DX LISTENING DIGEST 3-033, February 26, 2003 edited by Glenn Hauser, ghauser@hotmail.com Items from DXLD may be reproduced and re-reproduced only if full credit be maintained at all stages and we be provided exchange copies. DXLD may not be reposted in its entirety without permission. Materials taken from Arctic or originating from Olle Alm and not having a commercial copyright are exempt from all restrictions of noncommercial, noncopyrighted reusage except for full credits HTML version of this issue will be posted afterwards at http://www.worldofradio.com/dxldtd3b.html [note change] HTML version of all January issues: http://www.worldofradio.com/dxldtd3a.html For restrixions and searchable 2003 contents archive see http://www.worldofradio.com/dxldmid.html For restrixions and searchable 2002 contents archive see http://www.worldofradio.com/dxldmid2.html NOTE: If you are a regular reader of DXLD, and a source of DX news but have not been sending it directly to us, please consider yourself obligated to do so. Thanks, Glenn FIRST AIRINGS of WORLD OF RADIO 1171: WBCQ: Wed 2300 17495-CUSB, 7415, Mon 0545 7415 WWCR: Thu 2130 9475, Sat 0700, Sun 0330 5070, 0730 3210, Wed 1030 9475 RFPI: Fri 1930, Sat 0130, 0730, 1330, 1800, Sun 0000, 0600, 1200, 1830 Mon 0030, 0630, 1230 on 7445 and/or 15038.6 WJIE: M-F 1300, Mon and Tue 0700 on 7490 WRN: Rest of world Sat 0900, Eu Sun 0530, NAm Sun 1500 WRN ONDEMAND from Friday: http://new.wrn.org/listeners/stations/station.php?StationID=24 OUR ONDEMAND AUDIO: Check http://www.worldofradio.com/audiomid.html [Low] (Download) http://www.k4cc.net/wor1171.rm (Stream) http://www.k4cc.net/wor1171.ram [High] (Download) http://www.k4cc.net/wor1171h.rm (Stream) http://www.k4cc.net/wor1171h.ram (Summary) http://www.worldofradio.com/wor1171.html CONTINENT OF MEDIA 03-02: from Feb 25 available at DXing.com: (DOWNLOAD) http://www.dxing.com/com/com0302.rm (STREAM) http://www.dxing.com/com/com0302.ram (SUMMARY) http://www.worldofradio.com/com0302.html UNSOLICITED TESTIMONIAL G'Day Glen, Chris Martin here in a wet Brisbane. Just like to send you an unsolicited testimonial to say I greatly appreciate the effort you put into the DXLD. Please keep on with the text format as it is easy to read and pick items to print. Very up to date! Keep up the good work. Cheers (Chris Martin, Feb 26) ** ANTARCTICA. Informo que el nuevo director de LRA36, Radio Nacional Arcángel San Gabriel, 15476 khz, 1800-2100 lunes a viernes, con 10 kW de potencia en antena rómbica, a partir del mes de marzo 2003, será el Mayor Carlos Flesia, quien a su vez será el jefe de la Base Esperanza, en el Territorio Antártico. 73's GIB (Gabriel Iván Barrera, Argentina, Feb 26, Conexión Digital via DXLD) ** BRAZIL. After years of listening to Brasilian stations on shortwave, it's fun to watch one in action, albeit not one that's on shortwave. Radio Tupi, Rio de Janeiro, has a 24-hour live video feed running at http://www.tupi-am.com.br/tupi.ram The show at 1800 UT features Luiz de Franca, a happy, chatty big guy reading messages and dedications and hosting silly games, drenched in reverb, with tons of cheesy sound effects --- it's classic radio. And surprisingly hi-tech, looking nothing like the shabby little trainwreck mental image I had of SAm broadcasters (Al Quaglieri, NY, Feb 26, Cumbredx mailing list, via DXLD) Rio = big city ** CANADA. Mr. Hauser, Thank you for your work with short-wave radio. Below, is the text of a letter which I received from the Canadian government regarding the future of RCI. It was written in response to a note I sent regarding the need to continue service (Greg Koos, Feb 25, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Dear Mr. Koos: On behalf of the Honourable Sheila Copps, Minister of Canadian Heritage, thank you for your correspondence of January 20, 2003, regarding recent changes at Radio Canada International (RCI). Ms. Copps appreciates your advising her of your views and has carefully noted your comments with respect to this matter. It should be recognized that there has been no reduction in the Government's ongoing financial support to RCI. That commitment has enabled RCI to carry out its valuable public service broadcasting role of projecting Canada's voice abroad and conveying Canadian values to foreign audiences. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) is mandated to provide an international broadcasting service and does so through RCI. The Government is confident that the CBC will continue to fulfill this mandate. Since 1998-99, RCI has received ongoing operational funding from the Government in the amount of $15.52 million per year. In addition, between 1998-99 and 2000-01, the federal government provided the CBC with a total of $15 million in one-time funding for the replacement of RCI transmitters and other capital projects. RCI funding is provided to the Corporation under a contribution agreement between the Department of Canadian Heritage, on behalf of the Government, and the CBC. On March 31, 2001, this agreement was renewed for one year. On April 18, 2001, Mr. Robert Rabinovitch, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Corporation, indicated, within the context of programming and operational changes involving RCI, that the CBC will be working with the Government over the coming months to determine the Corporation's needs and obligations with respect to serving audiences abroad. It should be noted that while the Department of Canadian Heritage is responsible for overall broadcasting policy and legislation, the CBC operates independently of the Government under a framework provided in the Broadcasting Act. As an autonomous Crown corporation, its Board of Directors and senior management are responsible for its day-to-day operations. In view of the autonomy of the Corporation, you might wish to share your views directly with Mr. Rabinovitch at the following address: Canadian Broadcasting Corporation Post Office Box 3220, Station C Ottawa, Ontario K1Y 1E4 Telephone: (613) 724-1200 Web site: http://www.cbc.ca Electronic mail: commho@ottawa.cbc.ca I trust that this information is useful. Please accept our best wishes. Yours sincerely, Jess Dutton, Senior Policy Advisor (via Greg Koos, DXLD) ** CANADA. CBC Resumes 10 PM News: See http://www3.cbc.ca/sections/newsitem_redux.asp?ID=2726 for details. For two of the announcements in that release, it is like a blast to the past: - The new news program called World Watch airs at 10 p.m. It's not called the 10 O'Clock News as it used to be, but that's what it is. Just listened to the first edition (to the Atlantic provinces) on the net. It goes for just under 10 minutes, followed by 90 seconds of local/regional weather. I suppose we can guess that this show only runs on *weekday* evenings. It is different from the old 10 O'Clock News (cut back a few years ago) in a two ways: it is separate from the hourly news, not the hourly news with extra content after 4.5 minutes; it is much shorter (about 10 minutes total now vs. 15 minutes then). C'est La Vie moves back to Friday morning at 11:30 -- exactly where it was before Sounds Like Canada. Hmmm... - Outfront moves to 11:45 a.m., Monday to Thursday -- exactly where it was before Sounds Like Canada. Hmmmmmmmm!... (Do I detect a pattern?) Cheers, (Ricky Leong, QC, Feb 26, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Times local, usual [+1/2/3/4 hour shifts] ** FRANCE. AM radio band finally free... If you try to catch AM French stations you`ll have perhaps more chance in the future. Many private or public radio networks are established on FM frequencies but at the present time this band is completely saturated. Things are going to change. Various public or private stations (see the list below) will be allowed to transmit on AM. Since December 2002 frequencies are available in some regions (e.g. France Info Toulouse on 945 kHz, France Info Le Mans on 711 kHz). You probably already heard them. Very soon more stations on the air : Littoral AM, R'vif, Équi-radio, Fréquence K, Radio Maria, Radio Bonheur, Pulsar, Radio Midi-Pyrénées, Latitude AM, Sud Radio, J FM, Exo 7, La La Radio, Radio Cannes,Cool Radio, One AM, MRL, Radio Talk Show, Superloustic, Radiopéra, Francilia, Radio Orient, Ciel AM, Radio Livres, Radio Nouveaux Talents, Radiorama, Radio Publique, La Radio du Temps Libre, BFM, MFM, Capytol, La Radio de la Mer, Radio Talk Show, Air AM, Beur FM, RMC Info, AM "E". Gd DX es 73's (Pascal - Tours, France NRD-515-ICF7600G- Ant. Datong AD270 + 15m LW, Feb 24, hard-core-dx via DXLD) France Info is the first French and European non-stop news station. F. Info can be heard all over France on MW on the following frequencies : m / kHz Bayonne : 201 / 1494 Besançon : 201 /1494 Bordeaux : 249 / 1206 Brest : 214 / 1404 - (Local programme from F. Bleu Armorique on Saturday 1100-1300 UTC) Clermont-Ferrand : 201 / 1494 Dijon : 214 / 1404 Grenoble : 214 / 1404 Lille : 218 / 1377 Limoges : 379 / 792 Lyon : 498 / 603 Marseille : 242 / 1242 Nancy : 358 / 837 Nice : 193 / 1557 Pau : 214 / 1404 Rennes (Tx Le Mans): 422 / 711 (Local programme from F. Bleu Armorique on Saturday 1100-1300 UTC) Toulouse : 317 / 945 All these transmitters mainly broadcast France Info national programme. Marine weather heard on France Info MW at 0547 UT. According to the French MW plan the new local station "City Radio de Paris" (France Bleu network) can be heard on 864 kHz during the day (0800-1800 UT) with music, news and road traffic around Paris. ID Jingles "sur 107.1 la City [sic] Radio de Paris" - "France Bleu sur 107.1 la City radio de Paris". Target area: 250 Km around Paris. Warning: All the stations listed at the end of my mail "more French in AM band" are not on air at the present time. It only means that their projects are validated (perhaps on air in a few months...) 73's - (Pascal - Tours, France, http://audiomaniac.multimania.com/ via hard-core-dx via DXLD) ** GUYANA, 3291.1, GBC, 0809 Feb 26, Very nice copy, excellent audio. Subcontinental music until 0812, at which time several American Black Gospel recordings were played. At 0221 there was a short Hindu religious program which lasted ten minutes or so. Voice of Guyana ID and time check were given at 0830. Islamic chant was on at 0840 recheck. For a brief history of broadcasting in Guyana check out: http://www.silvertorch.com/g_radio_bcast.htm For some basic information on The Guyana Broadcasting Corporation: http://www.cba.org.uk/guyana.htm (David Hodgson, TN, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INDIA. On 28th February 2003 the Union Budget will be presented in the Indian Parliament. All India Radio has the following special broadcasts for the occasion. 0500-0525 UT : Discussions on the Pre Budget Scenario 0525 onwards : Live presentation of Union Budget by Finance Minister 0700-0715 : Special Budget Bulletin in English 0715-0730 : Special Budget Bulletin in Hindi all on 7170, 11585, 15020, 15225 0730-0830 UT: Discussions on Budget Proposals on 7170, 11585 (15185 & 15260 from 0745 UT) All stations of AIR will relay these programs. News timings of regular bulletins have been changed on that day and AIR SW stations will come up on air from around 0500 UTC on their day time frequencies. Note: 7170, 15225, 15020, 15185, 15260 are from AIR Delhi in Kingsway. 11585 is from AIR Delhi in Khampur. On that day External Service will not be broadcast 15260 at 1000-1100 in English. 