will be
a total "bust" going the way of the horse and buggy,
the shaving cup, Quad FM(circa 1973).

You heard it first here!


IBOC blows!

Actrually, the AM IBOC sounds far better than analog IBOC, even the kind of
analog you could get on an older receiver and pre-NRSC. FM IBOC is a degree
better than analog FM. The real issue is with occupied bandwidth, not the
quality of the audio.

It's NAB's answer to satellite radio. IT AINT GOING TO WORK. XM
& Siruis are kicking your ass with local weather and traffic offerings.

Not really. Arbitron measures Sirius and XM in local markets if it is
mentioned. In LA, it shows up in less than a dozen diaries out of 7,000.

As Rich says, there are 2.300,000 subscribers. Given what we know about
radio usage, less than 10% are going to be listening at any one time, and
that divided among over 100 channels. That means, maybe 200,000 AQH
listeners, or 2,000 per channel at any one time. The #5 station in Traverse
City, Michigan has more listeners.

So
called "FREE" radio is exactly what you get for your money.

Which, is, in fact, its biggest advantage. Couple that with the existence of
about 700,000,000 "free" radios in the US vs. 2 million for XM and you get
an idea.

For the narrowminded broadcasters I guess Satellite radio is a fad, yes
sportsfans a "Fad"..just like satellite TV,just like cd's and DVD's.Just
like microwave ovens.

It is not a fad. It is a niche. A certain percentage will sign up, and it
will be profitable and successful.

CBS/Infinity/Viacom has it's head squarely up it's ass.

Rich answered this. They are ignoring streaming and satellite as one is not
profitable and the other is too niche.

At least
Clearchannel has the smarts to get involved in satellite delivery, Mel
Karmazin was a complete joke!

CLear Channel has, now, less than 2% of XM. And has stopped providing
programming.

turning his back on the newest form of
broadcasting,AND forbidding streaming audio from ANY CBS stations.

It does not make money, and does not create local market listening.

On 11 Jul 2004 15:04:48 GMT, "David Eduardo"
wrote:


Actrually, the AM IBOC sounds far better than analog IBOC, even the kind of
analog you could get on an older receiver and pre-NRSC. FM IBOC is a degree
better than analog FM. The real issue is with occupied bandwidth, not the
quality of the audio.

I'm afraid I have to disagree. The most charitable spin I can put on
AM IBOC is that it sounds bad in a different way than analog AM sounds
bad, and to my ears, the analog is preferable. The damage IBOC does
to the analog signal is serious and quite noticeable on anything but
the very worst-quality receivers, the interference products have the
potential to do great damage to other stations, and IMHO it's a step
backward for the sake of selling equipment.

As for FM IBOC, yes, the digital signal does sound better than a badly
processed analog signal. It is a shade worse than a
properly-processed analog signal. I produce a weekly program for a
public radio station that is delivered as a 320kbps .mp3 file. That's
lower quality than analog or "CD quality," and FM IBOC is worse yet.
I will concede that to the typical non-audiophile listener, the
difference is not noticeable without a direct A-B comparison.

However, there is an adjacent channel interference issue with FM as
well, so the question arises, why are we junking up the band and
reducing everyone's effective coverage area for something that is,
looked at in the most positive possible light, just "not worse" than
what we have? Just to be "digital?" Most listeners think they
already have digital radios, anyway. (They show digits for frequency,
don't they?)

I do not understand this at all, except that a few big corporations
with a lot of lobbying clout stand to profit from it, if it becomes
widely accepted.

Mark Howell

Rich Wood wrote:

I also doubt a full-time traffic and weather station would be
economically viable even in New York or Los Angeles.

There was one in LA about 9-10 years ago: KTRK-1650 or something like
that. (One of Saul Levine's experiments?) Didn't last particularly
long, probably because no-one listened to it all day, they just listened
for their particular area/trip and then tuned to another station
for music, news or whatever....

"Meyer Gottesman" wrote in message
...
The "Radio Crazy" is baaaaakkk!

Sadly the "Radio Crazy" predicts that AM IBOC will be
a total "bust" going the way of the horse and buggy,
the shaving cup, Quad FM(circa 1973).

You heard it first here!

