Don't know if people here are familiar with Google Trends
(www.google.com/trends) but it analyzes search terms by region and
volume. I did one to compare "world band" vs. shortwave:

http://www.google.com/trends?q=short...+%22world+band
%22&ctab=1&geo=all&date=all

And I thought it was interesting that shortwave is used much more
frequently than "world band" and
that the top regions searching (as a ratio of total search volume) for
these terms we

1. Canada
2. United States
3. Ireland
4. New Zealand
5. United Kingdom
6. South Africa
7. Australia
8. Singapore
9. Sweden
10. Malaysia

I thought it was kind of interesting. Also there is a general downward
trend in interest over the past few years.

-Art

On Jan 29, 12:35 pm, wrote:
Don't know if people here are familiar with Google Trends
(www.google.com/trends) but it analyzes search terms by region and
volume. I did one to compare "world band" vs. shortwave:

http://www.google.com/trends?q=short...+%22world+band
%22&ctab=1&geo=all&date=all

And I thought it was interesting that shortwave is used much more
frequently than "world band" and
that the top regions searching (as a ratio of total search volume) for
these terms we

1. Canada
2. United States
3. Ireland
4. New Zealand
5. United Kingdom
6. South Africa
7. Australia
8. Singapore
9. Sweden
10. Malaysia

I thought it was kind of interesting. Also there is a general downward
trend in interest over the past few years.

-Art

That reflects what most of us know - there is less and less to hear on
the HF bands and there are fewer and fewer people tuning in. The
shortage of messages even remotely related to shortwave on
rec.radio.shortwave is yet another indicator of how shortwave radio
has changed.

What is, and has been, needed is fresh blood in the hobby. How many
THOUSAND more hams would there be right NOW if the dumbasses (you know
who you are) that have fought dropping the pathetically obsolete
requirement for Morse hadn't been so short-sighted?

Morse is a wonderful thing. Seriously. I know it to be true. But driving
it down the throats of people that have no interest in it = insane. Like
requiring a 747 pilot to be fully competent with the operation of
Sopwith Camel. Very cool stuff, but how is it related to what they
intend to do?

More hams would have had the effect of drawing more attention to HF.
What ham hasn't introduced family, friends and even strangers to HF
listening in one way or another?

More hams = more "evangelists" for the hobby.

/bitching done for now
//misses the BBC broadcasts to North America
///afraid that all HF as we know it will soon be a thing of the past


Times change

Roadie wrote:

On Jan 29, 12:35 pm, wrote:

That reflects what most of us know - there is less and less to hear on
the HF bands and there are fewer and fewer people tuning in. The
shortage of messages even remotely related to shortwave on
rec.radio.shortwave is yet another indicator of how shortwave radio
has changed.

Helpful hint for the day:
Before responding it helps to read messages you are responding to in
their entirety. Once you have mastered that skill others will be able
to understand why you write the things that you do.



On Jan 29, 8:11 pm, d wrote:
What is, and has been, needed is fresh blood in the hobby. How many
THOUSAND more hams would there be right NOW if the dumbasses (you know
who you are) that have fought dropping the pathetically obsolete
requirement for Morse hadn't been so short-sighted?

Morse is a wonderful thing. Seriously. I know it to be true. But driving
it down the throats of people that have no interest in it = insane. Like
requiring a 747 pilot to be fully competent with the operation of
Sopwith Camel. Very cool stuff, but how is it related to what they
intend to do?

More hams would have had the effect of drawing more attention to HF.
What ham hasn't introduced family, friends and even strangers to HF
listening in one way or another?

More hams = more "evangelists" for the hobby.

/bitching done for now
//misses the BBC broadcasts to North America
///afraid that all HF as we know it will soon be a thing of the past

Times change



Roadie wrote:

On Jan 29, 12:35 pm, wrote:

That reflects what most of us know - there is less and less to hear on
the HF bands and there are fewer and fewer people tuning in. The
shortage of messages even remotely related to shortwave on
rec.radio.shortwave is yet another indicator of how shortwave radio
has changed.- Hide quoted text -- Show quoted text -

d wrote:

What is, and has been, needed is fresh blood in the hobby. How many
THOUSAND more hams would there be right NOW if the dumbasses (you know
who you are) that have fought dropping the pathetically obsolete
requirement for Morse hadn't been so short-sighted?



/bitching done for now
//misses the BBC broadcasts to North America
///afraid that all HF as we know it will soon be a thing of the past


Times change

Roadie wrote:


On Jan 29, 12:35 pm, wrote:

That reflects what most of us know - there is less and less to hear on
the HF bands and there are fewer and fewer people tuning in. The
shortage of messages even remotely related to shortwave on
rec.radio.shortwave is yet another indicator of how shortwave radio
has changed.