73 (Jose Jacob, VU2JOS/AT0J, Feb 26, dx_india via DXLD) ** IRAQ [non]. WHAT'S THE FREQUENCY, SADDAM? THAT MUCH WE KNOW: 1584 KHZ Swedish Radio Buff Uncovers Mystery Station That Seems to Play Games With Iraqi Politics By ANDREW HIGGINS, Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL Most evenings after dinner, Bjorn Fransson retires to a walk-in closet to fiddle with his powerful Japanese-made radio, hunting through a cacophony of distant voices speaking languages he can't understand. "It is like collecting stamps or birds," says the 59-year-old Swedish schoolteacher, who lives on the blustery island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea. "We all dream of finding something no one else has." Earlier this month, while tuning into an AM frequency usually clogged by country music from Prague, he picked up an unfamiliar broadcast in Arabic. He couldn't fathom what was being said but "understood this must be something new." He made a recording and announced his find on the Internet. Three weeks later, Mr. Fransson is wondering whether his 300 yards of wires and antennas lassoed more than just a new radio station: Did it actually ensnare a covert -- and somewhat clumsy -- American operation aimed at Iraq? That is certainly the view of many fellow radio buffs, who, having tuned into the enigmatic Arabic station themselves, are now abuzz with speculation that Mr. Fransson stumbled onto an American plot to rattle Saddam Hussein and foment dissent among his most loyal supporters. Some say they've even detected secret messages to U.S. operatives embedded in the station's astrological forecasts. "I'd be prepared to wager quite a few Iraqi dinars ... on this station having been invented in a room somewhere in Washington," says Andy Sennitt, a British radio enthusiast who, back in 1974, was the first to find an elusive outfit called Voice of Iraqi Kurdistan. He has a day job with Radio Netherlands. Nick Grace, the Washington editor of http://www.clandestineradio.com a Web site that tracks illicit radio stations from Iraq to Indonesia, says he's so convinced of a secret American link to Mr. Fransson's find that "I'd bet my whole house on it. ... This has all the hallmarks of a classic CIA operation." The Central Intelligence Agency declined to comment. As for Mr. Fransson, who has been hunting exotic radio signals for more than four decades, he's relishing all the excitement. Over the years, he has monitored and received acknowledgement cards from more than 2,000 stations in 216 countries, but this, he says, is the first time he has bagged a possible spy venture. He has written up his exploit for the magazine of the Swedish radio federation, given interviews on Sweden's state radio and regaled the few people on Gotland island who share his nocturnal passion for unintelligible babble. He has even become a minor celebrity outside Sweden, at least among radio fans, who are known as DX-ers, a name that derives from the Morse code abbreviation for long distance. The last time Mr. Fransson stirred any cloak-and-dagger buzz, he says, was 20 years ago when Swedish-security-service agents checked to make sure he wasn't using all the wires entwined around his trees to transmit illegal broadcasts. When he first picked up the new signal on Feb. 3, the Swede was puzzled by its unusual strength and the constant repetition of words that, to his ears, sounded like "radio secret." It was, he says, "very mysterious." Shortly afterward, though, a Finnish enthusiast tuned in to the same frequency and reported on the Web that the station's name sounded more like "Radio Tigris." Mr. Fransson turned for help to some Arabic-speaking students in his math class. He played them a cassette tape of the broadcast. "They got quite excited," he says. They told him that the station's name was in fact "Radio Tikrit" and that Tikrit is Mr. Hussein's hometown. The Iraqi government has no such station, though it does have a Mother of Battles Radio. The Iraqi National Congress, or INC, an umbrella opposition group, says it has nothing to do with Radio Tikrit. Each evening since the start of the month, a male and female announcer have chanted the same opening jingle: "For all of Iraq and for all Iraqis, this is Radio Tikrit." As news of Radio Tikrit's discovery spread, Arab radio amateurs tuned in and questioned whether the announcers who claimed to speak "for all of Iraq" were actually Iraqi. Some said their accents sounded more Lebanese. The choice of frequency -- 1584 kHz -- also aroused curiosity: an Iraqi faction long backed by the CIA, Iraqi National Accord, broadcasts on nearby frequencies from a U.S. transmitter in Kuwait. Tarek Zaidan, an Egyptian DX-er, added another piece to the puzzle. Radio Tikrit's male announcer, he said, sounds remarkably similar to an announcer on Radio Information, an overtly American-run station beamed into Iraq from "Commando Solo" planes flown by the 193rd Special Operations Wing. Mr. Zaidan said this suggests Radio Tikrit was perhaps recorded in studios also used by the Pentagon for some of its own burgeoning radio ventures. These, in preparation for a potential war, include broadcasts from a ground station in northern Iraq and a proposal to set up a clandestine transmitter in Jordan. A spokesman said that as a matter of policy, the Pentagon wouldn't comment. By mid-February, news of Radio Tikrit had reached an area in the north of Iraq where opponents of Mr. Hussein were gathering for a planned big meeting. Zaab Sethna, a London-based adviser to the INC, had made the journey and, after a tip-off about Radio Tikrit from an American buff, began to make inquiries. "Everyone here is completely mystified: Why would anyone name a radio station after Tikrit?" he said by telephone from Sulaimania in the northern no-fly zone of Iraq. "It's a very good way to turn off anyone who doesn't live in Tikrit, which is nearly everyone. It's worse than a bad joke." Even more puzzling than its name is Radio Tikrit's evolving message. When it started up, the station railed against the U.S. and Britain as "ravens of evil," mimicked news reports on Iraqi media and featured a talk titled "Before It's Too Late" that urged Iraqis to prepare to battle America. Gradually, though, antagonism toward Washington softened and praise of the Baghdad regime soured into criticism. By last week, the station had completed a 180-degree turn. It denounced the Iraqi leader as a "tyrant" and lambasted his family, according to BBC Monitoring, a service that transcribes, translates and analyzes foreign broadcasts. The "Before It's Too Late" slot featured a letter from an "honorable officer of the Republican Guard" urging fellow officers to abandon the Iraqi dictator: "You would be fools not to realize the extent of popular wrath that awaits you if you do not leave this gang and flee." This bizarre about-face, say radio aficionados, suggests that the station belongs to an exotic category of psychological operations known as "black clandestines." Unlike the U.S. military's Radio Information broadcasts into Iraq, which make no secret of their affiliations and include recordings of Pentagon briefings, covert "black" stations try, for a time at least, to imitate features of enemy broadcasts. By shifting direction later, they hope to unsettle the enemy and even create the impression that former loyalists have changed sides. It's unclear whether Radio Tikrit's flip-flops have had any impact inside Iraq. But they have flummoxed even professional radio experts listening from outside. Four days after Mr. Fransson first detected Radio Tikrit's signal, BBC Monitoring issued a brief report describing "what appears to be a new Iraqi opposition radio station." Three days later, it declared Radio Tikrit "pro-government." After a two-week silence, it pronounced the station anti-Hussein. BBC Monitoring is an arm of BBC World Service, which is funded by the British Foreign Office. Amateur radio buffs jumped on BBC Monitoring's zigzags and period of silence as evidence of interference by the CIA, which funds FBIS, an American monitoring service. FBIS collaborates with the BBC's service and provides most of its translations of Iraqi broadcasts. "It's very fishy," says Mr. Grace, the Washington-based clandestine radio hunter. A spokesman for BBC Monitoring says it "definitely wasn't leaned on." Mr. Fransson, meanwhile, has returned to his closet to stalk new signals, but he hasn't caught anything interesting. The Radio Tikrit mystery just gets "bigger and better" and has been fun, he says. He thinks the station is "connected to America in one way or another" but he doesn't know to whom exactly. For a hard-core DX-er, this is a big problem: He can't write to ask for an acknowledgement card to add to his collection. He sent an e- mail message to an Iraqi opposition radio station in London in the hope that it might lead him to Radio Tikrit. He isn't holding his breath. "I'm basically a collector," Mr. Fransson says. "I like making contact with different people, but I don't know who these people really are." [includes WSJ style portrait of BF:] http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1046211641805769463,00.html?mod=todays%5Fus%5Fpageone%5Fhs (via Martin Gallas, D. R. Cole, Mike Cooper, Bill Smith, Chuck Albertson, Matt Francis, WORLD OF RADIO 1171, DXLD) ** IRAQ [non]. 'Psy Ops' Campaign From VOA News MIDEAST LEAFLETS, RADIO USED IN PENTAGON 'PSY OPS' CAMPAIGN AIMED AT IRAQI TROOPS, CIVILIANS Meredith Buel, Jerusalem, 25 Feb 2003, 20:13 UT Although President George W. Bush has not made the final decision that the United States will lead a military coalition to disarm Iraq, psychological warfare by the U.S. military is already well underway. The campaign is aimed at both Iraqi soldiers and civilians. Flying from aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf, U.S. warplanes have released millions of leaflets over Iraq. They warn Iraqi civilians to keep safely away from military installations and tell Iraqi soldiers they will be bombed if they aim weapons at coalition aircraft flying over their country. Psychological warfare is designed to influence a potential enemy without the use of violence, said Lieutenant Colonel Ed Worley, a spokesman for the U.S. Central Command's forward headquarters in Qatar. "Our desire is to not fight a conflict with the Iraqi military. Anytime you have war people die. The goal of the information warfare campaign is to make sure that we can do what we need to do, to disarm this Iraqi regime led by Saddam Hussein, without ever having to fire a shot," he explained. In addition to leaflets, the U.S. military is broadcasting radio programs in Arabic to the Iraqi people on short-wave, medium wave and FM frequencies. Lani Kass, professor of military strategy at the National War College in Washington, said the most effective message is one President Bush has already sent. "Well it seems to me that the message is, or should be, the one that the president sent in his State of the Union address to the Iraqi people, basically saying your enemy is not surrounding your country. Your enemy is enslaving you. Meaning Saddam Hussein is the enemy, not the United States. That to me is a very powerful message," Ms. Kass said. Ben Abel, a spokesman for the U.S. Army's Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations Command at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, said the broadcasts try to convince listeners in Iraq that the goal of the U.S. led coalition would be to liberate them from the government of Saddam Hussein. "I think a lot of the enemies that we go up against have been misled as to what the military's aim is. I think that was very evident in Afghanistan, as the most recent example. We are not there as conquerors. We are not there to take over their country. We are there to help them, to liberate them and to try to see them on to a better way of life. When people are lied to for such a long, long time you have to keep reemphasizing your point. Psychological operations is a way that we do that," he said. News reports say the U.S. military has also been sending e-mails and calling the mobile telephones of Iraqi commanders, urging them to surrender, or at least remain neutral during a war. Professor Lani Kass said information warfare can target specific concerns. "The United States wants to make sure that no weapons of mass destruction are used. Hence there was a direct message sent to Iraqi commanders, basically saying do not do that or you will be facing a war crimes tribunal. So you have a variety of outcomes which you are trying to achieve, all of them designed at the military level to minimize the violence and shorten military operations in order to essentially save lives on both sides," she said. Ms. Kass said it is difficult to measure the impact of information warfare, although she said during the 1991 Persian Gulf war, many of the approximately 87,000 Iraqi soldiers who surrendered were holding coalition leaflets. Professor Kass said prisoners revealed during interrogations that the leaflets worked, and were especially convincing to Iraq's regular soldiers (via Mike Terry, DXLD) ** IRAQ [non]. See also KURDISTAN just below ** ITALY. Today I received a beautiful wall calendar for 2003 from Radio Roma in Rome, Italy. It measures 17.5 inches (7 cm) long by 16 inches (6.4 cm) wide. Gorgeous color photographs of art pieces and historic scenery. It was mailed on January 27th. They send me one each year and I save them. Wonderful items to collect for their beauty. If any of the Radio Roma people are on the SWL list, Thanks! Well, I guess they recognize quality reception reports when they get them, heh? (chuckle) It took me two years to get a QSL card. I even got a nice electronic calculator with large buttons for Christmas, before I got a QSL card (Duane W8DBF Fischer, Feb 25, swl via DXLD) ** KURDISTAN [non?]