NPR Finds XM's Achilles Heel 330
PreacherTom writes "In the ongoing radio wars, one only has to listen to 20 seconds of Howard Stern's language to know that the lack of regulation gives satellite radio a distinct advantage. Of all the challengers, it seems that NPR has finally found a weakness in XM, which supplements its satellite coverage with earth-bound transmitters. A recent test found that 19 of these transmitters were unlicensed and another 221 exceeded their authorized power level, giving NPR an opening to press with an apparently sympathetic FCC. It certainly doesn't help that XM's own filings support their case."
If the signal is encrypted, so what? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Think of the children (Score:3, Insightful)
Government assistance only makes up a portion of NPR's funds. The rest comes from the support of its listeners and its advertisers. NPR spends that money investigating the news. That's what this is.
Re:A war over antiquated technology? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:A war over antiquated technology? (Score:3, Insightful)
The FCC wasn't always that way, but in the last >3 decades it has completely abdicated responsibility for ensuring both access to the airwaves and breadth/diversity in programming.
My biggest point of disagreement is the assertion that radio is dead. Commercial radio has been effectively dead for years, i wish someone would finally pull the plug.But as someone who lives in a city with one of the oldest community-based FM stations in the country (KBOO in Portland, Oregon, second only to WBAI in NY and KPFA in SF), i'm convinced that community-based and community-oriented programming can make all the difference in a locale's sense of cohesion and identity, especially for groups underrepresented and underserved by Big Broadcast Corps (aka ClearChannel, merchant of blandness). Local news covered by local folks (unlike the local daily paper, which is owned by Gannett), and a full spectrum of music programming done by amateurs in the best sense of the word - lovers of the music. Can't beat it. Public-access cable fills a similar role, but has narrower reach.
iPod-toting techsters are still in a minority - a lot of people still listen to broadcast radio.
Re:YRO??!!! (Score:3, Insightful)
1. The FCC is involved. This is an agency that has some questionable pracitices and policies. Its primary purpose is to regulate the airwaves on the interest and behalf of the public. In this case the FCC can make or break a decision to give the public more choice in how it recieves its news and entertainment. This is a matter of your money (if you buy ANYTHING from the US or anything carring an FCC cert you have in some way paid taxes some of which went to the FCC) being used to control your airwaves and your choice for content delivered on those frequencies.
2. Current media oligolopy. The traditional broadcasters (ie ClearChannel) are trying to maintain their hold over the radio market. I expect this kind of behavior from such agencies but NPR, though a private organization, has traditionally worked hard for the public. I suspect that NPR is invovled here because NPR isn't being broadcast on XM/Sirius because they can't pay or won't make enough revenue for the satellite providers. I personally find that not broadcasting public radio/tv is socially irresponsible, but it is well within their rights as a private corporation.
3. NPR has an important role to play here. NPR is the friendly bully for all public interest and community radio. A lot of community/low power radio efforts can be assisted by the rules and regs that help the bigger public broadcasters like NPR and PBS. The social climate in the US is not currently favorable for public broadcasting. I would hope that in the long run people and corporations will realize that this is important and use their voices and dollars to support it. We need to put some other pressure on media rebroadcasters (cable compaines, satellite radio companies, regular broadcasters) to continue to push public interest programs and support the little guy, not because the law says they do, but because its what they ought to do.
Re:A war over antiquated technology? (Score:3, Insightful)
I can hear content that nobody else wants to carry because the audience is too small. I travel a lot by car, and enjoy listening to local radio stations because they are the only evidence left that not all of the US sounds like New York or California. I once listened to a Navajo radio station while on a long trip. Can I get that on XM? Right.
Radio is still the great equalizer because it is relatively inexpensive to broadcast and the listening devices can be as cheap as a couple of bucks or as expensive as thousands of dollars.
Yes, it may be eventually supplanted by newer technologies, but it is far from antiquated.
Re:Shills.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:A war over antiquated technology? (Score:3, Insightful)
People who don't give a shit, those who are just assholes, and people who have no clue. The world is full of all three. I frequently run into people broadcasting over the station I like listening to at the upper end of the spectrum at stoplights on the way to work (maybe all the same person, my schedule is pretty regular), perhaps they had a device that let them pick any frequency so they set it to the one that they usually listen to just to save them the effort of pressing an extra button. Maybe they don't know that the guy in the next car over is trying to listen to the traffic report and can't get it because of them, maybe they do and they don't care, or maybe they picked the frequency for the fun of fucking things up for everyone else.
Need a designated low-power frequency. (Score:3, Insightful)
We need to take a single, or maybe a handful, of FM frequencies (probably at the low end of the band) and designate them for low-power portable operations -- usable only by transmitters below 200mW (or whatever the cutoff is for unlicensed FM transmitters now).
That would simplify people's lives who use portable audio equipment, because they wouldn't have to hunt for unused frequencies, and it would also make electronics designers lives easier (you'd just need a selector switch to choose between a few of the low-power-designated channels, or maybe not even that), and it would keep the unlicensed broadcasts from interfering with existing fixed service. It would pretty much be good for everybody.
It seems like this is just common sense; these sort of micro-FM-transmitters aren't going to go away anytime soon; in fact there are more of them being made every day. So the interference problem is only going to get worse if we don't do something.