Media Diversity?
The Federal Communications Commission just shut down another unlicensed radio station, this time in Brattleboro, Vermont.
If all those senators up in arms about the FCC's revised ownership rules are really serious about media diversity, they'll change the law to let stations like this exist. Re: your breath: don't hold it.
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They also just started a national do-not-call registry. This is an affront to free speech and the constitution. Citizens, this is totally unamerican and intolerable. Stand up for your rights and fight!
Yeah, my radio reception is way too clear. When I’m listening to a block of The Smiths, what I really want is to be interrupted by some idiot railing against what the queers are doing to our soil.
When I’m listening to the Smiths, any interruption is welcome. But that’s beside the point: There’s plenty of room for more radio stations on the dial without increasing reception interference.
Maybe so, Jesse, but without somebody with au-thor-i-tie minding the store, who’s to stop someone from using an “occupied” frequency?
The classic libertarian answer is that substantial interference should be treated as trespass and prohibited, which is substantially different from saying that one must receive a license from a federal bureaucracy before proceeding to transmit.
Of course, this leaves a number of legitimate questions open, such as how far a signal should be able to propagate before interference is allowed. And there’s a large literature dealing with those issues. But you can answer them in a number of different ways within the same basic framework of permitting unlicensed broadcasts on unused frequencies and treating interference as a tort.
Yesterday, Bill Gates learned the hard way that the Secret Service is serious when it comes to checking ID’s at the White House. The Microsoft billionaire pulled up at the White House for a meeting with Homeland Security’s Tom Ridge. But when they asked him to show some ID, Gates said he had left it in his car …
Stay tuned …
http://www.drudgereport.com/flash.htm
joe, I have read elsewhere that two stations could theoretically broadcast on the same frequency without interfering with one another, if only one had a radio “smart” enough to separate the two signals. I don’t know whether this is true or not, though. I hope that Jesse will enlighten us.
That’s something different, Jim. They wouldn’t simply be broadcasting on the same frequency. They would, to put it really simplistically, be transmitting across a whole bunch of frequencies, dodging the other signals, and getting put together again on the other end by a smart radio.
Here’s an article that does a much better job of explaining the idea than I just did:
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2003/03/12/spectrum/
Well if you’re listening to a block of the Smiths the queers must have had some effect…
Regarding interference: Here in the South SF Bay, and Monterey Bay areas, the FM frequency 89.3 MHz is pretty crowded. On my 36 mile commute to work, I can hear three separate stations on that channel: a community radio station translator in Santa Cruz; a college Top 40 station in Fremont; and an eclectic high school radio station in San Jose. There is a brief stretch of Highway 85 where the latter two stations’ signals battle each other for supremacy, but overall, everybody seems happy with the coverage they get. Although I sometimes lose one or the other of the signals sooner than I’d like, I must also confess a general appreciation for the programming diversity. I’m sure the residents of the respective communities appreciate having their own homegrown radio stations a lot more than they would Yet Another Clear Channel Outlet (aka, “YACCO”).
The spectrum can accommodate quite a few additional players, and it is criminal that the FCC will practically mandate the consolidation and concentration of federally blessed monopoly ownership on one hand, while crushing true, community oriented diversity with the other.
FCC delenda est.
Thousands Sign Up for Anti-Telemarketing List
WASHINGTON — Thousands of Americans signed up Friday on a “do not call list” that will prevent telemarketers from bothering them at home. (Yeah, right.)
Eager Americans rushed to place their home phone numbers on the FTC’s list, shortly after President Bush launched the measure in a White House ceremony. (Idiots!)
By noon the list had grown to 370,000 and the Web site was receiving 1,000 hits per second. Bush said, the do-not-call list should now help Americans enjoy their private time without unwanted interruptions. (Fat chance.)
Jim, it is possible to transmit multiple signals with the same frequency- time division multiplexing.
http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci214174,00.html
But it does require digital signals, expensive equipment, and major coordination- not something I’d expect to come from competing radio stations. But it is conceivable that a single company could offer multiple signals on a single frequency. Just in case there aren’t enough clearchannel stations in your area.
Could we possibly refrain from using the term “queers”? I find that pretty damn offensive since it plays no context in this conversation. There’s no need for name-calling with people you don’t know. Try to use the vocabulary I hope you’ve gained over the years of your existence. For the record: No I’m not gay, and no, I’m not a teacher. I’m an 18 year old high school senior. Keep it relatively clean, people.
EMAIL: draime2000@yahoo.com
IP: 62.213.67.122
URL: http://www.enlargement-for-penis.com
DATE: 01/26/2004 08:19:56
A coward mistakes oppression for peace.