. A couple of shortwave logs of Iraqi clandestines - selected from http://www.dxing.info/community/viewtopic.php?t=857 - examples of the changing frequencies, both intentional and drifting: kHz - date - UTC - station, comments: 3899.97, 26.2. 0400 Voice of Iraqi People, Iraqi Communist Party. 3901.94, 24.2. -1846* Voice of Iraqi People, Iraqi Communist Party. 4025.4v, 24.2. 1728 Voice of the People of Kurdistan 4026.7v, 26.2. 0310 Voice of the People of Kurdistan, // 4417.5, soon drifting to 4026.08 // 4416.9 4085, 24,25.2. -1931* Voice of Iraqi Kurdistan, the strongest one of the Kurdish stations 4090, 26.2. 0400- Voice of Iraqi Kurdistan, first an ID in Kurdish, but the rest of the programming was in Arabic 9570, 24.2. 0010 Voice of the Iraqi People, back here for a change, ex-9750, ex-9570 (Mika Mäkeläinen, Finland, Feb 26, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LATVIA/LITHUANIA/RUSSIA. In regard to Kai Ludwig's comment: Latvia joined the HFCC on 14 January 2003 in order to protect 5935 kHz in a proper way. Lithuania joined the HFCC in 1999. Ulbroka 5935 has been registered by the Russian authorities in the HFCC schedule as "Kaliningrad" (KLG) throughout the 1990s, it appeared last in the HFCC A02 table (Bernd Trutenau, Lithuania, Feb 26, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LEBANON [non]. Reminder that the Free Patriotic Movement was to have started regular broadcasts Tue Feb 25 at 1600-1700 on 11515. I forgot to check for it both Tue and Wed, but would not expect to hear much over here anyway. Since their publicity did not make it clear, I went looking on website http://www.tayyar.org where audio is also ondemand, to find out if it is 7 days a week, and it is, per program grid in English about shows actually in Arabic, daily u.o.s.: 1600 Lebanese National Anthem 1605 News 1620 Political Analysis 1630 Mon Zig zag, Tue Lebanon`s Heart, Wed Violence of the pacifists, Thu Report of the Security General, Fri A Man fom [sic] our land, Sat Tomorrow`s whining, Sun Sunday Interview 1640 Understand each other [exc Sun, Interview continues] 1655 Quote for tomorrow (from http://www.tayyar.org/files/radionews/030224_grid.htm via Glenn Hauser, WORLD OF RADIO 1171, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LESOTHO. 4800, R. Lesotho 0401-0408 Feb 26. At tune-in, heard their usual ToH music played on the Lesiba, a local wind instrument. This was followed by pips, and into the presumed news read by a female. At. 0406 an instrumental version of Leo Sayer's "When I Need You", followed by more talk by the female. SINPO 33333, with some ute QRM on LSB (George Maroti, NY, Cumbredx mailing list via WORLD OF RADIO 1171, DXLD) Back on again ** LUXEMBOURG. 6095 RNZI -- but from 1550 UT disturbing DRM signal co- channel ----- Auf der Suche nach BFBS Aussendungen höre ich gerade 6095 kHz sehr stark einfallend seit 1500 UT. Ist wohl mal wieder RNZI aus Rangitaiki(?)... 1306 bis 1659 UTC mit speziellen Zyklonsendung für den Pazifik. Hi, just heard GREAT signal of RNZI on 6095 at approx. 1455-1550 UT into Europe. But now [at 1550] DRM signal started co-channel. NZL suffers underneath. ----- No fun anymore: at 1550 UT DRM signal started co-channel suddenly, broadband signal on 6088.83 to 6101.20 kHz portion, New Zealand underneath. Even R YUG from Bijeljina Bosnien on nearby 6100 kHz is disturbed. On the RNW DRM special transmissions page is an item of RTL Luxemburg 6095 kHz, but start with 75 kW on March 3rd then. DRM tests from Luxembourg, 25 February 2003 BCE (Broadcasting Center Europe) will conduct DRM tests on its shortwave transmitter in Junglinster. Luxembourg on 6095 kHz from March 3rd until March 13th daily at 1300-1700 UT. The antenna is non- directional, and the DRM transmitter power will be approx. 40 kW. Several DRM modes will be tested. Reports and feedback are welcome to eugene_muller@bce.lu or michel_asorne@bce.lu Is there any other station testing in the 49 mb at present???, starting from 1550 UT. [later:] Glenn, yes DRM mode RTL 6095 kHz tested today at 1550-1700 UT! see RNW DRM site (Wolfgang Bueschel, Feb 26, WORLD OF RADIO 1171, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Up from 6090 to avoid Bayern 6085? Enclosed an item about DRM tests from Junglinster on 6095: March 3 until March 13, 1300-1700 "depending on availability of transmitter", 40 kW, "RTL test program in German and French", in practice a mixture of the German and French RTL programmes I guess. Preliminary test observed already today from 1550 by Wolfgang Büschel, confirmed by Markus Weidner as RTL-Radio German with 20.9 kbit/s. 6095 is already in use by Radio Polonia within the announced time frame: 1300-1359 English, 1400-1429 Russian acc. http://www.radio.com.pl/polonia/main_en.asp?ln=frequencies HFCC registrations: [1234567 days of week] 6095 1230 1400 27SE,28W WWA 100 285 271002 300303 D POL PRW POL 884 6095 1400 1430 28NE WWA 100 047 271002 300303 D POL PRW POL 885 (Kai Ludwig, Germany, Feb 23, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** MONGOLIA. The following has been taken from the VOM website: A-02 Summer Broadcast Schedule of the Voice of Mongolia Greenwich time Frequency Power/Azimut Chinese 0930-1000 990 126/120 1100-1130 990 178/120 Mongolian 0900-0930 990 126/120 1030-1100 990 178/120 (Alan Roe, Teddington-UK, April 8, 2002! via wb) Despite the SW data is OK, looks like the MW data on website is wrong, should turn round. I guess, Azimut is given first in the column, then power in kW is given. So seemingly MW power is 120 kW only, and azimuth may switched to either 126 or 178 degrees (Wolfgang Bueschel, Feb 26, DX LISTENING DIGEST) 981 is packed with synchronised/unsychronised CNR-1 transmitters and also has a powerful TWN transmitter. 990 should be much better for U-B to China (Olle Alm, Sweden, DX LISTENING DIGEST) See USA [non] 3-032 ** NEW ZEALAND. RNZI on 6095 all-night with cyclone warnings, but blocked by DRM test from LUXEMBOURG, q.v. ** OKLAHOMA. The 1640 in [Enid] OK also has an application for a directional antenna both day and night with "normal" power. This would be a real oddity if approved since directional antennas are only supposed to be allowed for coastal stations in the expanded band (Patrick Griffith, CBT, Westminster, CO, USA, NRC-AM via DXLD) Gasp --- probably aimed right at my house... Last I heard they plan to use the existing KCRC-1390 site on the north side of Enid, instead of getting out in the country, where there should be plenty of available towers/sites (gh, DXLD) ** POLAND. R. Polonia creamed by DRM test: see LUXEMBOURG ** RUSSIA. NOVOSIBIRSK MEDIA: BUILDING THE 'INFORMATION VERTICAL' By Andrei Deriabin Although the recent activities of Novosibirsk politicians and officials are not overtly connected to this year's parliamentary elections or next year's presidential and gubernatorial elections, a series of local media developments in the last month lead one to conclude that they are already moving to clean up the regional media environment. Some observers believe that recent cuts in Radio Novosibirsk broadcasting, the closure of the local Ekho Moskvy affiliate, and Novosibirsk Oblast Governor Viktor Tolokonskii's promotion of a regional mass-media bill are signs of a tightened "information vertical" aimed at controlling regional media content. Beginning 20 February, the broadcasts of Radio Novosibirsk were decreased from 2 1/2 hours a day to 30 minutes because the federal broadcasting company's (VGTRK) Radio Rossiya, which holds the license for national wired-circuit broadcasting, unified its national broadcast schedule. On 31 January, Radio Novosibirsk Director Vladimir Piskarev said that this decision will mean that the local audience of 300,000 -- mostly pensioners and housewives -- will now only be able to listen to national radio programming rather than local news. Renat Suleimanov, a member of Novosibirsk City Council and chairman of its Media Relations Committee, stressed that "the committee considers this decision unfair." "However, we have little chance of defending our position," he added. "It looks as if an 'information vertical' is being built. All this relates to the forthcoming elections." Local FM radio is also undergoing changes. On 27 December, Ekho Moskvy, an important private source of political information in the regions, dropped its broadcasting services to Novosibirsk, a city with a population of 1.5 million. Ekho Moskvy Editor in Chief Aleksei Venediktov said that the contract with the local retransmitting company in Novosibirsk, MKS Plus, expired on 26 December. Without any explanation, Ekho Moskvy's local partner exercised its right not to extend the contract. But the station's listeners have been demanding an explanation on Ekho Moskvy's website and on the local sites ngs.ru and novosibirsk.ru, which are crowded with angry posting calling for the local station's return. A spokesperson for MKS Plus said that the station was shut down because it was targeted at a narrow audience and did not generate sufficient advertising revenues. "There is no political pressure of any kind," MKS Plus Director Nikolai Melekhin said in an interview with the newspaper "Novaya Sibir." "The point is that information broadcasting requires sufficient resources and a large staff of journalists who need proper salaries.... Also, the Moscow office did not want to concern itself with the station's ratings or the quality of its programs. The last time the station had high ratings was during the conflict around NTV and Ekho Moskvy itself. Then some personnel crisis occurred, and the quality of the station's programs started going downhill. That's the main reason to stop the broadcasting in the regions." However, the arguments that Ekho Moskvy was responsible for the lack of advertising revenues in Novosibirsk and the low-quality local programs do not seem convincing. Ekho Moskvy listeners generally agree that the Novosibirsk branch did not adopt successful advertising and marketing policies. "The local programs...looked like rough patches and caused nothing but irritation, especially when some interesting program from Moscow was suddenly interrupted," one listener wrote in her posting to a local Internet forum. "As to the point that the whole project