shortWWWave

Rumours abound today that Australia's ABC-TV could be shortly renamed "ABC1", based upon a short promo that has been posted at TV Tonight. If so, this would be one of the most significant changes to ABC-TV in its 51-year history.

The video seems to suggest that the well-known ABC logo (see left) may disappear, which may well result in much irate correspondence to newspapers and the ABC...

Almost 28 years after commercial FM radio came to Australia, Launceston in Tasmania is finally set to have its own commercial FM station. 7LA, the major local commercial station, currently broadcasting on 1098 kHz, was scheduled to start test transmissions on 89.3MHz on January 8th.

Launceston's other commercial station, 7EX, is also expected to move to 90.1MHz at some point in the future; the station currently relays Melbourne's Sport 927 horse racing station. It is likely that the station will change format when it moves to FM, and the Sport 927 broadcasts will transfer to a narrowcast AM licence, as an FM commercial licence is too valuable to waste on horse racing.

The 2008 edition of the renowned Passport to World Band Radio book is now available. For years, the Passport has been providing schedules, receiver news, a comprehensive radio directory and one of the best introductions to shortwave radio for novices available. For a brief look at this edition, the table of contents is available online.

Passport to World Band Radio 2008 can be purchased from Amazon, here: