RADIO Round the World

Radio Record, Volume VI, Issue 1, 15 July 1932, Unnumbered Page

RADIO Round the World

UDENOS AIRES is to have a new and up-to-date broadcasting sta-. tion operating on a power of.20 k.w., to give reasonable daylight reception in the city and suburbs. Bg * % HT Soviet’s appeal to the German broadcast authorities for permission to relay from the Leningrad Opera IIouse has been firmly refused. The objection was advanced that there were no land lines suitable which would transmit all the musical frequencies, It is understood that Germany desires nothing whatever from Russia, and is at a loss to know how to discourage her people from listening to Russian. broadcasts. ‘ % Bg % ALES of receiving sets in Canada last year-the worst trading year known-inereased 28 per cent, although there was a decline of 16 per cent. in the sum received by the manu-_ facturer and importer. Q RELcIoM, has created a Commission for Broadcasting. ‘This was necessary to deal with the activities of private stations, which had overstepped the mark in objectionable references to the yarious members of the Government, including the PostmasterGeneral, 3 % % CZECHOSLOVAKIAN doctor, who likes, if possible, to avoid rising from his bed in the early morning hours to attend patients, has fitted up a two-way microphone and _ loudspeaker system between his bedside and the front door. Patients or their representatives can now obtain the medico’s advice with a minimum of inconvenience to both. Bg Do % HP license fee payable by the owner of a receiving set in Italy has been increased by two shillings per annum. The increase will be allocated to a special fund for subsidising theatre productions of operas and ‘other performances. bd we * SPATS | in "I/Orangerie," the municipal gardens of Strasbourg, have been fitted with headphones connected to a central broadeast receiver, and — passers-by are invited to enjoy . free concerts at their leisure. . 2 = RITISH wireless license figures passed the four and a half million mark in March, and the total is now npproximately 4,600,000. This is nearly a million in excess of the figure a year ago. It is expected that the’ 5,000,000 mark will be reached in. September. ST * bad nr ITIL the general improvement in land-lines on the Continent of Europe, elaborate arrangements are being made for international relays’ for the B.B.C. One of the first series will be of first-hand operatic performances from Germany and Austria, the home of opera,

om ~ PARis has found. another use for the photo-cell. Fixed to a lamp-post outside one of the boulevard subways is a photo-electric cell by. means of which groups of lights in the passage are switched on or off, depending upon the amount of daylight or artificial illumination in thé street above. The object of the contrivance is, to mainain in the subway an intensity of illumination roughly: corresponding to the light outside, so that motorists are not confused ‘by great variations in light on entering or leaving the tunnel. * % ik {tz is hoped to solve problems con"~neéted with wireless echoes and the possible effect on radio waves of the aurora borealis from the investiga‘tions. conducted by two expeditions to the Arctic this year. One led by Prof. i. V;-Appelton will visit Tromso, in Norway, and the other, led by Mr. J. M. Stagg, will study meteorology in Northern Canada. . Twelve countries ate co-operating. . ah % * — T has been found that the new B.B.C. headquarters are uncomfortably small for the staff, and already the corporation has been driven to fresh expenditure of £50,000 to purchase the freehold of two neighbouring houses. % Fe % WIRELESS is playing an important part in the TEngland-to-Africa weekly air mail service. Seventeen specially equipped wireless stations along the 8000-mile route keep in constant touch with the aircraft while in flight. wm = 1] OR the first time in European radio history a really effective protest has been registered by listeners. Tifty per cent. of Denmark’s licensees have failed to renew. The station managers assert that the reason is the serieus money shortage, while others contend that it is a tangible protest against poor programmes. It is thought generally, howeyer, that the cause lies between these two contentions. g R B eed safe in an Austrian electricity works is fitted with a loudspeaker equipment which cries. "Help" whenever the door is opened. It is rumoured that local Socialists are endeavouring to have the alarm amended to "Help yourself." % ote sk . N electrical | engineer of Hanover has’: invented -a_ radio « relay device by’ which a pilot may switch-on the aerodrome lights before landing. a. a * ‘ N . unusual. honour -has come to " Henry, Lee Carter, of Rochester, New York, -who- is: reputed’ to be the world’s youngest licensed radio transmitter. . This child of ten years has been appointed an official relay operator of: the American Radio Relay League, a‘ distinction- held by only 4 per cent. of the total number of ‘licensed. amateurs in the United States and-Canada..

BOUT £1,188,000 worth of receivers for motor-cars were sold in the United States in 1931-three times the amount realised in 1930. * * 2 RELAYS to .German stations of Covent Garden opera, under Sir Thomas Beecham, are to be England’s return for similar relays of German operas, Which, it is stated in Berlin, are to form a regular feature of future Inglish programmes. * Bg th RECENTLY a very perturbed member of the staff of a Paris broadcasting station upbraided an announcer for want of care in his remarks at the microphone. The offender had just announced the formation of a new musical group known as the Mozart Circle (Cycle Mozart). "Regardez!" exclaimed the clever one. "Tree adyvertisements are forbidden! Who is the maker of this bicycle?’ ok % (SANADIAN TELEVISION, LTD., is being incorporated under a Federal charter to engage in the ngenufacture ‘Of "television apparatus. ‘Whe organisation has secured exclyfive licenses for use in Canada of patents and equipment of two outstanding groups, the. Baird Television Co. of Iingland, and the De Forest-Jenkins Television Corporation of U.S.A. The rights of the Canadian company will include not only .all existing, but all future developments. % ES a HH American listener looks with horror upon the license system employed to finance breadeasting in Kurope, and fails to ‘understand why anyone ‘should’ not be allowed to tap the "free ether’ without payment. Recognising this obstacle, the Sanabria Television Corporation of Chicago is asking timidly whether listeners would be" prepared to pay monthly, a small sum, on the same basis as the gas and electric bills, for the privilege of seeing the world’s greatest entertainments and athletic events, as well as the world's news, right in their own homes the minute they happen. te % % THE social» spirit has always been well to the fore in American amateur radio,-and -celubs of all kinds abound within the:ranks of the American Radio Relay League. The mostunusual, however, appears to be the Barnyard Club, formed by a group of amateurs in the 9th Radio District. Yo be eligible for membership a transmitter must own eall letters with a zoological significance, and at present the eleven amateurs to qualify hold "Wo" call-signs, followed respectively by the letters, BUL, CAT, COW, BOG, DUC, EGG, FLY,-HEN, HOG, HWS, and OX. America is not alone in hinusual amateur transmitter clubs, however, for Hurope hag an organisation known‘as the "Ragchewers." Members qualify for.adnrission by being able to transmit and receive 16 words per minute. "Members "meet" on the air at specified times, on .eaeh- amateur band, and run‘a° littlé -magazine entitled "Ragchewing." "A subdivision is the Bed-Haters’ Club,.members of which usually transmit between 3 and 4 o’clock in the morning. i