was running at a loss, it seems as if nobody seriously worked on the issue. It's as if the local branch intentionally failed in order to use that as excuse [for the shut down] later on." Another Novosibirsk listener wrote on the online forum at ngs.ru that "advertisements in the news blocks didn't fit the station's general image and were antiliberal in spirit." The same listener also notes that in addition to the commercials' very poor quality, Ekho Moskvy- Novosibirsk was not careful in selecting the goods and services it advertised, as if the station managers had no idea of its audience profile. If this is true, it is hardly surprising that the radio station failed to gain an acceptable level of advertising revenues and overall financial sustainability. Many observers, however, believe that the station was shut down because of its criticisms of government policies and its reputation as an "opposition" outlet. In 2003, such Russian media outlets have become particularly unwelcome because of the parliamentary elections slated for December. Novosibirsk Oblast will also be holding a gubernatorial election at that time. Therefore, some analysts speculate, the authorities have started "cleaning up" regional media in preparation for the campaigns. They note that Ekho Moskvy has already closed its local stations in Vladivostok, Nizhnii Novgorod, Perm, and Volgograd. Last but not least, Tolokonskii has initiated the drafting of a new regional-media bill. "I cannot say that I am fully satisfied with our media relationships," Tolokonskii said on 20 December. "What is required is to bring some order to that field, to increase authorities' responsibility in their media work, and to provide journalists with full access to information. At the same time, journalists should be more responsible for the adequate presentation of such information to their audiences." Aleksei Simonov, president of the Moscow-based Glasnost Defense Foundation and a well-known free-speech advocate, has been asked to organize a drafting group that will prepare the bill. Simonov told "Kontinent-Sibir" on 20 December that he had submitted to the Novosibirsk Oblast administration an activities plan and a budget that includes focus groups and roundtable discussions with local NGOs. The budget also includes two research studies: one of public attitudes toward the media and a second on relative access to media in urban and rural areas. Tolokonskii has also pledged to involve local media professionals in the drafting of the bill, but there has been no decision yet about the bill's ultimate legislative status. Meanwhile, Novosibirsk Oblast administration Information Department head Yurii Korobchenko, who is supervising the draft's preparation, said that the administration has also been preparing another document -- its contents have not yet been made public -- to regulate media relations. Recent events indicate that media relations will probably be regulated with an eye toward restricting direct media access to senior regional authorities and increasing the buffering role of their press services. On 17 December, local television journalists were barred from a session of the oblast administration presidium, and not even standard protocol shots were allowed. After that, Tolokonskii ordered the creation of new rules for presidium staff and the media. Journalists will no longer be allowed to attend presidium sessions, and the administration press service will now manage all contacts between the media and local authorities, including providing responses to reporters' information requests. "The presidium is a working organ," Tolokonskii said, "and there are some things that are not always tactful to expose to the public." "Novaya Sibir" commented on 20 December that Tolokonskii thinks it is "not tactful" for the public to know when he "rails at the presidium's members" and when "they argue with him." There are about 10 regional media laws in Russia today. Most of these laws merely repeat relevant federal law, placing certain restrictions on it and sometimes regulating the distribution of state funding. The media is often regulated by regional laws in areas known for their problems with freedom of speech, such as Bashkortostan. Novosibirsk, with its well-developed media sphere, is scarcely in this category. It is not quite clear why the Novosibirsk Oblast administration has suddenly decided to draft a media law. In light of the upcoming oblast gubernatorial election, however, it seems likely the draft law is part of preparations for Tolokonskii's re-election campaign. Even if, as some journalists believe, the new media law is not meant to pressure local media, the drafting process might be used to attract regional and national public attention to Tolokonskii, especially if the State Duma resumes its discussion of possible amendments to federal media laws such as those vetoed by President Vladimir Putin in November. If a regional media law is passed, Tolokonskii might be able to position himself as a leader in the discussion of topical social and political issues and to attract much-needed media coverage to his campaign. Simonov believes that the Glasnost Defense Foundation's role in drafting of the Novosibirsk bill will ensure that it is fundamentally democratic and functions properly. "If what the governor needs from this act is merely convenient legislative formulations that let him manipulate the press during his election campaign, he will not achieve it through the [Glasnost Defense Foundation]," Simonov said. "Another possibility is that a well-conceived media law will enhance the governor's reputation in the media and such public relations is for the common good." Media executives and owners have developed the habit of explaining media-sector developments in purely business or management terms. But anyone who is familiar with the state's media policies will likely think these recent events in Novosibirsk are conscious efforts to squeeze out media outlets that are independent or cannot be controlled by the authorities. Andrei Deriabin is the founder of Developmental Policies, an independent, nonpartisan research and consulting organization for Western Siberia (RFE/RL Media Matters Feb 24 via DXLD) ** SWEDEN. RADIO SWEDEN --- Coming up on Radio Sweden: Thursday: In the "S-Files" what do prehistoric and modern man have in common? Friday: Our weekly review Saturday: "Network Europe" Sunday: "In Touch With Stockholm" takes up opposition to war/anti- Americanism, violent crime, and hiphop in Sweden Here is the upcoming Radio Sweden shortwave schedule in English for the period beginning March 30, 2003 (all times UTC unless otherwise indicated): Europe/Africa/Middle East 1330 17505 kHz 1730 1179 and 6065 kHz (Sundays on 13580 kHz instead) 1930 1179 and 6065 kHz 2130 1179 and 6065 kHz Asia & Pacific 1130 17505 kHz 1230 15750 and 17505 kHz 1330 17505 kHz 2130 11650 kHz 0130 9435 kHz North America 1130 17840 kHz 1230 17840 kHz 1330 17840 kHz 0230 9495 kHz (via Sackville, Canada) 0330 9495 kHz (via Sackville, Canada) (SCDX MediaScan Feb 26 via WORLD OF RADIO 1171, DXLD) ** U K. Hi, Glenn! Regarding the info you stated on last week's WoR about the BBC special TV-discussion series supplanting "On Screen" for 4 weeks: The host of the last "On Screen" before that new series began stated that, after this special series ends, there will be only one more edition of "On Screen". It will then vanish and be subsumed into a new hour-long BBC weekend arts program with the April schedule changes. Just what we needed: for the BBC to screw up the current arts-program daily hours that they had just about gotten right finally after many years of schedule shuffling! And, to add insult upon insult, to put the replacement on during the weekend, a time when we already have far too many simultaneous programs on all sorts of media (SW, local FM NPR, TV, etc.). How disgusting! I wonder if the science programs will also be messed up? Why couldn't they have just left it as-is for a change? I suppose that there's a batch of BBC jobs that depend on constant schedule shuffling, even when it isn't needed. 73, (Will Martin, MO, Feb 26, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U K. More BBC Troubles! http://abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s791775.htm Monday, February 24, 2003. ANTI-FRENCH JOKES CENSORED, BROADCASTER COMPLAINS Veteran British broadcaster and satirist Ned Sherrin has accused the BBC of censoring jokes poking fun at the French, while letting a similar gag about the British go on the air unchanged. Sherrin, 62, who presents BBC Radio 4's long-running variety show Loose Ends made his complaint in a letter to the Times published on Monday. He said that the anti-British joke "What do you call a pretty girl in London? A tourist," was broadcast after the taping of an edition of Loose Ends in Amsterdam last Saturday. "I used it only to set up ripostes written for me," Mr Sherrin explained, while apologising for "the unmeant, unpatriotic insult to so many lovely, young British women". However radio listeners never got the chance to hear those ripostes, such as "What do you call a Frenchman advancing on Baghdad? A salesman". "For some extraordinary, dumb reason the balancing jokes were censored," Mr Sherrin complained in his letter to the paper. The right-wing British press, including the Times, has criticised the French line over Iraq, especially its reluctance to endorse any US-led military action against Baghdad. Anti-French comments, including personal attacks on President Jacques Chirac, have multiplied in editorials, signed columns and feature articles (via Wolfgang Bueschel, DXLD) ** U K [non]. RUSSIA. BFBS 5945 1500-1800 - Tuesday evening I noted a changed signal behaviour of this outlet and this was confirmed on Wednesday during the tune-up period, which adhered to the Samara routines. Samara is also on 5935 to basically the same area with VOR Persian and others. (Olle Alm, Sweden, 26 Feb, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. A VOICE FILLED WITH HATRED, INTOLERANCE By BRIAN KLADKO, Staff Writer, North Jersey News [full version of story referenced in 3-031] From a corner of his cluttered North Bergen living room, radio personality Hal Turner spews a message of hatred to people all over the world. He describes Chicago as "an urban cesspool full of savage Negro beasts, filthy [Hispanics], Jews.... " He fantasizes about the destruction of Los Angeles by a North Korean nuclear attack: "All the filthy mongrels who are infesting that city have pretty much ruined it. We could bulldoze the radioactive soil and all the toasted, brown-skinned savages off into the ocean and start new." He endorses the killing of a U.S. District Court judge, because she ordered a white supremacist to stop using the name World Church of the Creator - the trademarked name of a religious group in Oregon. "I don't think killing a federal judge under these circumstances would be wrong," he says. "It may be illegal, but it wouldn't be wrong." All this came from just one hour-long episode of the "Hal Turner Show.'' Each weeknight, the radio show's volatile mix of political and social commentary - along with calls from listeners - can be downloaded live from his Web site. On Mondays, however, Turner's show also travels the airwaves. Relayed by telephone lines to a transmitter-for-hire in northern Maine, its 50,000-watt signal bounces off the ionosphere and reaches shortwave radios throughout the Western Hemisphere, Europe, and, if atmospheric conditions are just right, Asia and Africa. A few years ago, it would have been inconceivable for an extremist like Turner to reach such a large audience. But shortwave, like the Internet, has given a powerful megaphone to people who were previously limited to passing out fliers, staging rallies, or, if they were