Category Archives: Current Events

NASB & DRM USA Annual meetings, Birmingham, Alabama

USA NASB logoI attended and presented at the NASB meeting last year at Radio Free Asia’s headquarters in Washington DC. It was an amazing meeting and great opportunity to talk radio with industry leaders. You should consider attending an NASB meeting if your schedule allows. Here are the details:

(Source: NASB Newsletter)

The 2013 Meeting will take place May 15-17, 2013 at EWTN Television in Birmingham, Alabama.

Registration for the meeting is free of charge, and it is open to anyone with an interest in shortwave broadcasting or listening. To register, fill out our online registration form at www.shortwave.org/meeting/meeting.htm or send your name and e-mail address to Jeff White at radiomiami9 [ a t ] cs.com.

As usual, the NASB Annual Meeting will be held in conjunction with the DRM-USA platform on May 15-17, 2013, at the headquarters of NASB member EWTN (Eternal Word Television Network) in Birmingham, Alabama. NASB President Glen Tapley, Terry Borders and other EWTN staff members will welcome shortwave broadcasters, listeners and anyone with an interest in shortwave radio to the Birmingham venue.

Arrangements have been made for hotel accommodation at the nearby Holiday Inn Express for a price of $75.00 plus tax, including breakfast daily. The Holiday Inn Express Irondale (a suburb of Birmingham) is about a half-mile from the TV network, the location for Thursday’s meeting and tour of the TV studios. The hotel will provide a free shuttle service to and from EWTN and a continental breakfast. EWTN will provide lunch Thursday. On Friday, participants will take a 40-minute trip to the WEWN shortwave transmitter site high in the picturesque mountains surrounding Birmingham, and the radio staff will have a cookout on the hill for attendees. EWTN is looking forward to your visit!

TENTATIVE AGENDA FOR NASB 2013

WEDNESDAY EVENING
Reception at hotel with cocktails (including non-alcoholic) and hors d’oeuvres for all participants, sponsored by the Holiday Inn Express

THURSDAY
Meeting takes place at EWTN TV station 9:00 am-5:00 pm
The meeting will be opened by the EWTN President/CEO
Tour of TV plant
Lunch at TV plant
Afternoon presentations: DRM talks, AJ Janitschek of Radio Free Asia (on “Green Engineering”); Dr. Dowell Chow, President of Adventist World Radio; Mike Rosso, Vice President, and Dave Hultsman of Continental Electronics; Mark Allen of Rohn Tower Company; and Jerome Hirigoyen of Télédiffusion de France about TDF’s Issoudun transmitter site

FRIDAY
Tour of shortwave transmitter site – vans will pick up at the hotel. Remarks by Terry Borders.
Cookout on the mountain for lunch
Back to TV plant for business and board meetings (or on the mountain if agreeable)

HOTEL RESERVATION DETAILS

Room reservations need to be made at the Holiday Inn Express by April 16 to ensure the group rate. After that, reservations can still be made, but only based on availability. There is no cancellation fee if the reservation is canceled by 6 PM the date of arrival. Otherwise there is a one-day charge.

Attendees simply need to e-mail: [email protected] with the Subject: NASB Reservations

The hotel will send confirmation within 24 hours. The price is $75.00 per night plus tax.

Those who do not wish to use e-mail can phone the hotel at (205) 957-0555 and request to speak with Adrian or Margarita.

Information you need to provide in your e-mail or by phone:

  • Name of Guest(s):
  • Email/Phone Number:
  • Check in/out dates:
  • Estimated time of arrival:
  • Preference of room type (King or Two Queen Beds):
  • Number of People in Room:
  • Method of Payment: (Do not provide credit card number with e-mail. The Holiday Inn Express will contact you later for that information.)

If you have any questions about the 2013 NASB Annual Meeting, or would like to sponsor an event at the meeting, contact Jeff White at [email protected]

NASB Members:

  • Adventist World Radio
  • Assemblies of Yahweh
  • EWTN Shortwave Radio (WEWN)
  • Family Stations Inc.
  • Fundamental Broadcasting Network
  • Radio Miami International
  • Trans World Radio
  • World Christian Broadcasting
  • World Wide Christian Radio

NASB Associate Members:

  • Antenna Products Company
  • Babcock International Group
  • Continental Electronics Corporation
  • Far East Broadcasting Co.
  • Galcom International
  • George Jacobs & Associates
  • Hatfield and Dawson Consulting Engineers
  • International Broadcasting Bureau
  • Rohn Products, LLC
  • TCI International, Inc.
  • Telediffusion de France (TDF)
  • TDP (Belgium)
  • Thomson Broadcast & Multimedia

Annual C.Crane sale on “orphan” radios

CCRaneOrphansI just received an email announcing a sale on C. Crane “orphan” products; customer returned products that C. Crane inspects and gives a full 60 day money-back guarantee and full 1 year warranty. This sale has almost become an annual one and offers great bargains.

I have purchased C.Crane orphan products in the past and have never been disappointed.

