Shortwave Radio Is Dead -- Wait-a-minit, it's still ALIVE

My Grundig G2, which has been my go-to SW radio since September, 2014.

I am a member of several radio DX internet forums, and periodically the subject of Shortwave Radio comes up. And it's understandable. Most people who are into long distance radio listening are into Shortwave Radio, or were into Shortwave Radio when they were younger.

It sort of goes with the territory. I'm more into MW/AM listening, but I still tune the SW bands periodically, seeing if there is anything to hear. I used to also tune the SW Ham bands, but I haven't done that in over a year. Last time I did, they were more or less MIA.

All that said, over the past week or so I've been pleasantly surprised that I've been able to hear some distant SW stations once again on my trusty Grundig G2, which is about as sensitive off its whip as my DX-398 is using a 25 ft. indoor wire (10 meters, roughly). The G2 also has great selectivity (for broadcast radio) and it sounds great through headphones.

WHAT IS 'SHORTWAVE RADIO', SOME MAY ASK?

For those who aren't aware of what Shortwave Radio is, it is a form of radio broadcasting that uses higher frequencies than the MW/AM band. Shortwave also is peculiar in that it 'reflects' off of the ionosphere, allowing broadcasts to be received -- day or night -- thousands of miles / kilometers away. Generally, the lower SW frequencies work better at night for long distance listening, and the higher SW frequencies work better during the day for long distance listening. And SW, in general, works better when the sun has a lot of sunspots, because that determines how 'reflective' the ionosphere is to radio waves.

The Passing of The World Radio-TV Handbook

And lately there has been a lot of talk on the radio DX forums about the future of Shortwave Radio, as well as the miserable propagation conditions lately, and whatever the Solar Cycle seems to be doing. Some of the talk is prompted by the recent decision by the famed DX annual book, The World Radio-TV Handbook, to stop publishing after this year.

I have two copies of the WRTH -- one from the late 1980s and another from the early 2000s. As the publication was a little expensive for my needs, I only bought it when I felt I really needed it for foreign MW station listings. Still, it is a sad thing when a SW or DX publication goes dark. I still have my copies of the long gone magazines Monitoring Times and Popular Communications. We have entered a new era where everything is online. The trouble is -- the internet isn't only affecting DX publications. It's also affecting DX itself, as more people in various parts of the world use the internet for audio, instead of radio.

And online, a lot of DX'ers have used the passing of the WRTH to talk about the future of Shortwave Radio itself.

Generally, in such discussions, I have been more pessimistic than optimistic. That said, my last big blog article about SW said 'Get 'Em While You Can!' In other words, switch on your radio, see what's out there, because in 20 years SW may well be history, and by then, even MW might be disappearing. 

Shortwave Is Dying, Like Radio Is Slowly Dying -- BUT IT'S NOT DEAD YET!

That said, even though I am pessimistic (realistic?) about SW right now, I still try to remain optimistic. There are times that -- even now -- things can be heard. You just have to tune into the right SW band at the right time... And get lucky.

Last year things appeared so dismal on SW that I was lucky if I heard anything more than Brother Stair and Cuba on 31 and 49 meters... There were times even WWV was barely readable, and even occasions when WWV was completely MIA -- something that never occurred even ten years ago.

A few weeks ago it was much the same -- and I would pick up WWVH instead of WWV, which was something that never happened until a year or two ago. When I was a kid, I never heard WWVH, and WWV was always local or regional strength, as dependable as the sun rising tomorrow. And it didn't seem to make a difference where the Sunspot Cycle was -- cycle up or cycle down, WWV was like Old Faithful. But that definitely has NOT been the case with WWV over the past year or two, though.

IT IS ALL ABOUT THE SUNSPOTS!

Since the Solar Cycle dipped in 2016-2017, it seems that SW conditions went downhill fast.

A NOAA graph of the last two Solar Sunspot Cycles, Cycle 23 and Cycle 24, showing the peaks of Cycle 23 at the far left side of the chart (two high spots during 2000 and 2002). Near the right hand side, you can see the 'twin' peak sunspot levels of Cycle 24 -- the most recent cycle -- during 2012 and 2014 (the years are designated at the bottom of the scale). The sunspot numbers were starting to dip late in 2016 until they hit bottom during that wonderful year, 2020. :-)

Now it seems that the sunspots are trying to improve. And over the past week, I have been hearing some unique signals coming from the opposite side of the world -- on just my Grundig G2, which is my go-to radio when it comes to SW listening, as it's very hot off the whip antenna and the sound is great on headphones.

As most SWL's know, the Shortwave bands depend on Sunspots, as does the Medium Wave band to a certain extent. Solar output varies with each Sunspot Cycle, and each Sunspot Cycle is 11 years long, going from minimum to maximum to minimum.

When the sun has a lot of sunspots, solar output is higher, and the ionosphere -- upon which SW and MW depend for long distance listening -- is more energized, which reflects (or refracts) signals back to earth, sometimes thousands of miles away. Consequently, long distance radio conditions were much improved when the sunspots were up from 2011-2015 or so.

Starting in 2016, the 11-year sunspot cycle started dipping. In other words, there were less sunspots, and at the same time, the Sun was decreasing its output. And, as it turned out, our last sunspot cycle was poor, when compared to previous sunspot cycles. Even at its peak in 2012-2014, the sun was lower in solar output than it had been the previous two sunspot cycles. In fact, some solar scholars think that the next two cycles may be even lower at their peaks -- and that we may be headed into a "Dalton Minimum", where the solar output may be low enough to reduce crops.

SUNSPOT CYCLES AND REDUCED CROP YIELDS

There is an Indian news outlet ("WION") that had a feature story on China's government urging its people to stock up on food. Although the Indian news service had no answer to the question why that would be happening, I wonder if the solar cycle issue has anything to do with it? Do the Chinese know something about sunspots and crop cycles that we don't know?

Here is a graph from Electroverse.net, showing the pattern of Sun Cycles over the past several hundred years. Some solar scientists think that the next two solar cycles may be low, even at their peaks. The last time this happened, there were longer Winters, shorter Summers, and crop failures.

I did a search on Solar Sunspot Cycles and crop failures. I did manage to find at least one study that had been done by the USDA in the late 1970's, where they compared crop yields in the US Midwest, Plains, and Texas to the sunspot cycles. They discovered that crop yields were typically lower during the dips in solar cycles. Although the actual solar output differences between sunspot peaks and lulls, when measured at the Earth's surface, are relatively small, such changes apparently do affect crops and even possibly the weather.

Here is a link to the study. It is available for download in PDF form:

https://naldc.nal.usda.gov/download/CAT76674961/PDF

Those of us in the radio hobby already know that the Solar Cycles affect MW and SW. But over the past three to four years I've noticed the greening of the trees in early Spring, which used to always occur around April 5th, has been delayed by about a week during 2018, 2019, and 2020, and it was delayed by about two weeks during our cold Spring here in 2021. Whether the reduction in solar output was related to the trees being late, I simply do not know.

Here is a NASA article explaining how, during low sunspot periods, the solar output is actually reduced, although it appears that the increments are low.:

https://climate.nasa.gov/blog/2953/there-is-no-impending-mini-ice-age/

Here is a chart from NASA showing the increases in the Earth's surface temperature, and also the decrease in Solar Irradiance over the past decade.:

NASA chart showing Temperature increasing since about 1960, and Solar Irradiance decreasing since about 1980. (Courtesy of NASA)

Either way, with the new Sunspot Cycle approaching, we're headed into a cluster of years where there will undoubtedly be a lot more sunspots than we've had the past three to four years. But will this new cycle be better than the last two, or worse? I guess that time will tell.

