for your viewing pleasure
Very good video on Radio and how it got started. Something for everyone in part 15 to watch. And back then the battle was for FM lol.
I have a copy that was broadcast on our PBS station several years ago.
Fantastic view into the roots of radio. I've alway felt a kindred spirit to Major Armstrong. I think Sarnoff hired some thugs to push him out the window but that's just my opinion. At least his wife carried on the fight and eventually won the court battle against Sarnoff.
DeForest gave us the Triode but that was just a serendipity. He couldn't even explain why it worked.
Sarnoff was just a greedy capitalist who would roll over anything in his way. Wow, did I say that.
There's some passion for radio and disdain for the users/abusers that took advantage of others coming out here. That's about as ranty as I get.
A treasured book is titled "Man of High Fidelity: Edwin Howard Armstrong" by Lawrence Lessing published by Bantom Books. Maybe you'll spot it on Amazon or the used-book store, as I do believe it's out of print.
As suspicious as I am, I'd never considered the idea that Armstrong's death was an assassination, but the idea fits the setting, so now I'll add that to any future commentary on my part.
Large corporations today have radio in their grip and it's a hellova limp grip.
Just as the FCC was bought off by RCA when the idea of changing the FM frequencies that were allowed for Radio broadcasting thus making Armstrong's FM Radio's obsolete so too was the FCC bought off by big corporations who try and kill off any notion of hobby Radio. So too comes the music industry fighting for a stronghold on the submitted material the artists create. This will occur until someone changes the way the music is recorded and distributed thus making the physical CD and need for the RIAA obsolete. Again history teaches us that greed only gets you so far until someone takes existing technology and changes it and makes that method of distribution obsolete. It was funny too how when FM was invented that the broadcasting companies already successful in AM wanted no part of FM and it was not until the late 60's till you seen it starting to be popular among home users. And now we know why.
Again this video is something all present and future part 15 hobbyist really should watch and thus get a grasp for how Radio was started. Thanks for the great educational video link.
In the early days of radio music was live on the air with both radio networks and stations keeping a staff orchestra. Playing of phonograph records on the radio was supressed until some stations wanted to replace their musicians with discs.
After a fierce legal battle the musician's union enforced a rule that radio stations must hire turntable operators who must be members of the musician's union.
It was independent FM stations that began running discs without turntable operators and the entire scheme ended.
The electrician's union for years required station audio board operators to be members of the brotherhood of electrical workers. This also ended during the rise of FM.
My knowledge of this history is sketchy, but generally on target.