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Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

wired.com

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Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#271

Post by nibs »

kuschku wrote: post #227
danjc wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. You don't realize how invasive radio and TV advertising is until you don't have it.

To be honest, I haven't heard a radio ad or seen a TV ad in almost 4 years. And I use radio daily, and watch some TV every now and then. But I only listen to N-Joy (part of the German public broadcaster NDR). Seriously, foundation-funded and tax-funded media are probably the best at the moment, considering how ad-ridden and biased the private media are becoming.

The only ads I see now are billboards, which leads to weird distortions in what products, cars, TV Shows, etc. I am aware of.

Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#272

Post by sosuke »

Frondo wrote: post #40
WalterBright wrote: post #19

I just bought an internet radio for my stereo (yes, I'm that old, I have a stereo). I was surprised to discover it also had a wire in the box that turned out to be an FM antenna. I thought with internet radio, who needs an FM tuner? (all the local stations have streaming URLs) Turns out I actually like it. It's handy when the internet fails, or when you're nearing data caps, or just want to run it all day without int…

It's funny, I really like listening to a number of local stations for the variety of music I get introduced to; but somehow, the fact that there is a real person curating it makes me enjoy it. Listening to spotify, it doesn't do it for me. Something about having someone come on, make a little human conversation, that's part of the experience for me. Algorithms don't cut it.

I do have a had time making my own playlists and the auto generated ones always seem to miss the mark. Going off to Google playlists now maybe someone else has already made the right ones. KIBM Watson radio DJ might be interesting.

Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#273

Post by dsfyu404ed »

hx87 wrote: post #248
91bananas wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's from commuting here in the US. A lot of people commuting here in Southern California are older driving junk cars with no features. But they always have FM radio.

"Older junk cars" almost always have a single- or double-DIN form for their radios, and aftermarket radios are available for ~$50, so it's not like they can't get other forms of audio.

Even if you only have to buy a plug-n-play harness and insert a coat hanger into a hole to get the old radio out DIYing something like that scares most people and a $50 radio install will probably cost $50 or more before the200% markup on the adapter harness the shop bought on Amazon for $5-$15. Just figuring out how to use typical automotive connectors is a major task for someone who's never done it.

It's a low priority for most people, costs more than you'd think if you don't DIY. OEM radios tend to have pretty good ergonomics anyway.

Most early 2000s and older stuff has a cassette deck anyway so a $3 adapter lets you plug in your phone.

Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#274

Post by arprocter »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #4
siddboots wrote: post #2

What's going on with Wired? This page has an autoplay video ad below the article text and an anti-AdBlock full-screen subscription nagger that pops up a few seconds after page load.

Part of their war on adblockers. In the past the adblocker nag has popped after you scroll down, well an autoplay video will get you scrolling to find out where it is and blam they pop the adblocker. Of course none of that happens if you hit 'reader view' in Firefox, nice easy to read article. Its one of the reasons I've stopped reading Fortune and Wired web articles.

Although once the 'blocker' nag pops up reader view gives a cannot load message

Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#275

Post by VLM »

hx87 wrote: post #248
91bananas wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's from commuting here in the US. A lot of people commuting here in Southern California are older driving junk cars with no features. But they always have FM radio.

"Older junk cars" almost always have a single- or double-DIN form for their radios, and aftermarket radios are available for ~$50, so it's not like they can't get other forms of audio.

A call center rents space where I work, by definition knowing their rate of pay, they're all poor. Their cars might have unrepaired crash damage, or mufflers held on my baling wire, but they have nice rims and nicer car stereos than my own.

Its a cheap extra luxury at the poor person level. Much like very expensive tennis shoes are a thing in their culture.

Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#276

Post by brookside »

orbitur wrote: post #259
rplst8 wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I suppose long term FM is dead, but meanwhile it has its uses. If true, this is really unfortunate. I've written about this before, but FM is a really great technology, and in a lot of ways it's only suffering because of the content. The sound quality of digital "equivalents" (XM Radio, HD Radio, Internet Radio, etc.) doesn't even come close to a clear FM station. Not to mention there are millions of vintage radios…

As an aside, I got a free SiriusXM trial with my new car, and the sound quality is terrible compared to FM. I was honestly reminded of the MP3s I got from Kazaa and burned to a CD in 2003, you can hear the aggressive compression.

I have knowledge of the bitrate at which Sirius transmits, and while it varies by station, 32/kbs is (or was) typical.

Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#277

Post by mason240 »

WalterBright wrote: post #19

I just bought an internet radio for my stereo (yes, I'm that old, I have a stereo). I was surprised to discover it also had a wire in the box that turned out to be an FM antenna. I thought with internet radio, who needs an FM tuner? (all the local stations have streaming URLs) Turns out I actually like it. It's handy when the internet fails, or when you're nearing data caps, or just want to run it all day without int…

FM radio is the only reliable way to listen to broadcasts of local sports.

Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#278

Post by mikeash »

pjc50 wrote: post #94
abalone wrote: post #64

Apple isn't activating it because it "might undermine Beats One"? Oh give me a break. You can stream just about any FM station you want with apps like TuneIn Radio.

If Apple didn't want you to have an FM radio, they wouldn't put it on the phone. It's the _carriers_ that oppose it.

If Apple wanted you to have an FM radio, they would enable it. Maybe not on all carriers, but iPhone is available on a bazillion carriers worldwide, and surely they don't all want to disable FM radio. And even if they did, Apple sells unlocked, carrier-neutral phones too.

Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#279

Post by mikeash »

DigitalJack wrote: post #250
lostlogin wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks, now this says something that squares with what I would expect it to mean. Strange how dropping that very key word leaves the same meaning. Still, English has many strange quirks.

It's super annoying but it has to do with misunderstandings and mispronunciations finding their way into common language. Another terrible one is "I could care less" vs "I couldn't care less." Both mean the same thing in the common language, but if I hear someone say the "could" version, they lose a lot of respect in my eyes. Languages evolve, and mostly it irritates me. I hate that the English Dictionaries used to b…

Are you also irritated by all the changes that happened before you were born, or is it just the new ones that bug you?

Dictionaries as an authoritative source really just means that they reflect older common usage. It just makes them slow, not somehow better.

Re: Your Phone Has an FM Chip. So Why Can’t You Listen to the Radio?

#280

Post by tingol »

simonh wrote: post #134
blowski wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firstly, why is the choice between no function or a crappy function? Why would every FM radio app necessarily be crappy? Secondly, why would it be useless when millions of people still listen to FM radio? In the UK for example, according to RAJAR (the UK radio body) 56% of radio listeners use FM compared to DAB or internet, which is around 26 million people. Thirdly, why does the hardware have an FM receiver at all i…

> Thirdly, why does the hardware have an FM receiver at all if I can't use it? It doesn't. One of the support chips happens to have an FM transceiver along with the ones the phone uses, but it would also need an antenna and an amplifier to be able to receive FM radio. And a bigger battery and a bigger case (or less battery life). And more software. And more product QA and support.

Headphones can act as an antenna and work without a problem, battery usage is negligible. I've had FM radio in all phones I've ever owned in Europe (high or low end, smart or feature) and finding out you can't do this in the US seems ridiculous.
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