Another chart from Electroverse.net, which shows the predictions made by a couple Indian solar scientists, Singh and Bharwa, concerning the future trend of lower and lower sunspot peaks during the 11-year Solar Cycles that radio hobbyists pay attention to. When sunspots are low, not only is radio affected. But other things, like crop yields, might be affected also.

Here is a link to an article mentioning the study taken by the two Indian scientists, Singh and Bharwa, where they suggested we may be headed for a new Dalton Minimum.:

A. K. Singh and A. Bhargawa: "Solar Cycles 25 and 26 [will be] very similar to the Dalton Minimum" - Electroverse

So, as we can see, the solar activity (or reduction of it) can affect our lives in many ways, not just for long distance radio.

IT CAN ONLY GET BETTER

Whether the new Solar Sunspot Cycle, "Cycle 25", will be better or worse than other cycles, is almost immaterial (aside from weather and crop effects, of course). This is because for us in the radio hobby, it can only get better from here, right? 

Meaning, Shortwave reception will be better, and MW reception at night should get better also. I remember in 2011 and 2012, which was when the last sunspot cycle, Cycle 24, was near its peak, I could hear Mexican station XEPE 1700 Khz as late as 10 or 11 a.m. on some mornings, and I could hear 1640 KDZR Portland nearly all day. Even in 2015 I could sometimes hear 1660 KBRE, Merced, California coming in (with its Rock music) during the mid to late afternoon! The radios I used were my Yaesu FRG-7 on a low, low, 150 ft. wire. But even my Superadios could pick up these stations at the same time, with readable signals, with an external loop. When I heard KBRE as early as 4:30 p.m. during the late summer it was on my Sony XDR boombox off of a three foot (one meter) hank of wire.

Being that XEPE at the time was ESPN, and KDZR was Radio Disney (playing pop music), it was fun listening to them so late in the morning or early in the afternoon. And KBRE's rock music is always fun to listen to.

When the sunspots began to dip in late 2016 that all started to change -- and for the worse! And SW, which is more dependent on sunspots than MW, got even worse.

Now -- if what I've been hearing over the past few mornings is any indication -- it just might be changing back!

THE HEARING OF MADAGASCAR!

My Panasonic RF-B45, which I recently discovered does fairly well on SW off the whip, much better than many of my other SW portables, although the G2 beats it slightly in readability. Where the 

RF-B45 really shines is MW -- it's nearly unmatched in overall MW performance. Recently, on SW, I was able to hear MWV New Life Station, broadcasting in Russian from Madagascar, on this radio, as well as my G2 -- and just off the whip. Although my RF-B45 had stronger signals, the G2 was a little more readable, probably because of the DSP chip inside.

Seattle, where I live, is at 47 degrees North and about 120 degrees W of the Prime Meridian. The opposite side of the world from Seattle is somewhere in the Southern Indian Ocean, maybe 400-500 miles from the icy, cold French island and research colony of Kerguelen (49 degrees South, 70 degrees East). The closest inhabited places to Kerguelen that have radio stations are Mauritius, Reunion, South Africa's Kwazulu-Natal coast, and Madagascar.

And of those particular countries, only Madagascar has SW transmitting facilities. South Africa used to have a big transmitter in Meyerton, south of Johannesburg. But that facility shut down. The closest SW transmitters to South Africa are in Botswana, just north of the South African border (used by VOA), and I think Eswatini (formerly Swaziland) also still has some SW transmitters.

Any time I hear a Shortwave station from that part of the world it is a fun experience, because I'm hearing something from the opposite side of the world. Back in the 1970's I used to periodically hear Radio RSA, from South Africa, hearing some of their rock music and folk music, as well as lessons in Afrikaans. And during the early 2000's, I sometimes heard Trans-World Radio (a religious station) broadcasting from South Africa also.

But I'd never heard Madagascar, until this week!

My Realistic, Radio Shack 200629, which I sometimes use to tune the SW and SW Ham bands, by either attaching an external antenna like the one shown in the picture, or I just clip my 25 ft. indoor wire to the whip, using the radio's attenuator if needed. I use this radio more on MW/AM than SW, but if I want to tune the ham bands, I'll use this radio or my DX-398, because my Grundig G2 doesn't have a BFO or SSB capability.

In fact, I heard three different stations from Southern Africa during the same week -- MWV New Life Station broadcasting in Russian to Eastern Europe from Madagascar on 9885 Khz (1843 UTC); Adventist World Radio broadcasting in French from Madagascar to Africa on 9515 Khz (2009 UTC); and the Voice of America broadcasting in Tigriyna from Botswana (9485 Khz, 1912 UTC). I also heard China Radio International broadcasting to East Africa in English from Mali on 11640 Khz (2030 UTC). From Asia, the Voice Of America was broadcasting in Korean to the Far East from the Philippines on 9800 Khz (1858 UTC). 

It reminded me of some of the mornings I would SWL before the sunspots plummeted in 2016.

I may include some of these loggings in more detail in another installment of my "Shortwave Loggings" blog section I started with my last blog article.

My hearing of the stations from Madagascar and Botswana were a sort of Christmas present, I suppose, but they also were a reminder that even when atmospheric conditions seems to be questionable, you never know what you're going to hear when you switch on your radio!

EXPECT TOUCH-AND-GO CONDITIONS FOR THE NEXT 3-4 YEARS

The only conclusion I can reach, is that during these bizarre solar conditions -- as the sunspots slowly build in number over the next couple of years -- there will be days and nights with some amazing catches, and others where the SW band sounds like Nuclear Winter conditions. Some nights I have tuned across the 31 meter band (9300-10000 Khz), and heard nothing but buzzy static. Even WWV doesn't come in. Other nights or mornings I might hear Voz Missionaria on 9665 Khz or some of the stations I mentioned earlier in this blog post.

It's probably certain that for the next 2-4 years the SW spectrum will be spotty like this. Hopefully, when the sunspots kick in around 2025 or so, it will be a decent cycle where there will be something to hear on the SW bands -- because 20 years from now, I fear there won't be any stations on SW to hear.

The reception of these new stations recently has increased my interest in Shortwave, and I thought I would run down some of the extra 'tools' I use when DXing the SW bands.

SOME CHEAP, EASY-TO-USE, AND HANDY TOOLS FOR SWLing

I have found over the years that some of the old-school SWLing tools are the easiest to use, and some of them aren't ever mentioned in SWLing articles or magazines. For those readers who don't want to be surgically attached to their computer or smartphone while listening to their radio, some of these helps might be of interest.

One of them is a tablet computer, with a SW Frequency list loaded in its browser. Yes, although a small tablet computer is still a computer, it's a little less intrusive than carrying around a laptop with you wherever you listen to your radio.

I have a Kindle e-reader, which also has an internet browser. I usually keep it handy when I tune the shortwave bands -- although I keep it switched off when I'm not actually using it. The Kindle puts out a minimum of RFI when turned on, which is helpful. And I always have the latest EiBi SW Frequency list pulled up on my Kindle's browser, which shows the entire listing even if the Kindle's WiFi is switched off. The browser keeps the EiBi listing stored on an always-open tab.

My smartphone also will pull up EiBi, but the listing looks unreadable on my smartphone's screen when compared to my Kindle, so I use the Kindle for that reason.

So -- if I hear an UNID ("unidentifiable") signal on my G2 or other radio, I'll pull up the EiBi listing on the Kindle's browser, and I can scroll through the frequency listing to see if any of the languages and ID'able info matches. 

Another useful 'tool' is to learn to ID languages, even if you can't speak them. You can do this by listening to them online, to learn to identify them, or perhaps listening to local radio broadcasts in other languages -- get the 'feel' for their sounds, and use online translators to learn key words, like 'noticias' (Spanish for 'news') and 'hai' (Hindustani and Punjabi for 'is').

