Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeffhs
I wouldn't be in such a hurry to get rid of your Collins, etc. boat anchors just yet. As I understand it, shortwave in the US isn't going to disappear any time soon; just standard AM broadcasting. Just think of what an outcry there would be from ham radio operators in this country if SW were legislated out of existence, and the ham bands reallocated to other services (the latter has happened on a very small scale here with part of the 220-MHz band, and could eventually happen with six meters as well, but to the best of my knowledge, all nine high-frequency ham bands, and most VHF-UHF bands, are still allocated to the Amateur Radio Service and are still in use). With over 640,000 amateur radio licensees in the US alone, the FCC probably wouldn't hear the end of it (if they reassigned the amateur frequencies, especially HF) for quite some time.
|
I don't think AM broadcasting will die anytime soon and will be with us for a long time to come, unless other factors some into play but that will require me to delve into the current realm of politics. Barring that, AM will be with us. Come to think of it, here in Pittsburgh, we lost both WAMO-AM and WAMO-FM, the only Black owned radio stations that cater mainly to Black listeners. One of our local, Pittsburgh, big-time Black businessmen, Eddie Edwards, recently bought a station to tap the recently abandoned Black market, it is a small, daytime, AMer on 660 kc, WPYT, 1400 watts day, 88 watts night.
AM does have it's main niche, talk, but there are plenty of local and music AMer's out there. I would hold up the headstone on AM radio, remember in places like Canada, it took government pressure to clear the AM band of the CBC but there are plenty of private AMer's in Canada as well.