In article ,
tommyknocker wrote:

I was just thinking about this today. Has anybody noticed that shortwave
radio has really declined over the past five years or so? We've lost BBC
and Deutsche Welle transmissions to North America, we've lost several
smaller European broadcasters entirely, other stations have drastically
cut back. Are transmitting facilities really going on the blink so soon
after the end of the cold war? Or has everybody jumped on the BBC's
bandwagon and concluded that satellite and internet broadcasting has
replaced shortwave? Any thoughts?

Well, BBC is still available on 5975. I'm listening to it right now,
20 over 9 here.

But yes, satellite and internet are going to replace shortwave. It's
inevitable. BBC is available on many cable TV systems already.
Noisy, static filled, fading, garbled shortwave is about as interesting
to today's digital satellite TV watching, MP3 player toting, cable modem
equipped PC "digital consumer" as smoke signals were to us 40 years ago.
I myself sometimes stream BBC over my cable modem. It's the only way I
listen to Australia.

It may seem a sad state of affairs to us, but the day is surely coming
when all you will hear on a shortwave radio is static.

Dan

Drake R8, Radio Shack DX-440,
Grundig Satellit 650, Satellit 700, YB400
Tecsun PL-230 (YB550PE), Kaito KA1102
Hallicraters S-120 (1962)
Zenith black dial 5 tube Tombstone (1937)
E. H. Scott 23 tube Imperial Allwave in Tasman cabinet (1936)