I am pretty good at IDing languages -- even languages I do not know have some identifiable characteristics. For example, Chinese has a 'sing-song' characteristic, and there are certain vowels, consonants, and dipthongs the Chinese use that sound very distinctive. Southeast Asian languages sound a bit similar -- to the Western ear -- but they each have their own, different sounds, too. Russian (which is heard here in the PNW on the MW and SW bands a lot) has its own unique sounds. 

To the American, English-speaking ear, Korean sounds a little like Chinese and a little like Japanese, but frequently the announcers will end words in "-mnida", which is the polite form of word endings, often used by Korean broadcasters. Japanese is fairly easy to ID, but even easier when you hear words ending in "-mashta," which is a polite form word ending in that language -- which I've frequently heard on the radio.

Here in the US, Spanish is easy to ID, as it's spoken by many people here. Portuguese sounds similar, except they have more 'zh' and 'sh' sounds in their language. 

South Asian languages, mainly Hindustani and some other related languages like Punjabi and Urdu, have frequent use of the word "hai" ("heh") which is their word for "is" or "be".

African languages each have their own sounds, and some of them are more difficult to ID than others.

Arabic uses the syllable "-wah" a lot, which is a word or syllable the denotes possession. They also have a lot of "ah" sounds in their language. Still, it's not easy for me to ID Arabic sometimes. But little clues like these, along with getting to know the sounds of the languages, can help you ID the language, which can often help you ID a station.

But any IDing of a language can help you ID a SW broadcast or SW station, and learning to ID a language isn't all that difficult once you get the hang of it. So, next time you're listening to a SW station broadcasting in a foreign language, listen to the sounds of the words. In time, you'll be able to ID languages that way.

This is a page out of my DX Logbook, on an evening where I weakly heard the Portuguese language preaching and music of Vox Missionaria, a station on 9665 Khz located in southern Brazil, in the state of Santa Catarina. I used to use a spreadsheet to keep track of my better loggings, but that 'habit' only lasted maybe a year. The cool thing about paper logs is that spiral notebooks are cheap, don't use batteries or electricity, and all you need is a pen.

Another old-school tool is a spiral ring binder notebook, like the one I use to keep notes while DXing. This way I don't need to keep my laptop computer handy, and don't have to worry about keeping it powered up, draining its battery, or worrying about it putting out RFI. I often transfer the best catches I've logged in my notebook to an Excel DX Logs spreadsheet. But I haven't done that since the sunspots dropped in 2016, as I lost interest.

A World Atlas is also a handy, cheap-to-use tool, if only to see which countries you are hearing. If you acquaint yourself with the geography of an SW broadcast's target nation, sometimes you can pick out the names of cities, states or regions of the country where the station is located, or the country that is being targeted. If you don't have a world atlas, a good online map can also work.

Here are a couple pictures of my Realistic DX-390 -- a Sangean ATS-818 with Radio Shack's badge on it. I used to use my 390 daily and nightly to listen to either Shortwave broadcasts, or ham radio guys talking using CW (Morse Code) or SSB (sideband transmissions). The top pic is of the back of the radio, showing the rough, but useful "world time zone" map that used to be placed on the backs of SW radios in the 1990s. In 1998 Sangean then began putting them in the radio software -- you would press a button and toggle through the names of major world cities and the radio would tell you what time it was there. This could help DXers determine hours of darkness in various places to help them ID stations, or tune to target areas without needing a 'grey line map', which weren't exactly plentiful or cheap in the 1990s.

This bottom pic is of the front of my DX-390. The handle broke years ago. You'll notice the radio says "Voice Of The World" on the lower corner of it. This is what these radios promised you back then -- you could literally hear the world. It was a big thing back then, and fun. Now, with the internet, you can "hear", and communicate with, the world. That is, when people aren't yelling at each other on social media about their politics.

A chart with time zones is still a handy, cheap tool. No RFI inducing computer or laptop computer needed. For quite a few years, Sangean, Radio Shack, and some other manufacturers put a time zone chart on the back of their radios. Some radios, like the DX-398 / Sangean ATS-909 series of radio, have World Time Clocks included, where you dial up the name of a major city and it gives you the local hour there. This can help you determine if there is enough darkness between you and your target region to hear a station.

For example, if it is midnight where I live, and I am hearing a station in the 49 Meter Band, chances are high that I am not hearing a station that is located where it is high noon, because the 49 Meter Band doesn't work well for long distance broadcasts during the daylight hours.

If you don't have a SW radio with a time zone chart printed on the back of it, or included as a feature you can bring up on its display, most World Atlases have time zone charts included.

This is my little Replogle world globe. I got it in the late 1990s for maybe $10, at a map store in Downtown Seattle that no longer exists. Globes used to be easy to find at stationary stores (which no longer exist) and the school supply sections of box stores. Alas, they are no longer easy to find and online many of them seem expensive. Sometimes you can get one at a thrift store. They are a handy, analog tool that can provide Great Circle Routes, Time Zones, and help you determine how far away a SW station is -- all at just a glance.

Last but no least, a Small World Globe can be a useful tool for an SWL DXer. A globe can quickly and easily help you plot the great circle route between your location and that of various SW stations you either want to hear, or think you may be hearing. If you're hearing a fluttery, choppy SW station, and you're in the northern tier of the US, or in Canada, chances are high you may be hearing a station coming in over the Polar Route, where the radio Auroral Zone can affect the signal. A globe can easily show you whether the Polar Zone is in between you and your target station or not.

A small World Globe can also give you an instant, almost 'real world' view of distances and bearings between you and target stations, something you can quickly see just by a glance at the globe.

If you don't have a globe, some "Great Circle Maps" can be found online, but I've found it easier just to get a globe and use that. New globes are starting to get a little pricey, but used globes can sometimes be found at thrift stores at reasonable prices.

OLD-SCHOOL STILL WORKS QUICKLY

Most of these 'tools' have their online and computer analogues -- for example, one could use a 'grey line' map instead of a globe and time zone chart. But I like to SWL the old fashioned way, with as little RFI as possible, and I find it quicker to use a notebook, pen, globe, time zone chart, atlas, etc. than to have a computer nearby that may add RFI to my reception.

In my case, I use a computer after the fact -- to log down my best catches, and put them either in a frequency log for MW, or a station log for SW.

A WHITE BOXING DAY!

In other news, my Christmas -- which I haven't talked about here, really -- was very quiet, as was my New Year's (and yes, many of us here in the PNW region of the US call it "New Year's"). Christmas was sort of rainy and dreary, and I spent part of it typing up a blog post here, and the rest of it doing some DXing, some reading, feeding my cats, playing some slide guitar, and doing some fiction writing. My extended family decided to forego Christmas gatherings because of the pandemic (Omicron), and they had snow. The next day, Boxing Day, it began to snow in my region south of Seattle. And it didn't stop.

Often we may get a little sprinkling of snow -- maybe an inch or a couple centimeters -- and it will rain soon afterwards and the snow will disappear. But not this time! The snow stayed for several days.

Now, here in the U.S. we don't celebrate Boxing Day. Most Americans don't really know what Boxing Day is -- it's something those of us near the Canadian border sometimes hear about, as it is mentioned on Canadian radio a lot, but we still don't understand the origins of the English holiday. Supposedly, Boxing Day was the day after Christmas when rich people would leave out food and other goodies on their porches for poorer people to pick up. In some parts of Northern Europe, they call it Annandag Jul -- "second Christmas day", where people go out and party a little. But here in the US we don't really have a special day between Christmas and New Year's.

A look down a street towards the hills, after a snowy Boxing Day, 2021.

Either way, it started snowing on Boxing Day, and it got cold -- it was below freezing, and stayed there all through the week until the day after New Year's. The coldest it got at my house was 15F / -9C. Several nights it was between -3 and -6C (in the 20's F). Pretty cold for Seattle. 

