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Friday, December 24, 2004
Avoiding holidaze music 
| | Okay, we're sentimental. We like to listen to holiday music, heading into Christmas. But after listening to DishTV's holiday music channel play the same series of songs that it's been playing for the last six years, I finally rigged up an antenna that would get KDB, our local classical station, and one of the last locally owned commercial classical stations in the country. KDB's hand-picked selection is perfect for Christmas eve, and I'm sure for Christmas day too. |
| | Also, after listening to a variety of Sirius Satellite Radio channels (which DishTV carries), I have to say I'm pretty disappointed with the level of repetition there too. I don't know if all their channels loop a limited set of selections, but it sure seems that way. |
Joi to the World
Will KFI rebuild its tower?
| | When I first moved to California in 1985, KFI's tower, which radiated a 50,000-watt (literal) clear channel signal I could hear at night in New Jersey back in the '60s, stood in an empty field in La Mirada, off the I-5 (Santa Ana Freeway). But by the time the tower fell last week (I wrote about it here), office buildings had grown under its guy wires. After I saw the buildings to up, I wasn't sure what that did for the ground system (straps of copper buried in the ground in all directions from the tower, required by FCC rules to maximize signal strength and efficiency); but it had the look of calculated risk. I thought... Could it be that the new owners don't care much about maintaining the landmark station's huge coverage area? |
| | Since falling the tower has had some bad press. Worst (for KFI and lovers of legacy landmark radio stations like myself), is the last line from the LA Times story behind that link: |
| | The station has not decided whether the tower will be rebuilt. |
| | The owner, Capstar TX Limited Partnership (which appears to have no web site), doesn't appear to have any other sites in L.A (though they own a pile of stations elsewhere around the country). If they're not allowed, or not inclined, to rebuild the lost 760-foot tower (at the La Mirada site or elsewhere), the giant legacy KFI signal may be history. Here in Santa Barbara, KFI is still audible in the daytime, but much worse at night, when the skywave off the shorter tower interferes with the groundwave). |
| | By the way, it appears that, after the tower was hit by the plane, it managed to fall on parking lots and other empty places, missing the new buildings, which was mighty lucky. More pix here and here. |
| | [Later...] I see here that Capstar is one of Clear Channel's companies. Clear Channel also owns KLAC/570 in Los Angeles. It's concievable that KFI could co-locate with KLAC and KFWB (which share a site east of downtown L.A.). Given the lack of local flight paths, and the presence of tall buildings in nearby downtown L.A., perhaps that site would make sense for KFI as well. On the other hand, it could be that KFI with a reduced signal is still big enough to get its current numbers in the L.A. metro, and that's fine with Clear Channel. |
Merry Momblog
Unreally Simple
On the other hand, his feet are now flippers
| | Found out yesterday that the reason none of my shoes fit anymore is that I've gone from a 9C to a 9 1/2 EEEE. And my arches haven't fallen a bit. Strange. |
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