From wood@stab.sr.seTue Jan 2 20:59:48 1996 Date: Tue, 2 Jan 1996 14:11:15 +0100 From: George Wood To: wood@rs.sr.se Subject: MediaScan/Sweden Calling Dxers 2239 ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: :: MediaScan :: :: SWEDEN CALLING DXERS :: :: from Radio Sweden :: :: Number 2239--Jan. 2, 1995 :: ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: Satellite, shortwave and other electronic media news from Radio Sweden. This week's bulletin was written by George Wood. Packet Radio BID SCDX2239 All times UTC unless otherwise noted. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Welcome to the first MediaScan of 1996, the year when digital satellite television is set to start in Europe. Today's was a very special program, an interview with the government minister responsible for broadcasting in Sweden, Minister of Culture Margot Wallstroem. We talked about her campaign to restrict violence on TV, whether the new national channels here will be analog or digital, and the future of public service broadcasting. If you missed today's program, the World Wide Web edition carries the interview, divided up into smaller to download chunks. I'll be writing it as soon as I finish this version of the program. (I'm also pleased to report that there are now more than 700 of you on the mailing list.) NORDIC MEDIA NEWS: SIRIUS--By February 1, all of the D2-MAC channels on Sirius will be encrypted, with the exception of TV3. Here is the channel plan: TV3 11.785 Ghz TV6 12.015 GHz ZTV 11.862 GHz ??? 12.092 GHz (Bert Dahlstroem in "Paa TV") PIRATE DECODERS--Regarding the recent report of advertisements for a satellite viewers club offering pirate decoders on TV3's Tele-Text service, and in the magazine "Paa TV" both owned by Kinnevik, who's TV1000 is the target of the cards, Johan (presumeably from the club) has written to say: "It is true that the product can be a component in the hunt to decode pay channels, but that is only part of the truth. The product is an interface between ISO-7816 and RS-232, two accepted standards. With this interface card you can connect a card reader (Viedocrypt or Eurocrypt) to a computer. In the computer you can emulate a smartcard. The program is available for free on the Internet, and at the moment can decode most Eurocrypt channels and some Videocrypt channels (not Sky, however). "This is, however, a worse alternative than a traditional pirate card, as the program is updated first when all similar commercial products have been updated. It is the worse alternative on the market... "Selling the interface card does not violate Swedish law, as the card by itself cannot decode images. The card is only an interface between two standards -- ISO-7816 and RS-232... "The program is a written work distributed free of charge over the Internet. Selling the interface card and the program, and installing them for someone, can be considered as a violation, but this has not been done by this company. "Then there is the ethical problem of the advertisement. This is understandible, but no law has been broken by either "Paa TV" or the company in question. If I had been the editor of "Paa TV", I wouldn't have run the ad, without checking first what it was all about. There is the problem. Ignorance often leads to such problems." More information about the interface card can be found at: http://www.paranoia.com/~defiant http://harley.pcl.ox.ac.uk/~paulmax (note we got a "connection refused" trying to access this site) (TV1000 viewers, legal or not, see Star Trek below) EUROPEAN MEDIA NEWS: AMERICA ONE--The new America One channel from National Public Radio and Public Radio International went on the air to Europe as scheduled right after midnight on New Years. It's on Astra transponder 22, the sound channel two steps up from the World Radio Network, at 7.74 MHz. SKY--Sky One viewers will be able to watch Sky Movies in January without having to use pirate devices! "Murder One", a 23-part "docudrama" series will be soft-encrypted for its showing on Sky Movies (beginning January 7, at 21:00 hrs UTC). No slots were available for the series on Sky One. ("What Satellite TV") STAR TREK--For Star Trek fans, the "Next Generation" and "Voyager" series have been running on Sky One. Now the original series is returning to Sky One as