lucky, hosting a late-night slot on public access television. The Southern Poverty Law Center, a civil rights group, says seven of the 21 shortwave stations in the United States broadcast far-right programs - a trend that began about a decade ago and has grown to about 1,100 hours of programming a month. "Hal Turner is part of an absolute explosion of radical, right-wing programming on shortwave," said Mark Potok, a spokesman for the law center. Turner began broadcasting two years ago, soon after losing the Republican primary for the 13th Legislative District. That election was his epiphany, when he began his transformation from far-right Republican to white supremacist and Holocaust doubter. Born in Jersey City and raised in Ridgefield Park, Turner served a 10- month stint in the Marines ("I was honorably discharged, that's all I can tell you"), worked in the moving business as a driver and sales manager, then became a commercial real estate agent. But his passion was politics. He wrote letters to the editor (some of them to The Record), and says he was a frequent caller to the radio shows of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Bob Grant. "'Hal from North Bergen,' that's what everybody knew me as," he says. Turner also occasionally made news of his own. He organized a 1994 rally for Grant, who was being vilified at the time for statements he made about blacks. He also revealed the name of a sex offender who had moved to Englewood, thus violating the confidentiality restrictions of Megan's Law. But Turner was more than just an agitator. He was a Republican committeeman in Hudson County (not a very difficult post to attain in the overwhelmingly Democratic county); he served as the North Jersey coordinator for Pat Buchanan's 1992 presidential campaign; and he managed the 1997 gubernatorial campaign of Libertarian Murray Sabrin, who had the best showing of any third-party candidate in New Jersey in the 20th century. In 2000, Turner decided to come out from behind the scenes: He sought to be the Republican challenger to Democratic Rep. Robert Menendez. But the Republican leadership in Hudson County, headed by then-Jersey City Mayor Bret Schundler, chose to endorse Theresa de Leon - a dark- skinned Hispanic mother of 10, and at the time chief financial officer for New York's Legal Aid Society. Turner is convinced that De Leon's ethnicity earned her Schundler's nod. "I had never judged people on their race, not prior to that point," he says. "And there I was, on the receiving end - in America - of a decision that I wasn't good enough because I was a white male." Turner entered the primary anyway, finishing third in the three-way race. Compounding Turner's sense of betrayal, Limbaugh and Hannity stopped taking his calls. "He became an annoyance and a nuisance and kind of repetitive in what he was trying to say," says Phil Boyce, program director at WABC-AM, which airs both shows. "Basically, the shows didn't feel he was of value anymore." Boyce said Turner's views were "inappropriate," but wouldn't get more specific. Boyce also said that Turner would badger call screeners and producers in an effort to get on the air. Turner, however, says Limbaugh and Hannity became too timid. "Talk radio was always the venue that people could use to express their opinion about things without an interlocutor," he says. "But alas, it seems to have succumbed to political correctness." Stymied by mainstream politics, and shut out by mainstream media, Turner took to the airwaves himself. He bought thousands of dollars of equipment and software, and a regular time slot from WBCQ - a "free speech radio station" that runs an eclectic mix of programming (including a show about Jewish religion and culture). WBCQ's owner, Allan H. Weiner, thinks Turner's show is one of the station's most listened-to programs, based on the letters, e-mail, and telephone calls he receives. Weiner estimates that Turner's on-air program draws 10,000 to 20,000 listeners. "We don't like everything he says, but he certainly has the right to express his opinion," Weiner says. "People in the listening audience need to know that there are people like Hal Turner and his listeners out there." But even WBCQ has limits. Weiner says he removed a white supremacist group, the National Alliance, from the station's lineup in 1998 because its show repeatedly advocated the killing of Jews. Turner, too, has run afoul of the station's hate-speech policy twice already, Weiner says. Once, it was for calling for the killing of lesbians; Weiner says he can't recall the other target of Turner's ire. "Hal knows he is walking a fine line at the station," Weiner says. "One more violation and we terminate his program." Weiner isn't the only one keeping a close eye - or rather, ear - on Turner. The Anti-Defamation League, an anti-Semitism watchdog group, considers him potentially dangerous, noting that Turner spoke at a rally last summer of the Aryan Nations, a white supremacist group, in north- central Pennsylvania. "His speech is not political," said Shai Goldstein, director of the group's New Jersey office. "His speech is violent." His critics also know where he lives. Two months ago, he says, the New Jersey Anti-Racist Action Network posted "community alert" fliers on telephone poles in his neighborhood, identifying him as a "local resident racist." That same day, someone scrawled the words "resident Nazi" on his mailbox. Occasionally, he says, he reports a threat he has received to police. "I own two handguns and a shotgun," Turner says, "and I will defend myself, my family, and our property." Federal authorities, including the FBI, also have taken notice, Turner says. The Secret Service and the U.S. Marshals Service (which provides security for the federal court system) have interviewed him about various statements he has made on the air, in print, or on his Web site, he says. Authorities refused to confirm or deny that they have investigated Turner. "Each of them has said to me, 'We're not trying to intrude on your free speech, but we got a report that you said 'X,' and we have to investigate as to whether or not you intended to act out on that,'" Turner says. Turner doesn't come off as threatening. He is 40, has been married for 12 years, and is the father of an 8-year-old boy. He offers a visitor something to drink. His walls are covered with photos of his son. "We lost two to miscarriage before him, so he's our pride and joy," he says. Turner speaks in calm, measured tones, answers questions directly, and doesn't get defensive. Even though he describes Hitler as being "the only white man who ever confronted the filthy rat Jews," he says he doesn't own a copy of Hitler's "Mein Kampf" or Nazi memorabilia. But then he says something like this: "I view violence as a tool that, when properly applied, can have magnificent results. And I think when people in our government wantonly ignore the constraints placed upon them in the Constitution, that sometimes violence is necessary." Turner says he doesn't hate all blacks, Hispanics, and Jews. (In fact, Sabrin, the Libertarian candidate whose campaign he directed in 1997, is the Jewish son of Holocaust survivors.) He just hates the ones who cause "social disruption." Expounding these views has cost Turner his job as a real estate agent. After critics of his show threatened to picket the firm where he worked, his employer told him to drop the show or leave. "And I'm just a pigheaded Irishman, and I said, 'No one's going to tell me what I can say and not say,'" Turner says. "So I hung up my real estate license." Turner still earns money as a real estate consultant, and his wife works as a computer analyst at a New York financial firm. His broadcasts, however, aren't a money-making venture; they cost nearly $4,000 a month to produce, and Turner asks listeners to help pay the bills. He also sells ad time to white power groups, a flag vendor, and the maker of a video game called "Ethnic Cleansing." Most months, he says, the show breaks even. In addition to his shortwave radio listeners, Turner recorded 1.7 million hits on his Web site last year; about 43,000 went to his "Listen Live" page, and 34,000 went to audio archives of his past shows. Still, Turner has no dreams of breaking into the "big time" of AM or FM radio and becoming the next Limbaugh or Hannity. "It's not within the realm of possibility, because I say what I think based on my life experience," he says. Part of that life experience is living in Hudson County - an odd place for a white supremacist, considering that it's one of the most diverse counties in the state. When he moved to North Bergen 12 years ago, he explains, he was simply a bachelor eager to partake of Manhattan's nightlife. He bought a condominium just before the real estate market crashed, and despite the overall rise in housing prices, he says he has yet to recoup his losses. If and when that happens, Turner is eager to move to western New Jersey. Until then, Turner says he doesn't mind living in a town where non- Hispanic whites, like him, constitute only 32 percent of the population. Although he rails against "little enclaves that replicate the Third World," he says North Bergen isn't like that. "Most of the people who live here in North Bergen are people who have come from the bowels of Jersey City, to try to improve themselves," he says. "They fit in just fine, they've assimilated, they've learned the language, they've taken a job, they keep a clean house. They are decent people." Turner believes that neighbors in his condominium complex return that respect. If that's true, it probably helps that most of them don't own shortwave radios. http://www.northjersey.com/page.php?qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjczN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXk3JmZnYmVsN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXk2MzQ1MzY2JnlyaXJ5N2Y3MTdmN3ZxZWVFRXl5Mw== (via Artie Bigley, Andy Sennitt, WORLD OF RADIO 1171, DXLD) ** U S A. FCC MUFFLES ARTIST'S MESSAGE, By Tony Mauro With the self-congratulation of Sunday's Grammy Awards behind it, the music industry has a real reason to celebrate today, and it has to do with a female performer named Jones: Sarah Jones the performance artist, that is, not Norah Jones the jazz singer. With little fanfare, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) late last week let it be known that it should not have held the hip-hop artist's career hostage for nearly two years. It now has decided that her music is not indecent and not patently offensive. After branding her work too controversial for many broadcasters to air, the commission rescinded a $7,000 fine it had slapped on a Portland, Ore., public radio station 21 months ago for playing her song Your Revolution on the air. The fine was silly in the first place, and it took the commission an outrageously long time to come to its senses. But in the spirit of giving credit where credit is due, it has to be said: In the end, the FCC got it right. With luck, Sarah Jones' victory will turn out to be a First Amendment turning point. It was May 14, 2001 when the FCC first notified KBOO in Portland that it intended to fine the station for playing Your Revolution on the air more than 18 months earlier. The song, the FCC said then, contained ''patently offensive sexual references'' that violated the commission's rules against airing indecent material. The radio station responded that the song was not, in fact, indecent, and there the matter sat until last Thursday. The FCC is supposed to act within 60 days, but until last week it never issued a final determination, despite continuing appeals to federal courts filed on Jones' behalf by People for the American Way. Because courts are reluctant to challenge the FCC's unparalleled authority over broadcast licenses and