I am now going to go on a little rant on this subject and a suggestion for a change. Firstly for readers of this forum outside of Canada a brief explanation of the Canadian unlicensed version of Part 15 pertaining to AM and FM(630-1710 klz and 88 -108 mhz). Unlike part 15 Canada has two sets of categories that unlicensed broadcasting falls under. BETS-1 and RSS-210. BETS refers to "broadcast equipment" and RSS(radio standards) covers everything else including AM and FM but this concerns AM and FM bands only which is RSS-210.
Yes, a transmitter can be certified under either one and here's the craziness of it all. With RSS-210 you can't broadcast and with BETS-1 you can. What is the difference? If you are sending your signal from indoors or outside but you are in a park, parking lot, private property, indoor arena, have a defined area and specific targeted audience you are not broadcasting. But!.....if you are outside or inside, from your house, from outside, on your property or in a public place and your signal is intended for the general public without a defined area you are now broadcasting! Sounds insane? It is! Intent is the big part of this. If I have my transmitter, could be a Procaster, set up outside as intended, I could be told to cease and desist as it is certified RSS-210, not BETS-1. BUT! if I go to a park and do the same thing it's now OK, now I am not broadcasting!!. You are shaking your head now, here's more. So why can't I make up a boundary and say around the block is my targeted area and the homes in that sectioned off area is my targeted audience? Would I now be not broadcasting? See how silly this is? By the way BETS-1 is the one that gives us more FM signal range than part 15(about 2100-2200uV/M@3M in the real world). RSS-210 is the same as part 15.
So what determines broadcasting vs not broadcasting is just which category the certification is under and perceived intent. No other difference. A transmitter can also be certified under both categories also...even making this more crazy.
A Procaster user in Canada got busted for broadcasting just because of this stupidity.
I have seen all these calls for petitions in the past for more power for part 15 but for Canada I propose this petition so to speak, stop the insanity....BETS-1 pertaining to AM and FM commercial bands should be abolished and it should all move to RSS-210 but still keeping the BETS field strength for FM(it was in past issues) and AM staying the same, as it's the same as Part 15. All unlicensed use should be RSS-210. That makes sense. If you are under RSS-210 the CRTC has a license exemption.
The broadcasting/non broadcasting nonsense be removed.
To conclude, non broadcasting is like a pager or walky talky which is two way communication between two people. Closed circuit. Broadcasting is any signal intended for anyone with a receiver to pick it up if they tune to your frequency. This other nonsense is just that....nonsense...
My rant is over.
Mark, in many years hearing about the two Canadian categories I have never come to understand it in a way that I could put into words, but being in the USA I have always let it blow by since I don't need to know. But today, reading your insanity rant, I decided to take the time to wrap my head around it but no matter how many times I read your descriptions of the two sets of rules I must say it makes no sense in my head. It makes me wonder what category I'd be in if I did exactly what I am doing but moved to Canada and did it there. I have a Procaster, so that's part of the puzzle, but my signal leaves the campus, which is my name for the yard, crosses streets and passes over other yards and even leaves the block. To the best of my knowledge no one around here listens to the radio, they all use computers all day or fiddle with handheld devices looking at pictures. I guess that makes me a non-broadcaster, but I listen on more than one radio so I am like two or three listeners broadcasting to myself. Or maybe that makes me like three radio stations. If I fall asleep and do not listen to all the radios is there even sound, I don't know unless it becomes part of a dream and I think it's 1976 all over again with me being paid to sit in a chair at an FM station keeping LP records playing so that complete strangers could save wear on their phonograph needles by listening but dreams shift around and I'd end up wondering where the bus stop was at that hour of the night. Seems like insanity for sure.
If you had the Procaster here in Canada and did exactly what you are doing now....I don't know how you are using it whether indoors or outdoors mounted on a fence,pole, or the ground. What is the campus? Is that just a name for your back yard? I think of a school school yard. If you tell me exactly how you have it set up, and where, I'll tell you if you would be broadcasting or not in the eyes of the Canadian government.
But...if it's outdoors in your back yard, on a pole, fence, etc and grounded via stake or radials, in a residential area receivable by anyone, not a specific audience in a defined area...as you said the signal travels anywhere, you are broadcasting and you would have a hard time convincing an agent that the intent is just your back yard. Especially with a studio in your house. But if you have it indoors that would be a little harder to say you are broadcasting as you can't be told you can't use it...you just can't broadcast. It doesn't matter if people have radios or listen. But as I said if you set it up in a public park, or say you lived next to the park and now you have a specific bounded area and patrons of the park now you are not broadcasting as your area and intention is not the general public in a undefined area.