Surprisingly, it didn't feel as cold as the usual 40 degrees and rain we get here during the Winter, maybe because the air was dryer.

My Snowman -- the first one I'd made in years. He lasted about a day and a half.

It was nice having the snow, actually. Something different from the dreary, cold and grey skies and dripping rain. I didn't ride my bike in the snow because it was so cold there was too much ice on the streets, so I went out for some walks, talked to a couple neighbors who were also out walking, and I even made a small snowman!

He was the first snowman I have made since I was a little kid. No sooner than the rains kicked in after New Year's was over with, my snowman disappeared. Either that, or some local kids might have kicked him down.

About a week after Boxing Day, on January 2nd, it began to warm up from below freezing to 40 degrees F again, the snow on the streets turned into slush, and it began to rain. And it's been raining ever since. 

:-(

And with that high note, I shall close this blog article, the fourth for 2022, a year I really do not expect to be much better than 2020 or 2021 were. If the pandemic starts actually lifting, hopefully things will look better overall. However, there is the threat of war in Eastern Europe, and that doesn't look good. Hopefully, war does not happen.

Even though this year hasn't been terrific, I intend to make the best of it. But I really don't have many awesome expectations. This decade -- the 2020's -- so far, has sucked big time.

I hope that this article finds all of you healthy and safe. 

Peace.

C.C., December 31, 2021 and January 7 & 28, 2022. Some pics added February 23rd.

The Sad Passing of Yet Another SW & MW Website -- The BCB DX Logger and SW Daily Logbook

My Realistic DX-440. In 2002-2003 I had this connected to a 100 foot wire, and heard the world -- especially on the "Asia Pipeline", when signals from all over Asia would pound in here into the PNW (Pacific Northwest of the US). During that time, I posted almost 2-3 time a week to the SW Daily Logbook.

A few months ago, I posted an article here on the demise of Yahoo's eGroups, many of which were useful for MW DXers and SWL radio aficionados. About the same time, I also posted an article about the sad passing of electronics box store Fry's.

Now, it appears another valuable tool for MW and SW DXers is gone -- DXWorld's BCB DX Logger and Shortwave Daily Logbook (DXWorld.com, not the ham oriented site DXWorld.net).

Apparently there was some issue in keeping the DX sites alive, because the two resources (along with several other sister pages dedicated to ham bands, VHF, FM-TV DXing and Longwave) have been 404 for one month now.

The BCB DX Logger was an old-school looking web page where maybe 15-20 MW DXers posted their new loggings -- whether unusual stations heard, or new stations heard. It was relatively anonymous but most of the guys had nicknames. There was also a Shortwave Daily Logbook I used periodically when I heard something cool on the Shortwave broadcast bands. That page allowed for a lot more description of what you heard. I usually left fairly extensive descriptions of my loggings.

Starting around January 22nd, the BCB DX Logger and SW Daily Logbook, along with their sister DX sites, went all 404. For a while DXers thought it was just going to be down for a week or so. But that, sadly, is not the case.

Although it's just one cluster of sites, it's still very sad when they leave the internet. One less place to go to post what you've heard, and what radio you were using. One less platform for the DX 'community' to gather and trade loggings.

It seems to match the ongoing trend of once popular DX websites disappearing into the ether. One similar, popular AM-DX site (which may have had that particular name -- I can't remember, unfortunately) was taken down in 2013-2014 or so -- it had a useful listing of every AM Band radio station in the US and Canada. Several months before closing the site down, its owner said he was losing interest in the MW DX hobby, and he said he was thinking about taking the site down. Then he did. I've also noticed that some of the radio and DX hobby forums I used to go to are gone, including a Canadian one, and some others have little to no new postings.

Before the AM-DX site I mentioned went down in 2013-2014, I was able to copy their entire MW frequency listing, and I still use that list -- in text file form -- to this day. I always update it when and where needed -- mainly updating new calls, slogans, formats, etc. for the West Coast stations I hear when DXing.

This deletion of a DX site isn't totally unexpected, as some other DX forums are seeing less and less activity, and one wonders if and when their days are numbered. Whether this is due to lessening interest in the hobby, or DXers increasing lack of interest in internet forums -- or people leaving the DX hobby, perhaps -- is a good question. Even some still-active forums are seeing less activity than they did 10 years ago. Blogging and forums in general are seeing less activity online. I've seen numerous blogs online that have not been updated in months, or even in years in some cases. 

Tastes obviously change in internet use as well as other pastimes.

My Panasonic RF-B45, one of my main MW DX radios. When I used the BCB Logger after 2011, this was one of my main DX radios.

As for the BCB DX Logger, I first discovered it in 2011 or 2012, when I got back into the radio hobby after about a 6-7 year lapse. At the time -- thanks to the high sunspots -- I was hearing a lot of activity on the MW band, and was logging new stations almost every week. During the time period 2011-2015 I probably logged 150 new stations. Obviously, I posted a lot of them on the BCB DX Logger.

During the same time period (2011-2015 or so) I was hearing a lot of cool stuff on the SW bands. I posted some of my loggings to the SW Daily Logbook.

The Shortwave Daily Logbook I discovered about ten years earlier. In the Fall of 2002 I got re-enthused in my SWLing. I started doing a lot of it early in the morning, when the Asia "pipeline" would be pounding away, full blast. I had a 100 foot wire antenna (30 meters) strung out back from the house, and I was hearing all sorts of interesting signals. Sometimes I'd heard a Chinese provincial broadcaster (the CNR station in Hohhot, Inner Mongolia, for example) with AIR India behind it! The fact that both stations had such divergent programming really helped in IDing. For ID help, I used Monitoring Times, PopComm, Passport and WRTH, as well as some online webpages.

There is nothing like hearing China's programming in Mongolian to Inner Mongolia (Nei Menggu) and AIR India phasing in together through your headphones, on the pleasing fidelity of a Realistic DX-440, to enjoy the best of the radio hobby!

I also found the 40 meter ham band and nearby 41 meter SWBC band to be gold mines for all sorts of cool DX.

This was when I discovered the Daily Logbook. I began to log my catches on the Logbook at least once or twice a week. There was another DXer from Guernsey in the UK Channel Islands, a gent named Robin Banneville, who also posted a lot of logs from his location. He used an Icom R-75. I was using my DX-440, DX-390, DX-398, DX-370 and Panasonic RF-B45.

I was posting new loggings, and DXing every morning, for about six months. And every cool new logging I would post on the Daily Logbook. There was a lull in my DXing life starting in 2004-2005 that went until 2011, and during that time I didn't SWL much, and didn't post anything on the Logbook. Starting in 2011, I started posting again, whenever I heard something new. At that time, I was using an indoor wire, because my outdoor one blew down in a windstorm, although I was using mostly the same radios.

But Mr. Banneville, who was a frequent poster on the Logbook, had mostly disappeared by 2011, and the Logbook was looking sparer and sparer, especially over the past 6-7 years, when the sunspots dived and MW and SW conditions dived along with them. I posted less, naturally, because of the numerous evenings and mornings where I heard nothing aside from Cuba and a couple US domestic SW stations, along with static. 

There were also times when the BCB DX Logger saw less activity, although it was still fairly active during the Northern Hemisphere Winters.

Now it all appears to be gone.

It is a sad time. It appears that yet one more internet DX 'haunt' goes away.

Being that the Daily Logbook is gone, I decided that periodically I will post my DX loggings here on my blog. I will either add them to the bottom of my other posts, or have separate blog posts with some of the loggings listed. I know that someone else's SW and MW DX logs are of marginal interest, but it also helps keep the DX flame alive if DXers appear enthused about the hobby. 