The Orphan Sale lasts until February 19th and includes both of their excellent shortwave radios (the CC-Radio SW for $119.95 and the CC-Radio SWP for $34.95). That’s a very low price for both—especially the CC-Radio SWP (check out our review here).

I’m very tempted to buy their CC Witness Plus ($119.95) simply so I can record medium wave with an all-in-one device. (It would be a dream machine if it could record shortwave as well.)

Three things you can do to honor World Radio Day 2013

DSCN2988wtmk

Children in South Sudan listen to their favorite shortwave program, VOA Special English. (Photo: ETOW partner, Project Education Sudan)

From my previous posts today you’ll already know it’s UNESCO World Radio Day–a day to celebrate the relevance of radio in the 21st century. Here are some ideas of how you can celebrate and make a difference with radio:

  1. Send a shortwave radio, care of Ears To Our World. You can send one self-powered shortwave radio to a classroom or community in the third world for as little as a $40.
  2. Sign the petition to keep RCI Sackville from being dismantled–Senator Hugh Segal is in the process of holding the CBC accountable for slashing RCI’s budget. Add your voice to support this cause.
  3. If you’ve heard my recording for UNESCO regarding the relevance of radio, you may also like to visit World Radio Day’s webpage and listen to what others have to say about the relevance of shortwave radio. Share this page with your friends.

…Oh, and one more thing:  you can turn on your radio, and listen.  World Radio Day is a young international holiday, but I’m most encouraged to see how it is receiving increased media attention each year.  This is a wonderful, meaningful hobby–and a worthy cause–so, enjoy!

Happy World Radio Day!

Cheers,
Thomas

Voice of Russia: World celebrates all-uniting role of radio

WorldRadioDay(Source: Voice of Russia)

February 13 is World Radio Day. It’s a young holiday, just two years old, established on the initiative of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 2011. Representatives of all of the world’s major radio broadcasters, the Voice of Russia among them, have gathered at the UNESCO’s central headquarters in Paris to celebrate World Radio Day.

February 13 is not a random date. On that day in 1946, Radio UN aired its first broadcast. In his World Radio Day-2013 message, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that as a boy growing up in a poor village after the Korean War with neither phones nor television people still had something that connected them to the world outside their small village – they had radio. Since its invention more than 100 years ago, radio has sparked imagination and opened doors for change, entertaining, informing, promoting democracy and connecting people wherever they are, and “in conflict situations and times of crisis, radio is a lifeline for vulnerable communities,” Ban Ki-moon remarked.

About 95% of all people throughout the globe listen to radio regularly, chief of the UNESCO’s Communication and Information Sector Mirta Lourenco told the Voice of Russia:

“Radio remains the most easily accessible mass media. You can listen to it in the remotest corners of the Earth. Thanks to radio, people who cannot read or write have access to information. Radio plays a crucial role in emergencies, natural disaster warning and during rescue operations. For the UNESCO, World Radio Day is the acknowledgment of the tremendous use of which radio has been to humanity over more than a century.”[…]

Read the full article at the Voice of Russia website.

Attend the 26th Annual Winter SWL Fest

For those of you readers who often feel you’re alone in your enthusiasm for radio, I highly encourage you to attend the NASWA-sponsored SWL Fest in Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania this year. The ‘Fest is jam-packed with radio-related information and attended by many radio kindred spirits.  Forum topics this year will include the following :

  • From the WBCQ Archives – Larry Will

  • The Annual Pirate Forum – George Zeller
  • QRP: Operating and Listening at Low Power – Skip Arey
  • Economically Enhancing Your Collection thru Auctions and Flea Markets – Ed Mauger
  • Defeating Jammers with Text By Shortwave – Kim Andrew Elliott/Thomas Witherspoon
  • The Shortwave Shindig – David Goren (Friday night confirmed)
  • The Other Side of Satellite Monitoring – Dave Marthouse
  • More! All About Loop Antennae – Jef Eichner

If you’re interested in attending the SWL Fest, too, go to the official website and register!

Radio documentary on history of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation

ABC reporter, and later RN documentary maker, Tim Bowden on patrol with a US Marine squad near Da Nang in Vietnam. (1966) [Photo: ABC ]

ABC reporter, and later RN documentary maker, Tim Bowden on patrol with a US Marine squad near Da Nang in Vietnam. (1966) [Photo: ABC]

(Source: John Figliozzi via InternetRadio Digest)

ABC Radio National will broadcast a weeklong series highlighting the history, development, key moments and future of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation on the occasion of its 80th Anniversary, from December 24-28.  Details from:

http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/specialbroadcasts/abc-80th-anniversary/4373618

There is a 16 hour difference between New York and Melbourne during our standard time winters; 19 hours between Los Angeles and Melbourne.  “Live” broadcast, therefore, will be at 2 am, Dec. 23-27; repeated at 9 am, Dec. 24-28.  No word yet on whether or for how long a podcast of this series will be made available.

John Figliozzi