The FCC doesn't have this craziness! There is no broadcasting/nonbroadcasting in part 15. But if the Procaster was certified under BETS, not RSS-210 you could now broadcast like you use it now.
But more insanity, RSS(radio service standards), when giving the rules for all frequency bands states "for any application" .. go figure!
My procaster AM Transmitter is located indoors but the antenna is half-in and half- out. The antenna starts on the inside and is a wire running vertically up the rear wall from the baseboard until it comes to the metal frame of the window, is attached to the lowest part of the window frame which becomes part of the antenna facing both indoors and out, and at the top of the window frame on the outdoor side more wire is attached vertically upward on the wall until a total of 3-meters is reached at the gutter. Underneath the floor are two ground radials facing north and south. Therefore I have indoor and outdoor reception and the yard is our campus, as my late wife and I considered our lifestyle to be "home school college" since we were always looking things up in books and have both taught college courses in the past. The only intention of the radio station is for our own use to listen to our own program selections, but the neighbors could tune it in but would have no way of knowing where it was coming from. The signal is good for 1,000-feet. Most of the signal is wasted on open lawns and asphalt streets. There is zero likelihood that drivers would have their radios tuned to our frequency.
@carl-blare According to this set up if you were in Canada you would most likely be considered non broadcasting as you are clearly intending to just have it for your own use.
Same as how I used it here. From indoors but admittedly with intention to get it to the neighbourhood. But intended or not it still would. But that's one of the 3 reasons I am on FM with the BETS transmitter now, and the Procaster is sitting in the cupboard.
But when it's inside it's not really considered broadcasting. Location, location, location!
But how did you get radials under a floor in your house? Another subject I know but you got my curiosity.
There is a reason for the split between broadcasting and non broadcasting in Canada. How good a reason I can't comment on.
In Canada, there is a separate regulatory body (the CRTC) which is charged with overseeing broadcasting content.
ISED, formerly Industry Canada, is not concerned with content, but only the technical aspects (including interference) of a transmission.
If you are a licensed broadcasting station, you must obtain an ISED license AND a CRTC license (you commit to broadcasting certain types of content in the latter).
The CRTC allows for certain types of broadcasting without a license. One is if your transmitter is BETS-certified. But you still have to adhere to the CRTC general broadcasting guidelines, and the CRTC reserves the right to order you to obtain a broadcasting license if they deem so appropriate. There are also a few provisos - they include no political or religious broadcasting, and if your broadcast is commercial, you can only carry the same content on one transmitter.
Key to this entire discussion is the definition of broadcasting, at least in the eyes of ISED and the CRTC. You are considered broadcasting if you intend your transmission to reach the ears of a member of the general public. It is not considered broadcasting if you transmit to an explicitly bounded area, such as a public place, or your own home and/or property. There is even a license you can get (RSS123) if you need more power than BETS to cover the bounded area, but your field strength at the boundaries cannot exceed 100uv/m. I'm not sure how rigidly that is enforced, as the license seems to be oriented around licensing a specific transmitter with a specific power, rather than transmitting to a given area. But then, when I was inquiring about obtaining such a license, I was sent several license forms, all different.
Anyway, I think this all makes some sort of sense. RSS210 covers many other transmitting scenarios other than ProCasters and the like. It would make more sense to be able to license the ProCaster under BETS, but the AM rules are much more restrictive than FM (which is why they go for RSS210).
@artisan-radio And that is what my rant was about and the changes I proposed. You have RSS-210 for AM and FM and BETS-1 for the same thing. It should all be moved to one place BETS or RSS and this nonbroadcasting thing be removed. Also why is the BETS for AM not the same as RSS-210/part 15? Much worse? And the better FM field strength was also in RSS-210 but was removed after issue 7. The only difference between a broadcasting transmitter and a non broadcasting one is the which one it's certified under. Nothing else.
AM and FM should be moved to RSS-210 and like I said put the FM field strength back to the way it used to be like BETS and remove the nonbroadcasting thing as it's nonsense. The CRTC can still regulate the content. The way it is now doesn't the CRTC have standards for RSS-210 also? The same as BETS? All I am saying is this is nuts, this nonbroadcasting thing.
And also if RSS-210 for AM is so much better it's useless if you can't broadcast This is nuts, that's all I am saying and that should change.
The main part of the house (which we name 'The Internet Building'), is located over a basement, and the rear-most room of the house is an extension built from the foundation wall out over the ground. Not long ago we had that foundation wall rebuilt and the workers had an access pit underneath the extended room, the perfect opportunity to drop a ground wire through a drilled hole and lay a radial at the ground facing south. The northward radial enters the basement and runs along the I-beam out to the front of the house where it enters the ground. No electrical connection is made to the I-beam because it is bonded with the electric panel ground, furnace, water pipes and ducting.