When I post my loggings here, I will do it in the style and general format used by the SW Daily Logbook, i.e., Frequency, UTC, name of Station, Country, Language, SIO (Signal, Interference, Overall reception), Description, Receiver and Antenna, and -- finally -- Date of Reception.

In all of my loggings, "tt" means Tentative logging, UNID means Unidentified station, UNR means "unreadable signal" (which I will rarely, if ever use here, because it's sort of pointless to put in loggings), LL means language. F after the SIO means "Fading", FF means fast fading or polar flutter fading. "Tx." means transmitter, as often an International broadcaster (like the VOA and BBC) use transmitters in Africa, the Philippines, Ascension Island, etc.

My trusty Grundig G2 FM-AM-SW mini boombox radio, which is terrific on SW, even off the whip antenna. I have been using it for most of my SW listening since I got it in 2014, including some of the loggings I have posted below.

I guess I should start my first installment of loggings (SW and some MW) here:

Some Shortwave & MW DX/SWL LOGS, January-February 2022:

7040 khz - 1830 UTC - Russian Navy 'K' marker beacon - RUSSIA (Astrakhan) - SIO242 - Was tuning the 40 meter ham band with my Panasonic (BFO on) and heard "K K .... K K K" in weak but fairly clear CW, with some of the characters fading into the ether. There was momentary interference by some ham radio op using LSB. (Panasonic RF-B45, 25 ft. indoor wire). 2 January 2022.

7050 khz - 1848 UTC - K7MM/KJ7DWXZ ham QSO - USA (Western part) - SIO353 - Heard my first ham QSO in slow CW in a long time. I wasn't able to read all the Morse Code (CW) characters because of fading, but one guy said it was "COLD". (Panasonic RF-B45, 25 ft. indoor wire). 2 January 2022.

7215 khz - 1906 UTC - tt China Radio Int'l - CHINA - (Cantonese) - SIO2-353 - Was tuning through the 41 Meter SWBC band and heard what sounded like Chinese Vaudeville show. Some idiot ham, who apparently was angry that China was using the 41 Meter band, said "I know it's Korea because of the language I'm hearing". It clearly wasn't Korean language. One would think hams would know more about Shortwave Broadcasts. Oh well. According to EiBi this broadcast probably was CRI in Cantonese to the Far East. (Grundig G2, whip antenna) 2 January 2022.

9620 khz - 1927 UTC - tt AIR India - INDIA (Bangalore) - (UNID LL, prob. Arabic) - SIO-252FF - Heard Middle Eastern music scales sung by a woman, and unison strings also playing in a Middle Eastern scale. Unison strings are where a lot of different stringed instruments are playing the same exact notes. It's not common in Western music. EiBi lists this as AIR India to the Middle East in Arabic. (Grundig G2, whip antenna) 2 January 2022.

9800 khz - 1941 UTC - tt Voice of America - USA (Philippines tx.) - (Korean) - SIO-353-4 - I heard symphonic music pieces here. Later on, I heard a woman speaking Korean. I could definitely ID the language by the "-mnida" endings to some words (a Korean polite language custom). EiBi lists this as VOA in Korean to the Far East from the Philippines. I heard this VOA station in Korean again a couple days later on January 5th, at SIO-252-3, 2033 UTC, with a news program including soundbites in English. (Grundig G2, whip antenna) 2 January 2022.

1700 khz - 0832 UTC - XEPE - Baja California MEXICO - (Spanish) - SIO-353-4 - XEPE is a station just over the border in Tecate, BCN, Mexico. For a while they were ESPN, but now they are owned by Mexican broadcasters "Heraldo Radio", and XEPE plays music overnights -- mostly 2010's pop, Disco, and some other 'classic hits'. This particular evening I heard Joan Jett's "I Love Rock and Roll," Usher's 2010 dance music pop hit "DJ Got Us Falling In Love Again" with Pitbull's rap bit in the middle, and then George Michael's 1990 hit "Freedom". Overnights XEPE plays music with frequent "Heraldo Radio" ID's by a woman in Spanish. They play a lot of interesting pop hits from the past. (Grundig G2, Crate Loop antenna). 5 January 2022.

11930 khz - 2047 UTC - Radio Marti - USA (Florida) - (Spanish) - SIO-454F - Heard a man talking in Spanish with a Cuban accent... "Europa... La America Latina... Cubano... Norte Americano..."  Then a woman was talking. Later there were references to Radio Marti. Marti ID's a lot, by referring to their station's slogan "Marti".  (Grundig G2, whip antenna) 5 January 2022.

11965 khz - 2054 UTC - tt MYE African Pathways Radio - USA (Madagascar) - (English) - SIO-1-252F - Heard a man speaking in what sounded at times like English, with mentions of "Creation" and "God". Into Canadian rock band The Guess Who's 70's hit "No Sugar Tonight" and then folk song with choral singing, with answer and call style singing. Then a guy was speaking, and there was a short piece of music on some strange sounding instrument, then the station was instantly OFF at 2059 UTC. EiBi lists this as MYE African Pathways Radio, broadcasting to West Africa in English from a transmitter in Madagascar. I've heard a fair bit of these sorts of broadcasts to Africa from Madagascar lately. (Grundig G2, whip antenna) 5 January 2022.

11900 khz - 2011 UTC - tt Voice of America - USA (Sao Tome y Principe) - (French) - SIO-554F - I tuned in to a 2000's era rock song that sounded like 3 Doors Down, a song called "Here Without You." Then there was a quick segue to a country-rock sounding track. Then there was a man talking in African-accented French. Then they played a sad pop song from the mid-early 2010's, Passenger's "Let Her Go". EiBi lists this as VOA in French to West Africa from Sao Tome y Principe, a small island country off the coast of Africa. (Grundig G2, whip antenna) 8 January 2022.

12075 khz - 2016 UTC - tt Voice of America- USA (Botswana) - (French) - SIO-354 - Tuned in to pop music sung by a woman, followed by a male announcer speaking accented French. Then another pop song (I hadn't heard before) was played. This signal was parallel to 11900 at the time.  (Grundig G2, whip antenna) 8 January 2022.

11640 khz - 2021 UTC - China Radio International - CHINA (Mali, Bamako) - (English) - SIO-1-252F - Heard a man talking in English with an American accent. The signal was weak, with fast fading, but clear enough to decipher the English words, as well as the accent. EiBi lists this as CRI in English to East Africa from Bamako, Mali. I must have been hearing some of  the signal off of the back side of their beam. The 25 Meter SW band was really active this morning. (Grundig G2, whip antenna) 8 January 2022.

Well, that's it for this installment. I'll post a few more at the bottom of my next blog article. 

I love the fact I've heard stations from Africa and Madagascar, because the first Shortwave radio station that I ever heard was South Africa's Radio RSA, which used to broadcast to the Western US on the 25 Meter Band during our afternoons. They always had a pleasant "Interval Signal", which had a bokmakierie bird singing and a sad sounding, Afrikaner folk tune ('Wer In Die Wereld Kitty') played on a folk guitar. Radio RSA, and Channel Africa which followed it when the apartheid regime fell in 1992, used to broadcast to the world on SW from Johannesburg. Their transmitters were in Meyerton, a small city south of the Witwatersrand, near the Orange River in what is now Gauteng Province, South Africa. 

This is a master tape of the Radio RSA "Interval Signal". For non-radio aficionados, "interval signals" were used by Shortwave broadcast stations to start a broadcast, usually running these sound clips in a loop, giving distant listeners a chance to tune their radios to the station clearly, before the actual broadcast began. Most SWBC stations used these interval signals. The Voice Of America played (and still plays) a version of the American folk tune "Yankee Doodle".