performers don't have much power to intervene, the commission has the astonishing ability to chill the expression of almost any vocal artist by fiat. That is what it did with Jones. But this time, the commission picked the wrong target: a talented woman whose message actually goes against the sexually abusive content of many of the songs of the male rappers of her generation. While all this was pending, many stations were reluctant to play Jones' song, according to her lawyers, with one San Francisco program director quoted as saying Your Revolution is ''a song that's been busted by the FCC.'' The experimental show on KBOO that played her song in the first place was temporarily canceled. In short, because of the FCC's action, American radio stations put Sarah Jones' music on the ''do-not-play'' list for nearly two years -- the equivalent of a lifetime in the world of music. Jones carried on in other venues, to be sure. Her one-woman shows, ''Waking the American Dream'' and ''Women Can't Wait'' earned her critical success, good audiences and even a cover story in Ms. Magazine. And, ironically, she has performed Your Revolution before high school audiences across the country. Girls in the audience, by one account, are ''spellbound.'' That's because high school girls understand Jones' song in a way that ham-handed government censors never will. The FCC said her song was intended to ''pander and shock,'' but in reality it is aimed pointedly at misogynist rappers who, in their words and music, treat women as throwaway sex objects. They are the shock panderers, not Jones. Your Revolution is not subtle. It borrows -- and deflates -- the pumped-up sexual vocabulary of male hip-hoppers who equate sexual conquest with power and even revolution. In one of the more printable verses, she asserts: The real revolution Ain't about booty size The Versaces you buys Or the Lexus you drives Jones adds, speaking directly to the rappers: ''Your revolution will not be you/ sending me for no drip drip VD shot.'' That powerful image is followed by even more vivid ones, many mirroring and spoofing the lyrics of male hip-hoppers who have escaped the notice of the FCC. The lyrics decry unwanted pregnancies and the abuse of women, and even advocate abstinence and viewing sexual intimacy as an expression of love and commitment. But always, Jones returns to her refrain, which echoes Gil Scott- Heron's The Revolution Will Not Be Televised: ''Your revolution will not happen between these thighs.'' Legal briefs do not often sound like music reviews, but Jones' brief challenging the FCC fine said it best: ''Ms. Jones used the hip-hop vehicle in Your Revolution because she believes it is a beautiful and creative art form. She believes that the appropriate response to the objectionable and disturbing elements in hip-hop is not to walk away from the art form, but to answer back with something more sophisticated and meaningful.'' And this is whom the FCC targets, along with the likes of Eminem and Howard Stern? Defenders of the FCC will say that it is required to respond to complaints by listeners such as the one that triggered the action against KBOO. Commission files are full of enforcement actions against radio stations -- KNDD in Seattle, WNEW in New York, WKQX in Chicago -- for songs, raunchy jokes and call-ins that cannot be viewed as harmful. Many, like the complaint against the station that played Jones' song, have taken months or years to resolve. As noted at a recent media forum, the FCC is the only government agency that is entitled by law and U.S. Supreme Court precedent to regulate speech that is indecent but not, strictly speaking, obscene. The FCC also can require that indecent language be aired only between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. to keep it away from children -- although, as KBOO lawyer John Crigler joked at the forum, ''after 10 p.m., I think only children are available'' to watch or listen. In the end, the commission's enforcement-bureau chief, David Solomon, decided that the sexual references in Jones' song were ''not sufficiently graphic'' to warrant punishment. Solomon added that context does matter and noted that Jones has performed the song in front of high school audiences. It was a ''close case,'' Solomon concluded, but the fine was not justified. It should not have been that close, and the commission should not have taken so long to decide that Sarah Jones is not the enemy. In our legal framework, the kind of censorship caused by the FCC's delay is a constitutional offense of the highest order. The fact that it finally has ended is good news not only for Sarah Jones, but Norah Jones and, heck, Spike Jonze and Tom Jones, too -- and anyone else who cherishes provocative free expression. Tony Mauro is Supreme Court correspondent for American Lawyer Media and Legal Times. He also is a member of USA TODAY's board of contributors. (c) Copyright 2002 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc. ** U S A. David Freudberg -- here in the states who has a very timely and excellent program feature series call "Beyond War." It's comprised of three, one-hour installments, with the first hour available for distribution beginning this week and subsequent programs released in April and in June. Each hour can be broken into 2 30-minute segments, if necessary. It is distributed in the US by Public Radio International and there are 200 stations that will carry it. Because of my contacts with overseas broadcasters, I've offered to help David identify selected outlets where he might reach listeners outside of the US. The topic and the content are extremely relevent, and the range of guests and spokespeople represented are quite international. My thinking is that, at this critical time, broadcasters and non-US listeners might be interested in material coming _out_ of the States which tries to deconstruct the choice this country will be making should it go into a war with Iraq. I'm putting word out to ask if you'd be willing to have a listen to the first hour, and consider it for use in your programming schedule. I'm especially interested in reaching domestic audiences overseas. If you're interested, please send me a message with your mailing address and other relevant contact information. If there are others I should be in touch with, please let me know that, as well. There is also an on-line site where you can download and MP3 of the full program for preview, or for broadcast. I'm happy to send you the link...just let me know if you'd like me to do that. Many thanks in advance for your consideration. You'll find the link at http://www.audioexchange.org Scroll down about half-way. There is also a link to the homepage for the producer David Freudberg. Listeners certainly can go to the audioexchange site to download the audio, but it's rather time-consuming for those on modem (rather than broadband). The best bet for a listener is to go to the http://www.humanmedia.org site and order a cassette or CD of the series. You can reach David via the website, too, with questions. Thanks, Glenn. Sue Schardt, SchardtMEDIA : Program Development and Strategy 11 Rockmere Street, Boston, MA 02125 p) 617.436.9024 f) 617.288.5262 http://www.SchardtMEDIA.org (via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. GIVING VOICE TO DISSENT -------------------- Bridgeport's WPKN Radio Covers The News With Left-Of-Center Takes Not Found In The Mainstream Media By JOHN JURGENSEN, [Hartford] Courant Staff Writer, February 26, 2003 In a mongrel studio at Bridgeport's WPKN-FM, Scott Harris and his production crew compete for space with old televisions, record players, cardboard crates and even suitcases. For more than 10 years, this clubhouse of grass-roots radio has been the home of a weekly half-hour newsmagazine meant to provide "a platform for individuals and organizations generally ignored or marginalized in mainstream media." "Between the Lines," created in 1991 by Harris and co-producer Denise Manzari as a response to the Gulf War, could soon mark another anniversary of sorts: the onset of a second war with Iraq. To its producers, the show's mission is just as critical during this historical refrain. "Then, like now, the voices of dissent were being drowned out," Harris said. At a time of unprecedented conglomeration in broadcasting and news production, WPKN (89.5) operates on the fringe, shunning commercial underwriting, subsisting on the generosity of listeners. The station's fiscal independence has bred a checkered program schedule that runs a musical gamut from "jazz adventures" to "spoken soul." In that anarchic environment, "Between the Lines" has staked out turf far left of center. The show exists within a motley network of alternative news outlets, many of which come together under Internet clearinghouses such as alternet.org and radio4all.net. Reporting on radical aspects of environmental, human rights and globalization issues, it's a news community that exists beneath the radar of most consumers of, say, CNN. In Harris' view, the potential of this alternative press was on display during the recent massive peace rallies. "The power of this ever-growing network of folks is demonstrated in the numbers that turned out on Feb. 15," he said. "There's this new blood that's especially come in during the last couple of years [since the riots at the Seattle WTO conference in 1999]. But so much of this information bypasses the media. If you just paid attention to them, you'd hardly know that there's a movement out there. On one level, people were probably shocked to see all these people turn out [on Feb. 15]." Speaking through the major news outlets, the Bush administration is spreading an aggressive message about Iraq. If people rely only on these outlets for their information about the potential conflict, Harris and other outsiders argue, they're not getting the whole picture. The many aspects of that picture emerge across the political spectrum and across the dial, where a chorus of voices are weighing in, from the radical activism of non-commercial stations like WPKN to the conservative hotbeds of AM talk radio. "I'm not there to mold someone's opinion," Manzari said. "The goal is just to get somebody on that will never, ever have a voice on the mainstream shows and to give them their 15 minutes, so to speak." Until just a few years ago, Harris and Manzari, directing a staff of 12 volunteers, were painstakingly splicing the show together on reel-to-reel tape, long after most of the broadcasting world had converted to digital editing tools. Since then, computers have brought "Between the Lines" a step closer to the mainstream media. But in content and ideology, the show has kept its distance. Unlike the bare-knuckled harangues of many radio talk-show hosts, "Between the Lines" largely lets its guests articulate the attitudes of the producers. But the show doesn't stay off the soapbox completely, as shown in this non-sequitur introduction to last week's interview with Greg Palast, a reporter with BBC television: "With France and Germany taking a firm stand against a U.S. war with Iraq, officials of the Bush administration, conservative columnists and right-wing radio talk-show hosts have begun a campaign to demonize European nations who are resisting Washington's agenda." "We're always up front with the fact that this is advocacy journalism," said Harris, 47, who grew up in Norwalk tuning into the political discussions about Vietnam and other inflammatory issues on New York radio. The voice of radio has changed since those years. In fact, an unprecedented broadcasting consolidation occurred after a 1996 congressional change in ownership caps. Since then, the total number of radio stations increased by just 5.4 percent, but the number of station owners decreased by 34 percent, according to the Federal