Sputnik-
Norway is all set to become the world’s first nation to drop FM radio for good and switch over to digital-only transmissions. Whereas politicians and technology aficionados hail the cutting-edge digital solution, ordinary Norwegians are none too happy about this decision.
Two thirds of Norwegians (or 66 percent) were found to oppose the FM switch-off, a survey by pollster Ipsos found earlier this week.
The controversial decision to become the first country in the world to shut down its FM radio network was made back in 2011, by the Norwegian Labor Party. Earlier in December, a last-ditch attempt to postpone the looming shutdown of Norway’s FM radio network failed in Norwegian parliament.
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More bureaucrats thumbing their noses at the majority of the people’s wishes.
They say other countries are looking into doing this.
Why?
ht/ fdr in hell
I quit listening to commercial radio a decade ago. I listen to streaming radio, but as of late I prefer silence. And classical music.
That is a complicated question due to the many methods of transmitting digital audio. FM is still a very good transmission method that can rival digital broadcasting from a fidelity standpoint when compared to relatively low bit-rate digital (Satellite radio for instance). Yes there is no picket-fencing with Digital and yes it is possible to transmit good audio digitally, however if the money guys have a say in it they will reduce the bit rate to minimum mid-fi rates to reduce bandwidth as there is no standard of quality that must be met in the U.S.
In Europe Terrestrial Digital is a different story since it is State mandated.
Over here the FCC threw their hands up and said “let the market decide”
It used to be that Technical Standards were decided by lab and field testing along with a consensus of Engineers. Now it gets decided by whoever bring the most lawyers to the table. Be careful what you wish for.
@Jewel – A good FM station, one with a signal of -60dBm (moderately strong) or better can deliver good quality audio with a good receiver and a decent antenna to reject multi-path.
And how is this any different then when the US switched from analog TV to digital TV broadcasting?
How would this look? Would we no longer have radio while driving? I don’t listen to it, I use my iPod to listen to talk radio podcasts, but my girlfriend likes her country station in the car. At home, of course, everything comes through the internet connection or digitally through saved files on the computer, flash drives and the occasional CD.
“They say other countries are looking into doing this.”
Monkey see: Monkey do.
That’s a piss-poor excuse to do ANY-FUCKING-THING!
izlamo delenda est …
I use FM, AM, and satellite. But mostly I use vinyl; digital sources are not up to snuff, they are ‘flat.’
It’s hard to flip the record over when I’m driving.
Around here, it’s classical — and SiriusXM’s one classical channel that tries to be everything to everyone. In other words, not of much use. Moving toward FM and our own CDs. Same for in the car.
I’m pretty much against ditching FM, or AM radio for that matter. I listen to FM in the car for both music and news, and I don’t see any good reason to go to satellite radio when I’m more interested in local stuff. Then, there’s also the idea that *any* form of radio communications would be necessary in a disaster. Getting rid of them is not a good idea IMHO.
Are Norway’s broadcasters state owned? If so, then the government will do what it wants. I don’t see this happening in the US with President Trump in office.
FM is for the little people.
@Corona December 25, 2016 at 11:10 am
I never had any trouble flipping the record when driving. I sometimes spilt a bit of my martini. But it all worked out in the end.
Why does that radio have 1600 on the left and 550 on the right? Usually their positions are switched. And it should be 540, not 550. Now that I’ve gotten your attention, allow me to correct your grammar.
“Nooooooooooo!!!”
Perhaps let the market decide? Government chooses poorly.
Where does govt get the authority to claim ownership of, and therefore total control over, big bands of the electromagnetic spectrum?
Al,
They TOOK it. They have NO authority – they have POWER.
(but you knew that – I understand that it was a rhetorical question)
izlamo delenda est …
Where would NPR go if it weren’t for FM broadcasting its commie and progtard programming?
I depend on AM & FM to report my local conditions, especially in a storm. I also use FM to keep an eye on the enemy, NPR
Digital radios are expensive – somebody wants a piece of the profits.
The new digital police scanners run around $500 for a decent one. So the cost to scan went up five fold with digital.
I live so far out on the frontier that I can’t get any radio. Wouldn’t bother me a bit. I listen to Sirius in the car and stream everything else through the internet.
Why replace an analog system that works very well and uses receivers that use little power, with a digital system that will not work nearly as well and requires receivers that use far more power?
An decent portable analog receiver can function for many hours, continuously, on a pair of AA batteries. A digital receiver will use more power than this in one hour, and will probably not work with AA batteries.
Digital radio is worthless crap.
This is another example of worthless societal parasites hijacking a regulatory body to serve the need of the parasites, rather than serving the needs of the host society.
We got XM on our new Honda cars and let it expire after the three month trial period. They give free teaser trials two or three times a year in attempts to woo new subscribers. We play it during these time periods.
It is good and clear except when traveling along a road with trees along the side. Since we live in tree hugging canopy road Tallahassee, that means it goes out a lot.
As someone stated earlier, Rush doesn’t broadcast on XM.
Nope, I live in Guam. Depend upon the radio
frequencies for typhoons and storms.
Where is the money coming for this? Who’s
getting paid?
FM ain’t what it use to was, lost it’s character when the bean counters decided they didn’t wanna pay djs and went drone.
There are so many extremely talented musicians that never get play and can’t quit their day job because the executives push their lip sinking……oh, don’t get me started…..
I like a wide variety of music, especially the Jazz forms, thanks to stumbling onto FZ as a kid in the 60s.
Digital has turned out to be a good thing for TV, much more variety of old shows on specialty networks. Free.
Maybe digital will bring back the variety once available on FM.