Here is a sound clip of the Radio RSA interval signal as it actually sounded on the air.:

Regardless of the distaste one felt about apartheid and the South African government policies during that era, the folk guitar tune and bokmakierie bird's sound was enchanting. It carried well over the airwaves.

The Meyerton transmitter, used by Radio RSA, Channel Africa, and other international broadcasters who used it to reach parts of Africa, is now long gone.

Southern Africa, Madagascar, Mauritius and Reunion are the closest continuously inhabited places to the exact opposite point on the globe from WA state in the US (that opposite point is closer to Kerguelen Island, but that island is only partially inhabited by some French scientists). So -- hearing any radio broadcast from that area of the world is like hearing the farthest radio signal possible.

IN CLOSING

Right now, it's still fairly cold out here in the Seattle area, although the constant rains we had since October have diminished. The average temperature is still 40F / 4C. Sometimes it "warms up" to 50F / 5C-6C. I won't complain, though. I just heard the weather report for Calgary, Alberta, Canada (on all news CFFR 660 Khz, which pounds into the Seattle area on all my radios) and their high for this weekend was to be -15C. That is COLD.

I hope this finds everyone doing well. 

Peace out to all,

C.C. February 21, 2022.

The Death of The Mass Media, and Why It Is Bad for America

The Seattle Times newspaper... The remaining print, daily newspaper in the Seattle area. Tacoma still has one, Everett still has one -- but most of the suburban papers, which were bi-weekly, or weekly papers, have long since folded. The Seattle Times' competitor, the Post-Intelligencer, went online-only after the Great Recession hit. I still buy copies of the Seattle Times now and then because I shall rue the day the print edition disappears. I grew up with newspapers. I wanted to work at a newspaper. I did for about a year, working in production. I even wrote a news story that was published in the now defunct West Seattle Herald. Now it seems like eons ago, and not just in years -- the print era was a different era.

Over the past several years, there has been much talk about the polarization of media, especially the news media in the US. As politics in the United States has become more polarized, people have begun to prefer their favorite news sources over those which may favor opposing viewpoints.

If I had a dollar for every time I've heard the phrase "I bet you got that from Fox News" I'd easily be 100 dollars richer. Now, I don't watch TV, so I don't watch cable news networks. I get my news from the radio, and some online sources -- generally news aggregators. I have my opinions, but I try to keep my mind open about things. As I worked for 20 years in the news and broadcast media, I am a little dismayed at some of the directions it is taking. But, at the same time, there are positive aspects to the change. 

I think what we're seeing is the dismantling, and in many respects, the democratization, of the mass media. The "mass media" doesn't seem so "mass" anymore.

As the older media -- newspapers, magazines, radio, TV networks -- start to fade in importance, increasing numbers of Americans get their news from online sources, be it a cable news video posted online, or a news aggregator like MSN or Yahoo news.

Although the shift of journalism going online hasn't necessarily killed journalism, there are some very disturbing trends, not just in journalism, but also in broadcast and music media -- all related to the change from old media (newspapers, paper books, radio and TV, CD's, DVD's, movie houses, etc.) to the new media (everything being internet "content").

Exit the Big Singing Star

A couple weeks ago I wrote a post here about the decline in the hit music industry, describing how the recording companies are having issues adjusting to the new, online music paradigm. I also suggested that the lack of great new hit music might be a result of this change.

There are fewer and fewer really big singing stars. That is partly because the recording and entertainment industry has less of a hold on the American music consumer than they did even 10 years ago, when Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, Justin Bieber, Kesha, and Pitbull were household names, and were turning out great hit music.

Now, even radio professionals admit that there are no more big singing stars. The loss of the big stars hurts the music industry, as it reduces visibility for their product. There no longer are famous faces to promote the industry as a whole. 

There has been a drastic shift from music purchasing (i.e. buying CDs, MP3's and the like) to the streaming subscription model. We see this trend in software and even books (with Amazon leading the way with their "Kindle Unlimited", eBook subscription model). This has cut into revenues for many artists and authors.

More Books = More Competition

In the case of book publishing, the subscription model, as well as the rise of the easily produced, paper-free, and independently produced eBook has caused the book publishing pie to get bigger, while each author's slice is smaller. Many in the independent author trade have seen the effects of this increased competition even since 2011 and 2012, when there was an eBook boom.

An example of the 'blockbuster novel', circa 2011. James Patterson is a prime example of a top-selling author who knows how to adapt with the times. He practically invented the idea of using TV advertisements for selling novels. Then he sped up production of his novels, by using co-writers. Almost half of the books in his 'backlist' (listed on the last several pages of the book in this picture) were co-written, with Patterson doing editing and refining. He changed the concept of the sole author into the idea of the author as a 'brand' -- where his name and style are the 'brand', with production being turned over largely to a team of co-authors. His idea of fast and frequent book production, by using a team, is copied by probably thousands of other authors today. 

However, Patterson -- and other top authors like him -- now have literally thousands of competitors, thanks to the democratization of book publishing. There used to be the 'Big 5' publishers and a few hundred smaller book publishers in the US. Now, technically, there are thousands of independent publishers -- many who sell thousands of dollars' worth of books a month -- thanks to the E-Book, and thanks to the new Internet Book Publishing Model.

...And Ad Revenue Drops

Along with this 'subscription model' trend, advertising revenues and royalties have dropped for individual media platforms -- the overall pie has enlarged, but each individual slice gets smaller and smaller. Newspapers took a massive hit in the late 1990s-early 2000s when free, online classified ads took a huge chunk out of their revenue. Major daily newspapers used to have maybe ten pages of classified ads, each ad running a week or so, costing maybe 3-5 bucks. When online, free ads became popular, a single daily newspaper probably lost thousands of dollars of revenue every month. 

One prominent newspaper owner stated in an interview that "[free online classified ads] destroyed the daily, and the weekly newspaper business." He saw revenues dive as soon as prominent online classified ads took hold nationwide. He wasn't alone.

Here is an article that backs up that newspaper owner's opinion. It claims that daily newspapers received up to 40% of their revenue from classified ads, which dried up after online, free classifieds became popular.:

Craigslist took nearly $1 billion a year away from dying newspapers | The Week

Deregulation and Recession Take Their Toll

At roughly the same time, the music and broadcast industry took hits from the 2008 Recession and the great online boom. Radio advertising revenues were cut by nearly 50% between 2005 and 2020, and radio employment was slashed by over 20% during the same time period. Over the same 15 years, royalties had dived for most recording artists, because the streaming model just doesn't pay as much as CD, LP, Cassette, and MP3 sales did. Musicians are always complaining about the low streaming royalties. But the streaming platforms can only charge so much for subscriptions, and can only pay out so much in royalties, so they can stay afloat.

And because no one buys music anymore, that source of income has disappeared.

As one can tell, the entire world of what we used to call Mass Media -- radio, TV, newspapers, recorded music, books, movies, videos, and journalism in general -- has taken a huge hit as everything finally went online between 2005-2020. Mass Media was exactly that -- various media that had mass appeal, and also had mass audience.

That has changed.

I have reached the conclusion that we are entering a phase where there is NO MORE MASS MEDIA.

A Soundgarden CD. Remember CD's? Remember CD stores? Remember when people used to buy music? People don't buy music anymore. They rent it -- mostly for free. Not that free is entirely bad. For years, you could hear music on the radio for free, and no one complained about that. But now, there is NO purchasing of music, except by collectors and people, like myself, who still like CD's.

It just doesn't happen. And the music industry, unfortunately, is suffering for it.

WHAT ACTUALLY IS 'MASS' MEDIA?

Now, perhaps I should mention the definition here, of what the term "Mass Media" actually means. According to my American Heritage Dictionary (Fourth Edition, 2001, p. 520), "Mass Media" is: "A means of public communication reaching a large audience."