73,

Meyer Gottesman, W6GIV
\

Why? for he same reason? lack of interest?


Quad didn't catch the publics fancy. now if they had marketed it as "home
theater system super surround sound (HTSSSS tm)" and dropped the QS, the
SQ, and the CD-4 labels... why we might still have walls full of 8 tracks
grin

Mark Howell had written:
| On 11 Jul 2004 15:04:48 GMT, "David Eduardo"
| wrote:
|
|
| Actrually, the AM IBOC sounds far better than analog IBOC, even the kind of
| analog you could get on an older receiver and pre-NRSC. FM IBOC is a degree
| better than analog FM. The real issue is with occupied bandwidth, not the
| quality of the audio.
|
| I'm afraid I have to disagree. The most charitable spin I can put on
| AM IBOC is that it sounds bad in a different way than analog AM sounds
| bad, and to my ears, the analog is preferable. The damage IBOC does
| to the analog signal is serious and quite noticeable on anything but
| the very worst-quality receivers, the interference products have the
| potential to do great damage to other stations

Simple question:
If AM IBOC is such hot stuff, why is it restricted to daytime hours only?

I can now hear the damage it does to the analog signal on KCBS. The
effect varies from radio to radio, but on almost all of them, the
noise floor goes up when IBOC is on.

On a synchronous detector, it sounds worse...like a mosquito buzzing
in the background. That's true even in a regional park with no power
lines or people nearby. And, on my AM stereo radios with those detectors,
that's with the stereo decoder OFF.

What's next: analog radios with 2 kHz bandwidth so we don't hear the
buzzing noise placed there to serve receivers that don't exist?!?!?

| However, there is an adjacent channel interference issue with FM as
| well, so the question arises, why are we junking up the band and
| reducing everyone's effective coverage area for something that is,
| looked at in the most positive possible light, just "not worse" than
| what we have? Just to be "digital?"

I suspect this is the back door through which DRM will slip for
broadcast radio.


--
Mark Roberts |"Bush campaign ads boast that 1.5 million jobs were added in the
Oakland, Cal.| last 10 months, as if that were a remarkable achievement. It
NO HTML MAIL | isn't. During the Clinton years, the economy added 236,000 jobs
in an average month." -- Paul Krugman, NY Times, 7-6-2004

In article ,
Mark Roberts wrote:

On a synchronous detector, it sounds worse...like a mosquito buzzing
in the background.

That's because it's in quadrature, which is "invisible" (modulo
transmission artifacts and channel noise) to envelope detectors. Your
sync. detector is only detecting one sideband at a time, so the IBOC
carriers don't cancel out.

(This is why I no longer listen to WBZ much during the daytime.)

None of the engineers I've talked to like the AM system. Some of them
see it as having potential to bring back a long-lost audience, in
spite of its significant flaws. Most of them see it as a pointless
corporate mandate that will waste their engineering budgets, reduce
their coverage areas, and dirty up their audio chains.

People I talk to in *my* business (computing, not broadcasting) are of
the opinion that traditional, reserved-spectrum broadcasting will
cease to exist inside of three decades, for various reasons, social as
well as technological. (That's assuming it isn't already dead -- many
of the people I know, my age and younger, are simply no longer users
of radio at all. It doesn't connect with them in any meaningful way,
nor does it serve their needs.)

-GAWollman

--
Garrett A. Wollman | As the Constitution endures, persons in every
| generation can invoke its principles in their own
Opinions not those of| search for greater freedom.
MIT, LCS, CRS, or NSA| - A. Kennedy, Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. ___ (2003)

Mark Roberts wrote:

If AM IBOC is such hot stuff, why is it restricted to daytime hours only?

Because the group delay that is the result of the uneven ionosphere prevents
it from being decoded properly when the signal is received on skip, and the
amount of stuff coming over the horizon on skip prevents it from being
properly received when it's being received on groundwave at night.

I can now hear the damage it does to the analog signal on KCBS. The
effect varies from radio to radio, but on almost all of them, the
noise floor goes up when IBOC is on.

I wouldn't be bothered by this so much if the digital system actually
sounded good. But the audio quality of the digital carrier is actually
a lot worse than good analogue AM. It's like listening to Cylon Warriors.
--scott


--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."