Communications Commission. Produced on Tuesday nights at WPKN, the completed shows are sent on compact disc to be uploaded to the satellite carrying the Pacifica Radio Foundation's feed. By Wednesday afternoon, Web editor (and Harris' wife) Anna Manzo loads the show onto the "Between the Lines" site http://www.btlonline.org About 20 radio stations across the country regularly broadcast the program. Reaching an estimated 20,000 regular listeners directly via WPKN's modest 10,000-watt signal (which extends to the midstate area) and untold others via the Internet, "Between the Lines" aims to supply the tools of activism to its listeners, said Sasha Summer Cousineau, who often reads the show's roundups of "under-reported" news. "The media has a way of making these issues seem bigger than us," she said. "This is a tangible way of putting power back into the hands of the citizens, [by demonstrating that activism] is about everyday things. It's clicking on a link, it's making the call, it's writing the letter." Collectively, the staff's own efforts add up to an estimated 60 hours required to produce and distribute each week's show, time carved out of busy work and family time. Power had deserted WPKN during the President's Day blizzard, so Harris, by day the director of a Norwalk halfway house, and his crew arrived at a cold, dark studio last Tuesday evening. As a space heater purred and jazz trickled out of the adjacent studio, elements of the show came together. Arch Currie, a director of project management and construction at Yale University, recorded narration that would introduce and conclude the week's segments. They included Harris' interviews with attorney Nancy Chang of the Center for Constitutional Rights, who spoke of the dangers to civil liberties inherent in the sequel to the USA Patriot Act; veteran activist Angela Davis and protest organizer Leslie Cagan at the Feb. 15 gathering in New York; and BBC's Palast, who investigated funding by U.S. ally Saudi Arabia of Iraq's nuclear weapons program in the 1980s. Bob Nixon, who's also been with the show since its start, had assembled the five-minute summary of news he felt had been neglected by the mainstream press. Then Summer Cousineau, a counselor at the Center for Women and Families in Bridgeport, recorded these reports on obstacles to hydrogen power, hunger in the occupied Palestinian territories and the environmental threat of sprawling ski resorts. Under a battered, glowing "On Air" lamp, Harris directed from behind the console, patiently pausing whenever WPKN DJs tromped across squeaky floorboards outside the not-quite-soundproof studio. Wearing headphones and a frequent wry grin, he edited on the fly, discarding flubbed takes and bookending his prerecorded interviews, which often originate on Monday nights during his live two-hour program "Counterpoint." By 11 p.m., the staff had departed, leaving Harris to pare his interviews to five-minute segments and patch together the rest of the show. He kept at it until nearly 4 a.m. This is how Harris defines his dissent. At the Feb. 15 march in New York, he wielded a microphone and a tape recorder, not a banner. "I practice my activism by trying to get this stuff on the air," he said. Copyright 2003, Hartford Courant (via Bill Westenhaver, DXLD) ** U S A. The FCC data for 1640 in OR shows an application for a directional antenna with 10 kW at night. If that happens I presume they will be aimed west (off shore). (Patrick Griffith, CBT, Westminster, CO, USA, NRC-AM via DXLD) ** U S A. KXTR Kansas City KS has created a "Long Distance Listener" page on http://www.kxtr.com/home The link is at the bottom of the page. I volunteered to be the first contributor, but they would like to hear from other DX-ers too. Regards, (Bjarne Mjelde, Berlevag, Arctic Norway, Feb 26, hard-core-dx via DXLD) ** U S A. CLEAR CHANNEL REPORTS 4TH QUARTER PROFIT http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EARNS_CLEAR_CHANNEL?SITE=FL PET&SECTION=BUSINESS (via Terry Krueger, DXLD) ** U S A. 520, WJCE (presumed) spur, 0633 Feb 26. Found the fundamental on 680 kHz, using another radio. Easy listening type music, including "Shadow of Your Smile" Heard the slogan, "Proud to be a part of Memphis, Easy Six-Eighty." The fundamental was not overly powerful, so I suspect this was a transmitter, rather then a receiver mixing product. I did not get the call letters, but WJCE from Memphis is listed on 680 kHz in the 2002 WRTH (David Hodgson, TN, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. Re: IBOC article in March QST I finally got a chance to see the article today. As others have said, it really downplays the interference problems. And there are also factual errors. Here's the most glaring one, in a Q&A between Steve Ford and Tom Ray. Q: How would you describe IBOC as it is used at WOR? A: Think MP3s on steroids. The actual data rate on the AM is around 96 kbps; it amounts to a large modem on the air. The smoke and mirrors part is that unlike a 96 kbps MP3 file, AM digital sounds great. Smoke and mirrors indeed. Tom Ray is dead wrong about the data rate, since it is 36 kbps for AM IBOC, not 96 kbps (96 kbps is actually the data rate for FM IBOC). Think MP3s on Valium. It's kinda scary to think that even the engineers who are implementing IBOC on their stations don't seem to have a good grasp of the technical details (Barry McLarnon, Ont., NRC-AM via DXLD) Perhaps they know, but it's just too late to turn back. They may be putting lipstick on a pig at this point. (Fred Vobbe, NRC-AM via DXLD) Especially Tom Ray - his employers have put him in the deep water, and he seems to be paddling as fast as he can - no matter which direction (Russ Edmunds, Blue Bell, PA, ibid.) I don't know if I like the guy, but he`s in the position where he loses no matter what he does, and he has lost credibility saying some of the things he has, with everyone in radio. IBOC is a mistake of the highest magnitude when put on the MW band. It`s a shame that money has talked people into what I predict as the final death rattle of the AM BCB. I still don't think people will handle the noise on their analog radios well. I would like to see E-147 or TV channel 14 given to digital radio where conditions are better for it and there will be less screaming about interference (Kevin Redding, AZ, NRC-AM via DXLD) I too just looked at it a couple days ago. My major concerns are: (1) How will multipath affect the signal, especially in a moving car at the edge of the primary coverage area? Multipath is not a problem with analog, but it could be a major problem with digital reception. (2) Cost of the receiver: I for one am not willing to spend an extra $100 to get digital AM. If anybody is, please give me your bank account information so we can set up a deal for transferring Nigerian oil revenues. (3) And of course, what it will do to nighttime reception of distant stations. We've talked about it mainly as a problem for DXers like us, but I wonder how many people out there are Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Detroit, etc. transplants and want to listen to baseball games and such on the flagship stations. And what about truckers listening to stuff like Truckin' Bozo? What's going on here is a complete redefinition of AM from a service providing regional coverage to one akin to FM and limited only to a 30-50 mile radius. That ignores a significant technical attribute and advantage of the present AM service (Dave Hochfelder, NJ, NRC-AM via DXLD) Try 25-30 miles instead of 30-50 - or at least that's what some folks are saying they don't care about anything beyond (Russ Edmunds, Blue Bell, PA, ibid.) HAH! In most major markets that's not even 1/4 of the suburbs. Those some folks are just rationalizing crummy coverage (Powell E. Way, ibid.) ** U S A. Here's a little more on WUSF-FM... they are still broadcasting analog as well by the way. I haven't had time to give it a good listen on multiple radios to see what if any anomalies on adjacent channels might be (Terry Krueger, FL, DX LISTENING DIGEST) WUSF-FM GOES DIGITAL WUSF-FM 89.7 in Tampa has begun transmitting a digital signal, the first station in Florida and the first public station in the country to do so. But listeners will need new radios to notice the difference. Digital radio promises CD-quality sound for FM, static-free AM and new data features. It is not the same as satellite radio offered by XM and Sirius, and it does not require a subscription. Radios capable of receiving the digital signals are expected to cost about $100 more than traditional receivers. Commercial stations in the Tampa Bay area, including those owned by Infinity Broadcasting and Clear Channel, announced in January that they would offer digital signals. They are expected to start transmitting soon. Story also at: http://www.sptimes.com/2003/02/26/Business/Business_today.shtml (© St. Petersburg Times published February 26, 2003 via Terry Krueger, FL, DXLD) I really wonder what this will do to FM? I suppose anybody that`s an engineer and is familiar with the process might know. In case you would like to read more about this report, the URL is http://www.broadcastsignallab.com/digital.php3 (jim thomas, wdx0fbbu, milliken, colorado WTFDA, via DXLD) Unlike digital TV, IBOC digital radio *is* backwards-compatible.[0] WUSF will continue to be DXable on standard radios for the foreseeable future. From what I hear FM-IBOC *does* mess up the adjacents just as IBOC-AM does. But I've not heard it myself. ====================================================================== The various DX propagation modes are independent of modulation technology. If the Es MUF from Toronto to Tampa is 93 MHz, then a signal transmitted from Tampa on 89.7 *will* reach Toronto. If the Toronto listener has the appropriate receiver, they *will* receive the signal. The big question is how the modulation scheme will respond to co- channel interference. Will the analog sidebands of CIUT-89.5 (which are, after all, on the *same frequency* as WUSF-IBOC's lower digital sidebands) make reception impossible? Good question. The other question is how long it will take an IBOC receiver to lock in on a broadcast - how long a signal must be present before audio is output. This will of course have a dramatic impact on whether meteor-scatter DXing of IBOC is possible. For digital TV it's looking like 2-3 seconds is enough to get an image - marginal for Ms. I suspect digital radio will lock much faster; I suspect Ms DXing of IBOC *will* be possible. ====================================================================== [0] at least as long as they operate in "hybrid mode". IBOC also offers a "digital-only" mode which is *not* backwards-compatible. I know of no stations using that mode. (with the possible exception of Ibiquity's experimental operations) (Doug Smith W9WI, ibid.) ** U S A. WESTWOOD ONE AND NBC NEWS ANNOUNCE THE FORMATION OF NBC NEWS RADIO --- Tuesday February 25, 3:27 pm ET Reports Featuring Tom Brokaw, Brian Williams, John Seigenthaler and Other NBC and MSNBC News Talent Will Begin Airing March 31, 2003. Westwood One and NBC News announced today the debut of NBC News Radio featuring content, programming and leading journalists from the top rated television news network, beginning on March 31, 2003. For the first time in the history of network radio news, newscasts will be fully anchored by top television news talent. NBC News Radio newscasts will be anchored by, among others at NBC and MSNBC, Tom Brokaw, Brian Williams and John Seigenthaler. Westwood One's NBC News Radio will be comprised of one-minute reports fed hourly each weekday from 6 a.m. - 10 p.m. EST. NBC News Radio will also provide one-minute special reports during breaking news events and affiliates will have the opportunity to simulcast breaking news from NBC and MSNBC. NBC