I guess the question here is: What is a 'large audience'? For example, my post here has the potential of reaching millions of readers. But is this blog truly a "mass medium"? I've had 80,000 blog views in the 8 years this blog has been in existence. That's maybe 10K views a year. Although I am grateful for every reader, that number is small when compared to some blogs and YT video channels, that get that many views in a week, or even a day.

Is that truly evidence that an internet blog is a "mass medium"? 

And at what point is a media considered "mass"? At 1000 views? 10,000 views? 100K? One million? The definition of what makes a media a "mass media" seems to be evolving.

I would think that 'mass media' is something that reaches hundreds of thousands, or millions of people -- be it by radio, newspaper or magazine, TV show, hit recording, movie, etc.

And I see the extensive reach of the Mass Media slowly eroding. In 1967, CBS Evening News announcer Walter Cronkite had between 27-30 million viewers a night, during a time that the United States had 150 million people. That was a time when America truly had what we could call "Mass Media".

Here is a link to a Forbes Magazine article about the heyday of TV network news, during Cronkite's era.:

The Decline Of The Major Networks (forbes.com)

The highest rated TV news shows in the US today have only 3-4 million viewers, and the US has more than twice the population it did in 1967.

Something has changed along the way. I think that 'something' is the internet.

From MASS MEDIA to Millions of Individual 'CONTENT PROVIDERS' --

In Just One Decade

To explain my concerns here, I must go back in time. 

I grew up when music was all purchased via LP record or cassette, and it was something you heard on the radio. I grew up in a world where the big three networks (CBS, ABC, NBC and you could also add CNN after the 1980s) gave you the news. For more analysis, newspapers and magazines gave you the backgrounds. We all (or most families) read Time, Life, US News and World Report, and Newsweek.

Every other house got the daily newspaper. Everyone watched the same TV shows. When MTV hit, everyone who had cable watched it at least some of the time. Everyone knew who the big rock and pop stars were. We all had the same records, tapes, and CD's we listened to. We all listened to the same radio stations. We all saw the same movies. We often watched the same movies when they were available for purchase or rental at video stores.

We all didn't think or believe the same, but we all had something in common -- the news and entertainment that we consumed and enjoyed.

Remember the Blockbuster movie? (pun intended -- that Blockbuster store sticker was a rental I bought when the Renton store was closing) Yes, Hollywood still turns out movies, but nearly all the promo clips I've seen online for 'movies' have been streaming-only productions. I saw one movie trailer about a month ago. Every other 'trailer' was for a streaming-only feature. The future of Hollywood is streaming. And it's changing how we view movies, and also blurred the distinction between the 'big screen' and the 'little screen'. Look out for more changes as moviehouses close and the day of the blockbuster movie fades away.

The DEATH OF THE VIDEO STORE AND RECORD STORE

As recently as the late 2000's we went to record stores, where we often bought the same CD's, LP's, and cassettes. We went to book stores (including chains that are long gone like Borders) and bought the same books. We went to video stores like Blockbuster and Hollywood Video and bought the same DVDs and VHS tapes. If we weren't buying the same items, we all knew about the other artists and stars that other people were into.

We all went to the same news and magazine stands, and most people at least knew what other people were reading, if we weren't reading it, too.

Everyone may not have bought the exact same recordings, books or movies, but we all knew what the best sellers were. In the book publishing world, there were more than just four big publishers, and more than just a handful of successful, top-selling, big name authors. Most big name authors actually wrote their own books, as opposed to the writing 'teams' that are popular now, where a big name author is little more than a brand.

I grew up in a world where there truly was a "Mass Media". Everyone had some form of media in common. If we didn't listen to the same radio stations, maybe we watched the same TV show. If we didn't read the same books, maybe we read the same magazines.

Now? There are few bookstores. There are no video stores. There are no record stores. There are almost no news kiosks and magazine stores and newstands. All of that is gone. Less people listen to the radio, or the same radio stations. Everyone has their own, individual internet streaming 'playlist'. Everyone has their own favorite source of news and opinion, and less people have the same sources in common.

Common Set of Stars, Common Sets of Facts

The extensive reach of every form of mass media when I was growing up gave most people something in common, something with which we could relate to each other, more often than not in a positive way.

We all were influenced by the Mass Media. 

It was so important that my parents encouraged me to study mass media and journalism in college. They actually had a course called "Introduction to Mass Media", with a textbook on it (which I still have). I took the courses, and I did very well at it.

MASS MEDIA TO INDIVIDUAL MEDIA

But my field, Mass Media, changed during the 2000s, when the internet started to become popular. It took maybe a decade for the internet to mature to the nearly infinite conglomerate of literally millions of content websites that it is now.

Today, we are entering a new age where there are millions and millions of music videos by hundreds of thousands of artists -- and all have the exact same reach. I have several songs on Soundcloud. Technically, I have the same reach as every other artist -- big name or little name -- who has songs posted there -- or anywhere.

I have several books for sale on Amazon. Technically, my books have the same potential reach that James Patterson's books do. There is no gatekeeper to prevent me -- and literally MILLIONS of other authors and MILLIONs of books -- from competing with a James Patterson or a Michael Crichton. 

The internet has become the great equalizer.

An Extreme Example of the Change in the Nature of Mass Media:

THE DISAPPEARING PORN STAR

A classic example of a mass media industry in flux, thanks to the internet content model, is porn. Whether one likes it or not, it's an industry that has been around for decades. And for at least a couple decades it was an industry where there were video and movie production companies, and some big names and -- for lack of a better word -- big porn stars.

Even as late as the early 2000s there were porn stars who almost became household names. There were maybe a handful of companies that made big money, most of them based in Los Angeles and Miami. You could go into any adult store nationwide and you would see the same DVDs and VHS tapes for sale, all put out by the same 20 or 30 companies.

That has changed. Today, it's all online content. There is one website alone that hosts over 750,000 individual porn (and other) content providers, and that number increases daily. And that's just one porn content provider's website. There are online porn chat sites with hundreds of thousands of 'content providers'. And those individual 'content providers' make money off of their numerous 'subscribers'. There are also porn sites with hundreds, if not thousands of individual "channels", featuring couples and individuals who sometimes have hundreds of 'subscribers'.

Now, regardless of how one may view something as controversial as the porn industry, it is indeed a de facto industry, with more than one site making multiple millions of dollars a year, per site.

It's All Gone Individual

And it's all gone individual, from an industry where there were actual companies, to the domain of the sole proprietor. Porn used to be a billion dollar industry in the US, with a handful of key, dominant companies, and maybe a hundred stars during any given year. Now it's probably making even more money, but there are no stars. 

Any girl or couple with a smartphone or webcam can make thousands of dollars and be a 'star'. And hundreds of thousands of them, worldwide, are doing just that. And to their numerous 'fans' -- they are indeed like 'stars'.

....AND MODELLING TOO

Along with the democratization of the porn industry, the modelling industry has also changed in a similar manner, where the 'middleman' -- the magazine publisher -- is bypassed. Now, on some social media, one can find literally thousands of enterprising women, modelling, promoting their own social media, and engaging with fans. When I was younger, there were 'supermodels'. Now there are literally thousands of them. All thanks to the internet.

The porn industry and the modelling industry have both gone in the same direction most music has... And most books have. And it's gone the direction a lot of audio-visual production has gone. It's gone the same direction the news industry is now heading. And you could include every other sector of the mass media.

It's an extreme example of the shift from mass media to individual, internet content.

And this trend does not just pertain to entertainment. It also applies to the NEWS MEDIA. And that part of this trend is the most disturbing.

THE NEWS INDUSTRY -- SLICED AND DICED

So, let's talk about the News industry. I was trained as a journalist in college. I edited college newspapers, and when I got out of college I worked for about a year at a newspaper chain, and then when I graduated from the University I was a news director at a community radio station for three years. 

