A controversial bill that would require all new cars to be fitted with AM radios looks set to become a law in the near future. Yesterday, Senator Edward Markey (D-Mass) revealed that the “AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act” now has the support of 60 US Senators, as well as 246 co-sponsors in the House of Representatives, making its passage an almost sure thing. Should that happen, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration would be required to ensure that all new cars sold in the US had AM radios at no extra cost.
I know that back in the early 00s I was traveling cross country and was surprised when I reached the prairies and realized there were way more AM than FM stations, but it’s because AM travels much farther even though the fidelity is lower.
That’s the trade off you make with AM. With just about all wireless transmission techs, really. There seems to be an inverse relationship between range and bandwidth. If you want one, you sacrifice the other. Compared to FM, AM radio leans more towards max range, so the audio quality isn’t quite as good, but it goes for miles.
And thats how you get all the people living in rural America who listen to AM nonsense talk radio.
Its also much, much cheaper in general to start your own AM talk show because of the relatively lower costs compared to FM broadcasting, so any crazy angry idiot can do it.
l’d think that the Internet (well, systems built on the Internet) has probably been the most-influential system for lowering the bar to transmit ideas in recent years. I mean, it’s really inexpensive and easy to post on social media, and that can reach a whole lot of people.
True, I agree.
In the past, AM radio was a much bigger piece of the pie in terms or right wing nonsense extremism vectors, and now it is still an important segment of it, but yeah the internet is certainly much more important overall these days.