Norway goes Digital, eliminates FM radio

[Kevin Vahey]

Meanwhile Industry Canada is slowly approving HD FM transmitters in Canada.
Of course the lack of consumer HD receivers available will doom the format
from catching on as has happened in the US.

http://blog.fagstein.com/2017/01/07/cite-fm-hd-radio/

On Wed, Jan 11, 2017 at 10:12 PM, Garrett Wollman <wollman@bimajority.org>
wrote:

> <<On Thu, 12 Jan 2017 01:45:37 +0000, Michael Wilkins <
> wilkinsmg@hotmail.com> said:
>
> > What is the future of FM here in the states?
>
> There is nothing coming down the pike, regulatory-wise, to replace
> it.  The band will keep on getting packed with more and more stations
> (and more and more unlikely directional patterns) to get the maximum
> analog coverage until it becomes uneconomical.
>
> If it's not gone completely by mid-century, it will have happened only
> because that spectrum just isn't that valuable for any of the possible
> competing uses.
>
> In countries that have successfully transitioned radio to digital, a
> few factors apply:
>
> 1) Stations licensed on a national basis with a universal-service
> obligation.
>
> 2) A small number of broadcasters dominating the media landscape,
> including state-owned broadcasters.
>
> 3) A sufficient amount of favorable spectrum available to allow a
> out-of-band digital service.
>
> 4) A regulatory policy that favors signal parity over competitive
> advantage between broadcasters serving a particular area.
>
> 5) A regulatory policy that separates transmitter ownership and
> operation from programming.
>
> Canada tried to implement Eureka 147 a decade and a half ago, with
> little success: none of these factors weighed in favor.  They were
> closest on (4) and (5) but Canadian regulation is much more about
> preserving the economics of incumbent broadcasters, with whatever
> signal constraints they may have, rather than equality, and while they
> do have separate licensing bodies for transmitters (Industry Canada)
> and programming (the CRTC), the two licenses have to be held by the
> same operator.
>
> In the UK, where all of those factors do pertain, the DAB
> implementation went much better -- although unlike Norway they haven't
> yet killed off analog broadcasting entirely.
>
> -GAWollman
>
>