I trained people to write news, and to announce the news over the air.

For a while, being in a big news operation -- be it a radio station, or a newspaper -- was my dream. That disappeared after the three year stint as a community radio news director, when I became exhausted from overwork. That dream also ended when I realised there clearly wasn't much money in writing news. A starting reporter in a big city barely made enough money to rent an apartment there. And if you wanted to get ahead in newspapers, you had to move to the sticks. And they wouldn't pay you much. And even if you succeeded there, the bigger cities' newspapers weren't hiring. Because even then, in the early 1990's, the news and journalism industry was changing. The papers were hiring less and less people. The news industry had already started its long, slow decline.

In the bigger picture, there was consolidation of major news and print-media organizations, and the shuffling off of personnel that often accompanies such consolidations. But in the smaller picture -- the 'picture' that the budding journalist has to deal with -- the industry was already shrinking from competition from TV, cable, and the internet.

As the years progressed (during the decade and a half that I was working in the radio industry as a masterer / sound engineer) the journalism and broadcast industry shrank. Radio shed 80-100K workers after the Telecom Deregulation Act of 1996. As the internet took hold, newspapers lost more and more circulation. Newspapers folded. Two local, suburban newspaper chains folded during the 1990's. Others consolidated operations with other newspapers before folding.

Approximately 50% Fewer Journalists, in Only 13 Years

And the data tells us that the news industry has actually shrunk in size, literally. In 2008 there were approximately 114,000 people working in journalism in the United States (according to Pew Research). That number, by the way, was undoubtedly a decrease from the 1980's, when the number was probably closer to 150,000, or possibly even higher than that (there are estimates that in 2010 the number of journalism workers was half of what it was during its peak in the 1980's, which would make the number of journalists in the 80's to be around 220,000).

Just last year, in 2021, there were only 85,000 journalism workers in the entire U.S., according to Pew Research. The number dived, in just 13 years, by just over a quarter. The trend is disturbing, as the Pew Research report indicates that journalism is more centralized, increasingly based out of just a few major cities, and less and less journalists are available to interpret local politics or news.

However, if one looks at the Bureau of Labor Statistics tables, the number of journalists in the United States is even smaller: only 46,700. You can see that awesome bit of data here.:

News Analysts, Reporters, and Journalists : Occupational Outlook Handbook: : U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (bls.gov)

That would be closer to a 50% drop in numbers.

Think of it. The entire number of journalists and news reporters in the U.S. is smaller than number of people in Wenatchee, Washington (a very fine city and metro area of around 45,000 on the Columbia River in Eastern Washington).

Do you think that the major news media are out of touch? The smaller number of people working in the news industry may be the reason why.

Couple that with the decline in ratings for the major news networks, it is a slightly disturbing trend -- Americans are less served, and probably less informed because of it. The decrease, industry wide, in the number of viewers of cable news networks means that they get more and more shrill as they compete for the smaller numbers of overall viewers. 

Does that really serve the American people? I'll let you decide.

I think that journalism has also declined in overall quality at least partially because of these changes. I wrote an article several years ago about the Decline of Journalism in the US. I think my observations then (in 2016) still hold true today.:

Interrock Nation: The Lost Art of Journalism

Here is a link to the Pew Research article about the decline in Journalism workers.:

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/07/13/u-s-newsroom-employment-has-fallen-26-since-2008/

A radio (and a very good one, I might add). Now, those of us older than age 30 know what a 'radio' is. But today, even radio professionals are musing over what the definition of 'Radio' really is. Is it streaming? Is it podcasts? Is it something you get from a satellite (like Sirius)? Is it any form of 'broadcast', audio-based information or entertainment? They don't know. There is no one definition, and there is no one, single answer.

AND RADIO LOSES EVEN MORE JOBS

As many of my readers probably know, I worked in the Radio industry for nearly 20 years -- 16 years at one company, and just over three years at two different radio stations.

While I was employed at my last full-time radio-industry job, the Telecom Act of 1996 was passed by Congress, and signed into law by President Clinton. The long term effect of the Act on the radio industry is debatable, but the long-term effect on the average radio worker was a net negative. Radio companies went on a buying spree. Then, with the aid of the computer and internet technology, they consolidated operations, getting rid of workers in the process.

A lot of jobs were lost in the years following. We even saw a few layoffs where I worked, due to the company being bought and sold, along with the accompanying consolidation. I finally lost my last radio job in December, 2006, when the company bought our largest competitor and eliminated the division where I worked.

Since 2008 Radio has shed 20% more of its workers. It is a shrinking industry. It's making about half of the money than it was in the 2000's, and it has less workers than it did in 2005. A lot of the blame might be due to the way the industry is run, but actually, Radio is adapting to the new, internet paradigm.

At the radio forum websites, the pros talk about this. And often the subject comes up: What really constitutes 'radio'? Is a stream actually 'radio'? Are podcasts 'radio'? Are Spotify and Pandora -- two streaming websites that are taking listeners away from radio stations -- are they actually 'radio'?

It seems that every segment of what used to be the Mass Media -- Radio, TV, the Music Industry, the Movie Industry, Newspapers and Journalism -- they all are asking the same question: What really is the 'media' anymore? 

Conclusion: We Have an 18TH CENTURY Media Model in the 21st 

Now, I'm not a big fan of everybody conforming to the same tastes, where everyone is cookie cutter. I'm not a big fan of everybody having to believe the same politics, or everyone having to have the exact same taste in music or books or movies or holding the exact same views on news and world events.

But at the same time, I am concerned that we are entering a world where everyone has their own, personal set of facts, and less and less people have things in common. When there are no big singing stars, we have less in common to enjoy and share. When there are a gazillion news sources, all of them opinionated (like we have in the US now), we have less and less common ground from which to find ways to get along when we have differences of opinion politically, or otherwise.

It almost seems as if we are going backwards, to the era where people lived in isolated valleys and remote regions, and their only "media" was localized, based completely on the local tastes, and all external information was fragmented or partial, depending on the odd newspaper that made its way there, or some traveller telling them what's going on in the next valley.

The main difference is that it's now all electronic. But the concept is the same: completely and utterly fragmented.

We're not there yet, but I fear that we are getting there. And what will it do to society? Is it a net plus? Or is it a net minus?

Many of my readers in other countries probably aren't in exactly the same situation. In their countries there are state and federal news media, government broadcasters, government radio networks, government TV networks, and the like -- networks and broadcasters that everyone watches or follows. But here in the wide open U.S., it's like the Wild West right now when it comes to news media and mass media, and I do not think the present trend is particularly good for society as a whole, even though it may benefit individual people in the short run.

It's just not really healthy for a society to have an 18th or 19th Century, fragmented media model when you have a 21st Century set of problems to deal with.

I try to be a positivist, however. People can adapt and thrive. Perhaps my fears, which I've expressed here, aren't valid. But the increasing fragmentation of American society, and the transformation of Mass Media into individualistic, free-form and often fact-free media -- where even the definitions of words are changeable from day to day, and people have less and less in common -- just doesn't look great right now.

One can only hope for the best. After all, the rise of the internet has not only dismantled the Mass Media, it has also democratized it. 

And democracy is a good thing, right?

I will end this blog article on a lighter note: with a cat picture. My cat Fluffy, when she was a kitten. I almost lost her to illness in August and September, but she came through OK. I always make sure to pick her up and pet her a couple times a day, thankful that she survived.

When she got older, she took to liking the bathroom sink.:

And with that, I hope all my readers are well and healthy. If you're a muso (Australian slang for "musician"), keep playing that guitar. If you're one of my fellow radio aficionados, keep listening. You never know what you'll hear. :-)

Until next time,

Peace.

C.C., February 11th, 2022.