As a novice who recently began DX-ing on a Realistic DX-160 and a Radio
Shack DX-398/Sangean ATS-909, I'm sorry to hear that shortwave
broadcasts may not be what they were when I was scanning signals with a
Hallicrafter -38 years ago. Still, it's pretty exciting to dial into a
band with a concentration of stations from around the world.

Regarding the missing BBC broadcasts, I think I'm getting one or two BBC
broadcasts, though I'm not sure where they are broadcasting. Can
anyone tell me when, and at what frequency, I should try to get BBC?
It's interesting that I can get five or six stations quite clearly from
their internet web site, including recordings of recent broadcasts. Also
listened (on my computer) to their live broadcast of the Cambridge
King's College Christmas music.

Jim

d wrote:

What is, and has been, needed is fresh blood in the hobby. How many
THOUSAND more hams would there be right NOW if the dumbasses (you know
who you are) that have fought dropping the pathetically obsolete
requirement for Morse hadn't been so short-sighted?

Short sighted? How many THOUSAND more hams would there be right now if the
dumbasses (you know who you are) would have buckled down and learned a measly
five words per minute?

/pats fool on head

1. The original interesting post, among other things, wrote "Also there
is a general downward trend in interest over the past few years."

2. Then YOU, among other things, wrote "That reflects what most of us
know - there is less and less to hear on the HF bands and there are
fewer and fewer people tuning in."

3. I then commented on what I believe may have been a contributing
factor to the problem.

There. All set? Try to keep up, mmmmkay?



Roadie wrote:
Helpful hint for the day:
Before responding it helps to read messages you are responding to in
their entirety. Once you have mastered that skill others will be able
to understand why you write the things that you do.

I know, and I don't completely disagree, but as I wrote: "Times Change".
What if, way back when, solid state hardware had been dis-allowed? I'd
be happy with it. The ignorant fools that can't even solder would have
been kept out of "my" clubhouse. Life would have been good. But the
hobby would have crashed and burned years ago. Bad.

The failure to adapt to change may have doomed the hobby. It will be
tough, perhaps impossible, to reverse the trend now. : (

We need to get kids interested in radio or the hobby will be gone in a
very few years.


dxAce wrote:

d wrote:

What is, and has been, needed is fresh blood in the hobby. How many
THOUSAND more hams would there be right NOW if the dumbasses (you know
who you are) that have fought dropping the pathetically obsolete
requirement for Morse hadn't been so short-sighted?

Short sighted? How many THOUSAND more hams would there be right now if the
dumbasses (you know who you are) would have buckled down and learned a measly
five words per minute?

Try once again buckwheat. The O.P. was referring to how frequently
the terms world band and shortwave were used and he noted that there
was a downward in in tnterest reflected by those numbers. He was not
talking about morse code.

On Jan 30, 7:04 am, d wrote:
/pats fool on head

1. The original interesting post, among other things, wrote "Also there
is a general downward trend in interest over the past few years."

2. Then YOU, among other things, wrote "That reflects what most of us
know - there is less and less to hear on the HF bands and there are
fewer and fewer people tuning in."

3. I then commented on what I believe may have been a contributing
factor to the problem.

There. All set? Try to keep up, mmmmkay?



Roadie wrote:
Helpful hint for the day:
Before responding it helps to read messages you are responding to in
their entirety. Once you have mastered that skill others will be able
to understand why you write the things that you do.- Hide quoted text -- Show quoted text -

In article ,
JimC wrote:

Regarding the missing BBC broadcasts, I think I'm getting one or two BBC
broadcasts, though I'm not sure where they are broadcasting. Can
anyone tell me when, and at what frequency, I should try to get BBC?
It's interesting that I can get five or six stations quite clearly from
their internet web site, including recordings of recent broadcasts. Also
listened (on my computer) to their live broadcast of the Cambridge
King's College Christmas music.

Go the their web site's home page for the World Service
http://www.bcc.co.uk/worldservice (or something like that).

About half way down the page is the box where you enter in your
city and get the daily or weekly schedule. Next to that is a
link labeled something like "Shortwave Update". This will take
you to a page that will give you the transmissions schedules for
their diffrent regional broadcast tracks.

Here on the West Coast of North America, I get transmissions targeted
to East Asia and SouthEast Asia in the early morning, and morning
(until about 9 AM Seattle time) and then again from (4 PM (0:00 UTC) to
after sundown. (9740, 6195, 5975, 3915 kHz morning, 15285 afternoons).
Then transmissions aimed at North Africa in late morning (12095).
And then West/Central Africa in early afternoon (15400). And there's
an hour in the afternoon with a Caribbean target that I can't remember
off the top of my head.

The different tracks have different schedules, but you can go the
the home page and use the above mentioned box to get a program schedule
for any city in the world.

This time of year, with the sun illuminating to the south, it's pretty
crummy listening in the northern hemisphere, but propagation gets a
lot better during most of the year.

Mark Zenier
Googleproofaddress(account:mzenier provider:eskimo domain:com)