Re: Walter's Telephones [Telecom]

On Jul 20, 10:09 pm, Wesr...@xxxxxxx wrote:
    Radio stations and most TV newsrooms got their news the same
way--from receive only Teletypes receivng the news reports put out by
the wire services' bureaus such as the one I worked in in Dallas.
Each service had a number of different wires, general news, sports,
radio, local or other state news, financial reports.

Those old green Baudot (5 bit) Teletypes remained in service well into
the 1980s before retirement. Many organizations subscribed to news or
weather services for various reasons. For example, the lobby of a
strock broker's office had a general news machine.



    The Teletype background noise was used on many radio and TV news
shows.

Long after the actual machines were retired a recording of the sound
was used to play in the background. More modern machines were either
silent CRTs or ugly-noise dot matrix printers.



    I don't remember headsets being used very much...most people
propped their phone on their shoulder while they were taking
dictation.  . . .

At one major newspaper all the desks had 'spacesaver' (also known as
'pharmacist') phones, with a headset hanging on the hookswitch instead
of handset.

     I could cynically suggest the it was not public taste but the
stations' search for ratings that let to the graphics and glitz.  I
still remember fondly the weatherman with a chalk or crayon board and
a stick, often making the weather more clear then they do now with
their electronic gadgets.

The Philadelphia TV news show on Channel 6*, WPVI, for years resisted
the electronic glitz of other stations yet had the highest ratings by
far. But they gradually evolved into radar, etc.

* A quirk in frequencies allowed the audio portion of Channel 6 to be
heard at 87.7 FM. Turned out many people listened to the station that
way, and when the station went digital that audio was lost.
Apparently to broadcast the audio now would require mountains of red
tape and FCC approval, even though it had been done for years and the
87.7 frequency is physically empty and not usable for anything else.

On another newsgroup I was disappointed that correspondents strongly
supported the _bureaucratic_ reasons "it can't be done", even though
_physically/technically_ it certainly can be done. Anyway, America
need not worry, we have plenty of bureaucrats eager to say NO! why
something can't be done. Too bad they fail to realize progress was
made by people thinking outside the box.

***** Moderator's Note *****

Being able to hear Channel Six on 87.7 wasn't a quirk: Channel Six's
assignment was from 82 to 88 MHz, and the audio carrier for the "old"
TV system was always 250 KHz below the top edge of the channel. Since
the audio was sent as FM, it could be heard of FM receivers tuned to
87.7, which was close enough to "capture" the signal.

The FCC won't allow the audio to stay on 87.75 because the entire
range from 54 to 88 MHz (The old channels 2 through 6) is being
reassigned to other services.

.

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