BBC License Fee - Gone - 2027

[CTListener]

I really did miss the best of the shortwave era, and it sounds like you recieved some nice commercial ones. I can recieve Radio New Zealand on their higher frequencies here in the Western US (usually 13.840 and 11.725), and it has servicable content, but not like three decades ago.

Shortwave is one topic about which baby boomers like me aren't spouting BS (unlike, say, music). Until the '90s, the low bands were crammed with signals every night and the high bands were busy every morning and afternoon. You never knew what you'd hear on the tropical bands. Even outside the broadcast bands, there was much more activity -- more utility stations, more aircraft communications, more hams, and if you were reasonably close to the coasts or the Great Lakes, plenty of maritime activity in the 2 mhz band, including ship-to-shore phone calls. The end of the Cold War started the decline of SW broadcasting and the internet made sure it would be terminal.

 

[TomásEstefan]

Having been born and raised in W.N.Y., I can assure you that is not true! Buffalo's PBS WNED TV is far more
viewed in Southern Ontario OTA than CBLT, the CBC affiliate for the Toronto region. Aside from "Hockey
Night in Canada," I can't even remember one other program I ever watched on CBC. WNED viewership
in Southern Ontario is so great that it receives more donations from there than in W.N.Y. Of course, the
population in Southern Ontario is greater...... How do you measure "impact?"

Do you mean that over the years, you've never watched "The National" on CBC TV? Particularly when it was hosted by Peter Mansbridge? You been missing a truly top-notch news program, one of the finest in the English speaking world...

 

[Prescott Joe]

Do you mean that over the years, you've never watched "The National" on CBC TV? Particularly when it was hosted by Peter Mansbridge? You been missing a truly top-notch news program, one of the finest in the English speaking world...

On occasion I'd watch it but only when there was some unusual world event and to get a somewhat different perspective.
Mansbridge, in my opinion, was NOT spectacular. In fact, I thought he was highly overrated. I believe more Canadians
watch ABC, NBC or CBS newscasts than The National. CBC has had a difficult time over the last few years.
They have shut down transmitters, consolidated operations, cut staff and sold off assets to
remain solvent. CBC programming brings little, if anything, new and exciting to the table and their ratings show it!