News Radio correspondents will also provide custom reports for major market radio stations. In addition to the news updates, NBC News Radio will include sportscasts, features and entertainment feeds. "As the need for world and national news increases, the demand for comprehensive, top quality news content for radio continues to expand," said Joel Hollander, President and CEO of Westwood One. "We are proud to offer to radio stations the unprecedented opportunity to hear NBC newscasts that are fully anchored by NBC and MSNBC's world class news personalities." "This partnership makes great sense for us," said Neal Shapiro, President of NBC News. "The power of NBC News already extended across the broadcast network, our cable channels and the Internet -- now we can add radio to the list. NBC has a storied history in radio. NBC News Radio gives us the opportunity to write some new chapters." For more than 70 years, NBC News has been the primary source of global news and information for generations of radio listeners, television viewers and Internet users, providing immediate coverage and in-depth reporting of major events. Operating around the clock, NBC News has bureaus in key cities in the United States and overseas. NBC News provides more than 25 hours of weekly programming in the United States, including the No. 1-rated broadcasts "Nightly News with Tom Brokaw," "Today," and "Meet the Press." The network also produces weekend editions of "Nightly News" and "Today." "Dateline NBC" is the signature broadcast for NBC News in primetime three nights a week. Also under the NBC News umbrella is MSNBC, the 24-hour cable news channel and Internet service launched in 1996, and primetime programs seen on CNBC, the nation's number one financial news and information cable network. Westwood One provides over 150 news, sports, music, talk, entertainment programs, features, live events and 24/7 Formats. Through its subsidiaries, Metro Networks/Shadow Broadcast Services, Westwood One provides local content to the radio and TV industries including news, sports, weather, traffic, video news services and other information. SmartRoute Systems manages traffic information centers for state and local departments of transportation, and markets traffic and travel content to wireless, Internet, in-vehicle navigation systems and voice portal customers (via Fred Vobbe, NRC-AM via DXLD) NBC radio network returns in March. [red or blue??] http://www.westwoodone.com/news_nbc.asp (via Brock Whaley, DXLD) Wow, a minute of news (including commercial?) by Tom Blokaw on the radio! I can hardly wait! For the newbies, NBC was once a great radio network, including news, before Westwood One got its mitts on it --- and most of its `competitors` (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) NBC TO PRODUCE RADIO NEWSCASTS WITH WESTWOOD ONE Tue February 25, 2003 04:29 PM ET NEW YORK (Reuters) - NBC News said on Tuesday it would team up with Westwood One Inc., a producer and distributor of national radio broadcasts, to produce short radio newscasts with the likes of anchors Tom Brokaw, Brian Williams and others. Starting March 31, the venture dubbed NBC News Radio will feed hourly one-minute-long broadcasts on weekdays from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. on weekdays from NBC's anchors. During big breaking news events, it plans to simulcast breaking news from NBC and MSNBC. NBC is owned by General Electric Co. Westwood One is managed by the Infinity radio broadcasting arm of Viacom Inc., which also owns the CBS television network. It also syndicates news radio programs from CBS, CNN and Fox News (via Brock Whaley, DXLD) ** U S A. Amateur Radio Station W4EHW [at the National Hurricane Center]...will adopt a new call sign, WX4NHC, on June 1 at the start of the new hurricane season. Ripoll [Julio Ripoll, WD4JR, the NHC's assistant Amateur Radio coordinator] said that, although the W4EHW (``Early Hurricane Warning``) call sign has been associated with the NHC's ham station since the start of the working relationship between the Center and the Dade County Amateur Radio Public Service Corps, the new call sign would give ``better on-the-air recognition, as WX is understood to mean weather, and NHC is well-known for `National Hurricane Center.``` He also said the change was in compliance with a trend among weather-related ham stations to use the WX prefix (ARRL February 26 via John Norfolk, OKCOK, DXLD) ** U S A. TARHEEL SWL/SIG NET Raleigh Amateur Radio Society North Carolina http://www.rtpnet.org/~rars/netsked.htm RARS Net Schedule [excerpts] Tarheel SWL/SIG Net Monday evening at 9:00 p.m [EST = 0200 UT Tue] is the Short Wave Listening (SWL) Special Interest Group (SIG) on the 146.64 repeater to discuss the shortwave listening. Don't think that they stop there though. Topics literally range from DC to Daylight listening, including shortwave, VHF, UHF and beyond. All areas of Radio Monitoring are covered including commercial Broadcast, Military, Aeronautical, Utility Clandestine \ Pirate, and Public Safety freqencies [sic]. Remember that even though the Tarhell [sic] SWL SIG meets the third Monday of the month, but the net will still be held on that evening. RARS Amateur Radio News Hour Sunday Evenings at 8:15 pm, enjoy an hour-long broadcast of the top Amateur Radio news programs available. Be sure to stop by for the ARRL Audio Newsletter, and The Amateur Radio Newsline. Always the latest news and enforcement updates from the FCC (via John Norfolk, OKCOK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) UNIDENTIFIED. 1710, Lubavitcher Radio?, 0641 26 Feb, Talk or lecture by a man in a language I couldn`t identify. After 0700 ethnic sounding music, but again couldn`t really tell the origin. Weak signal, not enough to work with. I don`t have a good antenna for this frequency. Have other stations been logged on 1710 kHz? Recent low solar activity has provided good lower band DX (David Hodgson, TN, DX LISTENING DIGEST) UNIDENTIFIED. 3927 15/2 2310 R. KORAK INTERNATIONAL - MX ID E BUONO (Roberto Pavanello, Italy, hard-core-dx et al. via DXLD) A one-line logs, lacking in detail. What`s this, a pirate? E presumably means English (gh, DXLD) UNIDENTIFIED. Caro Glenn, Segue um arquivo gravado da emissora UNID em 4890. Foi feita em um raro momento em que pareciam transmitir algo local, ao invés da programação cansativa que é apresentada. Perceba claramente citação a Huanta e Juliaca no Peru , além do espanhol ter o acento peruano neste momento. O resto da programaçao é certamente uma retransmissão. O que acha? 73 (Samuel Cássio Martins, Brasil, Feb 26, DX LISTENING DIGEST) I too hear Juliaca mentioned. Will take a few more tries to pull much more out of it. Obrigado (Glenn Hauser, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ CONVENTIONS & CONFERENCES +++++++++++++++++++++++++ AIB GLOBAL MEDIA BUSINESS 2003 Dear Colleague, I am delighted to tell you that the AIB Global Media Business 2003 takes place at the Royal College of Surgeons, Lincoln`s Inn Fields, central London, on Tuesday 29th and Wednesday 30th April. I do hope that you will be able to attend this important event, which is *the* conference and exhibition for the international broadcasting and global media industries. The Global Media Business 2003 brings together professionals from around the globe involved with international broadcasting. Speakers come from major players in the industry, including the BBC, Discovery Networks, Radio Netherlands, Clifford Chance, Convera, CASBAA and MTV. Alongside the sessions there is an exhibition of the world`s leading companies demonstrating the latest technologies for international and cross border broadcasting. Simon Spanswick, AIB Chief Executive, comments ``The AIB`s Global Media Business conference 2003 offers delegates and exhibitors alike the opportunity to debate the latest issues facing our industry at a time of enormous change and uncertainty. The full spectrum of technologies will be on display, along with expert guidance from companies, consultants and associations, all helping to inspire delegates from across the globe to enter discussions and debate the real issues that face the industry.`` Delegates are already registered from countries worldwide, including Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, the UK, USA, Czech Republic, Germany and Poland. You can join them for this invaluable two day event by registering now - and as a not-for-profit organisation, the AIB has kept the conference fee as low as possible! Full details are on the new AIB website, at http://www.aib.org.uk where you can download the delegate registration form today. There are a limited number of sponsorship and exhibition opportunities remaining and I will be happy to discuss ways of making the AIB Global Media Business part of your marketing plan. Please do not hesitate to contact me to explore how we can work together. I look forward to meeting you in London in April. Regards, Kerry Stevenson, Director, Sales and Marketing Association for International Broadcasting kerry.stevenson@aib.org.uk T +44 (0) 20 8992 7073 F +44 (0) 20 8852 0853 M +44 (0) 7768 610110 About The AIB The Association for International Broadcasting is the not-for-profit trade association for the cross-border broadcasting industry. Its growing membership reflects the diversity and the ever increasing significance of this multi-billion dollar worldwide industry sector. The AIB provides a range of services to its members, from lobbying through representation to consulting. It publishes a quarterly magazine, The Channel, which is read by more than 4,000 senior executives in more than 100 countries. The AIB`s monthly eNews service reaches almost 10,000 decision-makers worldwide. Comprehensive information about the Association is available online at http://www.aib.org.uk DIARY DATE Global Media Business 2003 29-30 April, London, UK Web: http://www.aib.org.uk Email: kerry.stevenson@aib.org.uk Organiser: The Association for International Broadcasting (via DXLD) PUBLICATIONS ++++++++++++ EDXP ANTENNA FORUM I thought I was doing him a favor by publicizing this in last issue, but Bob Padula is incensed at me, since it is NOT open to the public, just EDXP members. I assumed it was open since I got to it without a password. He`s changing the setup so riffraff can`t get in. I am so sorry (Glenn Hauser, DX LISTENING DIGEST) PROPAGATION +++++++++++ GEOMAGNETIC INDICES Phil Bytheway - Seattle WA - phil_tekno@yahoo.com Geomagnetic Summary January 21 2002 through February 25 2003 Tabulated from email status daily Date Flux A K SA Forecast GM Forecast Etc. 1/21 134 17 3 minor no storms 7 22 130 18 5 minor minor 7 23 136 18 3 minor minor 7 24 130 15 3 minor minor 7 25 129 26 2 minor minor 7 26 125 17 3 no storms no storms 8 27 121 10 3 no storms no storms 6 28 126 12 2 no storms no storms 5 29 124 12 3 no storms no storms 7 30 121 23 1 minor minor 6 1/31 120 13 1 minor no storms 6 2/ 1 126 11 3 minor minor 9 2 127 34 4 moderate minor 8 3 127 34 4 moderate minor 8 4 133 17 3 no storms no storms 8 5 135 16 2 minor no storms 7 6 140 9 1 no storms no storms 7 7 150 14 3 minor minor 6 8 147 11 2 no storms minor 6 9 139 12 3 no storms no storms 6 10 141 14 2 no storms no storms 8 11 136 16 3 no storms no storms 6 12 135 10 2 no storms no storms 4 13 132 9 3 no storms no storms 9 14 131 7 3 no storms no storms 6 15 131 19 2 minor no storms 6 16 124 18 3 no storms no storms 6 17 119 13 3 no storms no storms 7 18 112 12 3 no storms no storms 6 19 110 18 3 no storms no storms 6 20 116 12 3 no storms no storms 8 21 118 17 3 no storms no storms 8 22 120 13 2 no storms no storms 6 23 107 12 2 no storms no storms 7 24 104 10 2 no storms no storms 4 2/25 102 6 1 no storms no storms 7 ********************************************************************** (IRCA DX Monitor via DXLD) ###