Norway becomes first country to kill FM radio

[Prysin]

29 minutes ago, ShiftyFella said:

I'm not surprised that this happened considering plenty of countries been pushing for it, as there tons of moneys to be gained from all the licensing scheming. I just always thought it would be Swiss or Brits to jump on this wagon 1st.This is not analog tv where killing was justified to clear the way for LTE, so what they will do with all that free space?

Norway will be the second or third country to have national 5G coverage... so that is prob part of it. Yes, we already have LTE+ (aka 4G+).... and by the end of 2017 or 1h 2018 we will get 5G

[Prysin]

16 minutes ago, Nena360 said:

Wont happen! (DAB will fail!)

DAB has already failed, it's all about DAB+...

[Nena Trinity]

21 minutes ago, Prysin said:

DAB has already failed, it's all about DAB+...

But DAB+ radios are not in the majority of car and not to mention local radios will still use FM... o3o

[Princess Luna]

Meanwhile Brazil government is trying to approve a law to allow TV Broadcasts to keep using analogue signal so the companies can save a bunch of money... if that wasn't enough they also forgave a debt of 7 billion dollars with all the telecommunication companies and gave all the State communication infrastructure which values like 40 billion dollars... then nobody understands why internet, phone and cable tv are just awful in Brazil, no real competition just a few companies with monopoly ensured by the government and  they aren't forced to upgrade or improve ever while also winning bonus prize for being so incompetent

[Tech_Dreamer]

FM is like the 3.5 jack of the 20th century , *pssssht*

[samcool55]

Well, i hope they realize this is a bad idea.

When war happens again (which is always a matter of when, not if, look at history :p) knowing what's going on is very important.

And getting an AM/FM receiver going is very easy, DAB+ is like,awful. Hopeless.

 

Also as mentioned, cars! Some cars just don't have a DAB+ option at all, no support, nada.

Not even aftermarket ones are available...

[suicidalfranco]

just another cases of government intervention ruining everything and being bad 

[ChrEW]

I interested to see how the citizens of Norway will react, because here in Denmark they want to do the same thing, but it has been pushed back several times - I believe they are aiming for 2019 but only if 50+ % of the listeners of 2018 have switched to DAB+. If if there is an outcry in Norway, the danish government may reconsider.

The thing is here it would mean that most car owners wouldn't be able to listen to the radio because here in Denmark way too many drives cars that are 10-20 years old (because of the 150 % tax on cars), so the adaption is rather slow on DAB+.

Another thing that bugs be about going digital is when one is having bad reception because of external interference etc. With analog the sound would just be filled with some noise or whatever, usually still able to hear the song or understand the news cast, but with digital if there is too much interference the sound just disappear.

[OddsCrazyStuff]

This thread is wrong. They are not killing the FM, they are just moving the major channels to DAB. Local radios and such will still use FM, along with probably any emergency service that still havent upgraded there equipment.

 

FM probably wont be gone before the towers that operates them fail and dont get fixed (some 50 or so years old now). Which is why the change came. They didnt want to spend the money building new FM towers (my guess).

[Mihle]

The main reason why they do it is because now, they have to pay for both FM AND DAB+
They want to save money by dropping one of them. and therefore FM is getting dropped

have no idea why they didnt got to radio over internet and make the internet better instead.

BTW. old news....

[handymanshandle]

I don't really agree with the idea of killing FM either, digital broadcasts aren't the be all end all considering they likely require internet. Such as Spotify.

[handymanshandle]

4 hours ago, ChrEW said:

because of the 150 % tax on cars

Geez

So it's like buying two cars that costed the same and then about another half of that?

So let me get this right, € 23000,00 is the cost of a car before tax, you'd pay about another € 23000,00 and then some?

 

Or is that not right?

[Trixanity]

1 hour ago, wcreek said:

Geez

So it's like buying two cars that costed the same and then about another half of that?

So let me get this right, € 23000,00 is the cost of a car before tax, you'd pay about another € 23000,00 and then some?

 

Or is that not right?

It used to be 180% but was lowered to 150% fairly recently. That's just the registration fee. Add to that the 25% VAT on the purchase of the car. Cars are ridiculously expensive which means most people drive around in 15+ year old cars because fuck safety; tax revenue is more important.

[handymanshandle]

3 minutes ago, Trixanity said:

It used to be 180% but was lowered to 150% fairly recently. That's just the registration fee. Add to that the 25% VAT on the purchase of the car. Cars are ridiculously expensive which means most people drive around in 15+ year old cars because fuck safety; tax revenue is more important.

wow

[ChrEW]

1 hour ago, wcreek said:

Geez

So it's like buying two cars that costed the same and then about another half of that?

So let me get this right, € 23000,00 is the cost of a car before tax, you'd pay about another € 23000,00 and then some?

 

Or is that not right?

Actually a bit more complex. If we take the example with the 23000 € car, there is 25 % VAT which means the sale price before tax is 28750 €. Then you add 105 % tax of the first 11380 € of price before tax which is 11949 € and 150 % of the remaining value (17370 €) = 26055 €.

So the total price for the 23000 € car is 28750+11949+17370 = 58069 € which about 2,5 times the "factory price". 

[Trixanity]

1 minute ago, wcreek said:

wow

A car that costs about 450,000 DKK ($64,000) will end up costing something like 1,350,000 DKK ($190,000).

 

It's the car's retail price, add 25% VAT, then take that value and for the first 80,000 DKK you pay 105% in registration fee. The remaining is 150%. So that's why a car is almost 3 times the retail price. And you can't import cars to get around it as you'd still pay the 150% registration fee and jump through hoops to get it registered so there is ultimately no gain. It's a clever system from a revenue perspective.

