The political acrimony of the cold war provided a golden age for shortwave listening around the world. Yet, in the unfolding era of post 9-11 global chaos and corruption  (when we really could use it) shortwave radio has just become another media source where Americans are likely to get less international news and opinion. On the other hand, many of our old cold war enemies (Russia, China, Vietnam, etc) continue to beam lots of English language programming this way. But more and more of our traditional (and powerful) allies just don’t bother. Most significantly, two excellent English language global news sources have turned their backs on us. First the BBC World Service cut us off in July of 2001, then Deutsche Welle shut down shortwave transmissions to North America a couple of years later. And these are just the most notable of many cutbacks depriving North American SW listeners of dependable frequencies since the 1990′s. And in case you’re wondering, you can occasionally hear the official U.S. shortwave service (VOA) in the states, but there’s actually a law on the books that prevents them from trying very hard to reach American ears. But from what I’ve heard from VOA over the last few years, we’re not missing much…

There’s not much mystery as to why all this is happening. Old lo-fi radio hasn’t been really popular here for decades. Since the 1980′s shortwave bands have become non-existent on standard consumer radios, and if you’re determined to listen to shortwave you have to go out buy a special receiver just for that purpose. And more significantly, new and powerful methods of listening to the world have come along– satellite broadcasting and internet audio options.  

And for years, international radio giants like BBC and DW have been piggybacking segments of their English language content on North American (mostly FM) public stations as well. Not that long ago, WNYC in New York experimented with running the World Radio Network overnight, and like so much programming I’ve enjoyed on that station, it’s gone. Based in Britian, WRN aggregates all sorts of national radio content from around the world and offers a whole slew of programming packages grouped by language and/or targeted global region. It’s a quite a project. And it’s not a service– It’s a business. Taking a look at their website, it looks like WRN has become a real high-tech behemoth of international broadcasting since I last listened. While some stations in North America must be running their content (I found no list of affiliates on their site), their full schedule in English for North America has its own channel with Sirius Satellite Radio. At least for now, a model like this seems like the future of state-sponsored broadcasting. And if you want to get a regular dose of international news and opinion without all the fading, RF noise, and propagation issues, I’d say signing up for Sirius to receive WRN might be a good way to go.

And to wind this up, I have a clip.