Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio • Hacker News Board

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#21

Post by douche » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 5:20 AM UTC

As a US citizen, I cannot imagine a world without FM radio. It's almost the only option for in-vehicle audio. I've heard of such a thing as AM radio, but outside of billboards stating that accident information on interstate highways is available via that frequency, I have no connection to it. I've heard pray-tell that NPR broadcasts on such frequencies as well, but I can neither confirm nor deny that.

I suspect that Clearchannel and the other one that have effectively bought up monopoly rights to the FM spectrum would fight this tooth and nail.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#22

Post by brian-armstrong » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 5:34 AM UTC

If you're going to take FM radio and slice into a bunch of digital channels, it'd be interesting to make one or two citizens' bands. I know CB is kind of a mess but I like the idea that the music radio in your car could receive and perhaps even transmit on the local band.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#23

Post by timonoko » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 5:53 AM UTC

FM radio in Norway sucked so much because of mountains. Every fjord had its own tiny repeater, but only if there was at least one inhabitant, otherwise you heard nothing. The cell-phone digital network is much more advanced, the antennas are on mountain tops and there is always coverage within few hundred meters.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#24

Post by ptaipale » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 5:54 AM UTC

What do we do with more channels that we can't listen? If you really need a little bit of bandwidth around 100 MHz for other use, you could cut the spectrum from FM radio and still keep it running.

The place where I usually listen to radio is the car. Car radios don't have DAB receivers. They all have FM receivers. And these days most cars have radio units that are integrated to the car electronics, steering wheel controls etc - so it's not that easy to just get a new radio that fits the hole.

If I get rid of FM radio, I will not replace it with DAB. I'll listen to some streaming service over IP.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#25

Post by martinald » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 5:56 AM UTC

ptaipale wrote: post #24

What do we do with more channels that we can't listen? If you really need a little bit of bandwidth around 100 MHz for other use, you could cut the spectrum from FM radio and still keep it running. The place where I usually listen to radio is the car. Car radios don't have DAB receivers. They all have FM receivers. And these days most cars have radio units that are integrated to the car electronics, steering wheel co…

Most newish cars in the UK come with DAB as standard now.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#26

Post by snom380 » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 5:56 AM UTC

There's a huge marketing / awareness campaign going on right now in Norway to get people to upgrade their FM radios.

I wonder if the radio stations will realize too late that they're throwing away their one advantage (ubiquity) and maybe the option some people will choose when the car radio stops working is to not listen to radio at all.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#27

Post by acchow » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 5:58 AM UTC

jjoonathan wrote: post #11

userbinator wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet FM still can't beat AM for simplicity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crystal_radio

It's even easier to demodulate at high power :D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHSuInSkHtA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82s5Q3GIO9I

I have no idea how this works.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#28

Post by a1studmuffin » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 5:58 AM UTC

Don't most smartphones have emergency broadcasts built-in these days? Who doesn't have their phone on them when they're driving in a car?

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#29

Post by an_account » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 6:01 AM UTC

douche wrote: post #21

As a US citizen, I cannot imagine a world without FM radio. It's almost the only option for in-vehicle audio. I've heard of such a thing as AM radio, but outside of billboards stating that accident information on interstate highways is available via that frequency, I have no connection to it. I've heard pray-tell that NPR broadcasts on such frequencies as well, but I can neither confirm nor deny that. I suspect that…

AM is a great place to listen to NPR, and tons of talk shows + sports are on AM.

And FM being the only option for in car audio? That's crazy. There's cell data and predownloaded music, podcast and audiobooks.

Though I agree that tons of people would fight this change in America.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#30

Post by jtl999 » Fri, Jan 06, 2017, 6:01 AM UTC

rtpg wrote: post #16

frozenport wrote: post #15

The NPR One radio app costs me an extra $20 dollars a month due to high data usage. And NPR gets none of that cash. If my phone had user facing FM tuning I could probably contribute directly to content creators. I wonder if shutting down FM and replacing it with much more expensive mobile data is a conspiracy by cellular carriers?

Are you sure your phone doesn't have an FM radio? A lot of phones have it built-in (just need to have headphones plugged in for the antenna), but don't advertise it much.

People don't even reverse engineer baseband/FM radio chips in phones under the mentality that "it cannot be done." and other stigmas such as NDA's. Sickens me to no end.