[Zodiark1593]

4 minutes ago, ChrEW said:

Actually a bit more complex. If we take the example with the 23000 € car, there is 25 % VAT which means the sale price before tax is 28750 €. Then you add 105 % tax of the first 11380 € of price before tax which is 11949 € and 150 % of the remaining value (17370 €) = 26055 €.

So the total price for the 23000 € car is 28750+11949+17370 = 58069 € which about 2,5 times the "factory price". 

I consider a 20% tax to be high. This excessively high tax seems to serve to keep people off the roads instead. Ultimately, if your a gear/petrol head, avoid Denmark. 

[Juanitology]

16 hours ago, Zodiark1593 said:

Over in the States, you'd be better off pushing a boulder uphill. Not only is the install base for FM receivers massive, replacement with digital equipment, particularly for older cars is like to be cost prohibitive.

 

What digital standard is set to replace FM anyway? Cell service tends not to be very reliable for those commuting through rural areas (in my case, non existent). Satellite Radio for some reason also commands a price premium few will pay for essentially the same function as an FM receivers. 

They're going to use the same frequency band that is used today, but the broadcasts will be digital (DAB) so you can fit more stations within a given frequency range and the audio sounds a lot better, plus you can attach metadata to the signal and other neat things. The majority of radios in Norway are DAB enabled, and virtually all of the radios sold over the last decade support it.

 

People also made a fuss when terrestrial TV was switched over to a digital signal but after a short period it was just fine. In comparison, buying a new radio or an adapter (which btw is only about 60-100 USD not the 175 that's being quoted) is a lot cheaper than buying a new TV.

 

There comes a time when we have to go through a transition from an old cumbersome standard to a new one, even if it may cause temporary issues it's for the best in the long term.

[PlayStation 2]

Nah, fam. Sunny 98.1 FM is lit here. Steve Harvey in the morning, old school shit in the afternoon. Ain't finna kill FM here.

[suits]

Good maybe we can do it in America and the FCC can stop selling of frequencies and making us buy new wireless microphone equipment....

[leadeater]

8 hours ago, Zodiark1593 said:

I consider a 20% tax to be high. This excessively high tax seems to serve to keep people off the roads instead. Ultimately, if your a gear/petrol head, avoid Denmark. 

It may seem high but the entire tax systems of other countries doesn't work like US. For example I pay a graduated income tax up to 33%, multiple tiers of tax based on income brackets, then on top of that everything I buy has 15% GST (VAT equiv). Then there are also things like vehicle registration fees and warrant of fitness fees, house and land rates, EQC levies (earthquake insurance), ACC levies (Accident Compensation Corporation) and I've likely missed other stuff too.

 

However these taxes pay for all the infrastructure, schooling, health care, retirement plan and pension, unemployment benefit and many other social policies.

 

US is a culture that is pretty fiercely opposed to taxes, impression I get as an outside observer, where a lot of other countries focus on standardized quality of life. Neither is necessarily better than the other, both have major points that suck, but I don't feel hard done by at all.

 

US = Private sector driven

Non US = Public sector driven

[Drak3]

23 minutes ago, leadeater said:

US is a culture that is pretty fiercely opposed to taxes

No, the US is a culture that is fiercely opposed to our taxes lining the pockets of lawyer scum, and not paying for:

24 minutes ago, leadeater said:

all the infrastructure, schooling, health care, retirement plan and pension, unemployment benefit and many other social policies.

kupo.

[leadeater]

1 minute ago, Drak3 said:

No, the US is a culture that is fiercely opposed to our taxes lining the pockets of lawyer scum, and not paying for:

kupo.

Agree with your first point, no one should want that. But the other things, you still pay for them just in different ways than I do or some of the things you don't have and as a country if you feel that you don't want to provide it to the citizens then that is what you should do. We shouldn't go round trying to mimic what everyone else does, the point of a democracy is to ask the public what they want and then do that which is why no two countries are the same under those types of political systems.

 

And I say opposed to taxes because every second political point I here is about cutting taxes, which is a sure fire way of eventually crippling a government. Ignoring the wasted spending points as at some point if you keep cutting you'll end up in a running loss.

 

But hey this is a tech forum so that's enough of this boring stuff .

[Drak3]

2 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Agree with your first point, no one should want that. But the other things, you still pay for them just in different ways than I do or some of the things you don't have and as a country if you feel that you don't want to provide it to the citizens then that is what you should do. We shouldn't go round trying to mimic what everyone else does, the point of a democracy is to ask the public what they want and then do that which is why no two countries are the same under those types of political systems.

 

And I say opposed to taxes because every second political point I here is about cutting taxes, which is a sure fire way of eventually crippling a government. Ignoring the wasted spending points as at some point if you keep cutting you'll end up in a running loss.

 

But hey this is a tech forum so that's enough of this boring stuff .

Switch Retirement Plan and Pension with Social Security, and tweak healthcare to Obamacare, and those are all things US citizens pay taxes for, kupo.

 

 

Also, cutting taxes in the US is a huge political buzz phrase because we're taxed too much to survive on what should be decent money here, Kupo. And Obamacare just made it worse, kupo.  

[suits]

1 hour ago, leadeater said:

US is a culture that is pretty fiercely opposed to taxes, impression I get as an outside observer,

No we don't like people using our taxes to line their pockets, while we get less vacations, less raises, pay decreases, our roads are crumbling, our education is worse than ever, we are bankrupt, and have corruption in the absolute deepest areas of government. We have 4 years for a non-politician to try and change washington and if the new administration can't this country is sinking fast.