We’re not talking “zapping.” We’re talking letting the death happen without ludicrous interventions.
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Saving AM Radio
- Thread starter BruceB
- Start date
Exactly. Use fees from disappearing AM stations amount to a budget rounding error. Even if all AM stations faded out at once, which isn't what we're talking about, the FCC isn't going to feel the loss to any great extent.
The FCC was just in congress asking for more money a few weeks ago:
Her top priority is broadband internet. Not AM radio.
NARBA made minor adjustments in frequency of stations on the higher 3/4 of the dial. It did not move allocations or classes, it just shuffled the cards a bit.
To raise power would require eliminating night skywave protection, reducing daytime protection, and shutting down about 2/3 of all AMs to be able to do that.
It would also require nearly all stations to build improved or changed transmitter sites, something very few AMs will do.
The only partial solution is to make the AM translators permanent and let those linked AMs turn in the AM license. The rest of the AM will linger on until there is no more revenue.
AM can not be saved.
No station needs more than 50 kw to cover their market, and out of market signal are not revenue-producing.
Nobody is buying radios today. They will not buy "digital" radios. And it will take a decade or more for just half of all car radios to have digital.
That shows you that the FCC leadership is more concerned with mobile phones and the like.
All one has to do is look at "the rest of the world" (including our northern and southern neighbors) to see that AM is dead or dying everywhere else.
The upside is giving AMs that want to stay on the air the chance to improve facilities if a huge percentage of AMs move to their translator only
All of us with longer commutes are opposed. I do a weekly drive into the LA area, and at present could not make the round trip and my destination has no chargers and likely will no for man, many years.
I even looked at off-site chargers, and the back-up or "out of service" ratio means my combined 5 hour commute would take an extra additional hour at least and make it a 16 hour day sometimes. No thanks.
Opposition to EVs at their present cost is not just a single party issue. For many, it involves living in areas where long drives are required, living in apartment buildings with no present or near (5-year) plans for charging, working where there are no employee chargers, living in very hot or very cold climates, etc., etc.
As Kelly said, the AM license fees are "a rounding error" in the FCC budget. All AMs could disappear and the savings on staffing requirements would likely cover the lost revenue.
And were an additional band be added for AMs to move to, nobody is going to buy radios to listen. Brazil is trying this, and it is not working well at all (they added what is essentially the former low band TV channels to the FM dial).
That's not an FCC concern. Improving facilities is a licensee issue.
I'm not talking about the consumer issue. This is about adding regulations for EV manufacturers.
I think you can add many city residents, especially those living in rowhouses or townhouses with no garage. It’s not realistic, at least now, to be able to charge your car on many city streets.
Of course they are. That's where the money is. Not AM radio.
As for western Europe: AM is gone from France. Mediumwave is gone altogether; the Allouis longwave station at 162 is still on the air with carrier only because it's the official time standard for France. (Maybe RMC at 216 is still on the air; I did hear it last year when I was over there.) I believe mediumwave is also gone from Germany and Belgium. The Netherlands cleared the
The American solution to problems tends to be to allow the marketplace to take its course, so it may be a while - and there will probably always be at least a few AM stations - but I would not stake my career or investments on AM's being around.
Edit: Fixed very obvious typo, which I retained with a strikeout.
AM radio doesn't need saving. There are far better technologies available today than 100 years ago when it was invented. If an AM broadcaster is producing content worth hearing, they can move it over to an app as Big A recently suggested in the NYC thread..
Treat it like CB: walk away, let it become the wild west. Let anyone who can fire up a transmitter do what they will.
However apps are unregulated, so its unlikely the FCC will promote it.
Once again, not in the interest of the FCC to just "walk away" from its legal obligations. The law would have to be amended.
Denmark has a few AM's, ive heard one of their SW counterparts
The low pwoer am's not being a rousing success is a bit of a misnomer.... theyre mroe hobby stations then commercial ad selling entitites
Sunset the band. There are like... maybe 6(?) stations worth saving. Most are FM simulcasting anyway:
- WBBM 780 — now at 105.9
- WINS 1010 — now at 92.3
- WSB 750 — now at 95.5
- KNX 1070 — now at 97.1
- KYW 1060 — now at 103.9
- KFI 640... who market the crap out of the iHeartRadio app (and could steal 98.7)
AM is dead. Bury it and move on.
None of what you suggest is in the best interest of the public, nor the FCC. The MW/AM band is useless for anything other than broadcasting AM stations, so it's not like the UHF band where 6Mhz chunks of spectrum can be auctioned for revenue. May as well let time run it's course without government intervention.