well, Sundays at noon UTC. And Trekkers will be happy to know that Sweden's TV1000 will be broadcasting the "Deep Space Nine" series, beginning this Wednesday, at 17:00 hrs UTC. There seem to be a lot of pirate TV1000 cards out there, especially in Britain. The programs will be repeated the following Wednesdays at 07:00 hrs, and TV1000 is committed to broadcasting 46 episodes, which corresponds to the series first two seasons. Sweden's TV5 Nordic/Femman continues to broadcast the "Next Generation" Sundays at 15:00 hrs. TCC/DISCOVERY--The Children's Channel and Discovery seem to be sharing the transponder at 11.055 GHz on Intelsat 601. ORION--Orion Network Systems has announced that it will transmit Performance - The Arts to cable operators in the UK via the Orion 1 satellite. The transmission begins February 1, along with the Channel One news and entertainment channel, which was announced last November. For more information: http://www.prnewswire.com/cnoc/exec/menu?101263 (PR Newswire) ONXY TV--Onyx TV was scheduled to launch on Hot Bird on January 1, on channel 22 (11.148 GHz apparently). This is an unscrambled PAL music video channel in German. ("What Satellite TV") VH-1--Viacom is proposing launching versions of VH-1 for the Benelux and Scandinavian markets in 1996. ("What Satellite TV") ASTRA--Astra 1A, launched in 1988, will probably be used for satellite news gathering duties from 1998 onwards (after Astra 1H is in position(, being placed in an inclined orbit, and moved to either 24.3, 26, or 28.2 degrees East. ("What Satellite TV") HALLMARK--Hallmark Entertainment Network says it will launch its satellite and cable channel by the end of January, 1996. A segment of the channel's schedule will probably appear as part of the Sky Multi- Channels basic tier package. ("What Satellite TV") Another "channel" for the ever-popular transponder 47? As we've previously reported, the Hallmark Channel is supposed to be part of FilmNet's digital package to Scandinavia on Astra 1E. POLAND--CLT is to launch a Polish-language satellite channel this Spring. The channel will be called RTL-7, and will be the sixth satellite delivered Polish channel. ("What Satellite TV") CLT--There have been reports of various bidders and buyers for all or part of CLT, owner of the RTL television and radio channels around Europe. The latest report is that a group made up of Bertelsmann, Canal Plus, and Havas wants to buy one third of CLT. Recently CLT was forced to deny rumors that Rupert Murdoch's BSkyB was to buy a 30 percent share in the company. ("Tele-satellit") DIGITAL RADIO--Digital satellite radio is starting slow in Europe. Merger talks between Astra's first subscription music broadcaster, Digital Music Express, and its chief competitor, Music Choice Europe, may lead to a deal in early Spring. DMX has postponed the full launch of its UK service until April (although the German service is up and running), due it says, to a shortage to necessary microchips. But financial losses accumulated thus far have proved far greater than anticipated. ("What Satellite TV") ASIAN MEDIA NEWS: ASIASAT--The first test signals from the new Asiasat-2 satellite were sighted on December 18, with the text: "Welcome to Asiasat 2 Merry Christmas and Happy new year". The position was some degrees West of Asiasat-1, with a very strong signal on 3860 MHz. (Kim Slyns, TVROSAT mailing list, via Curt Swinehart) INDIA--A Hindi language verison of Europe's Family Channel is to be launched to India in the Spring. ("What Satellite TV") JAPAN--Rupert Murdoch's Star-TV plans to enter the Japanese market in April, according to industry sources. The move comes after Japan's Post and Telecommunications Ministry decided to allow international broadcasting via satellite. (Kyodo) NORTH AMERICAN MEDIA NEWS: ECHOSTAR--The EchoStar-1 satellite was successfully launched from China on December 28. It was scheduled to reach its final orbital postition at 119 degrees West after about 10 days, and is expected to be ready for full commercial transmission by mid-February. EchoStar is developing a state-of-the-art DBS system called DISH (Digital Sky Highway). A total of more than 200 channels of digital audio, video, and data services are expected to be delivered to homes through-out the continental United States with the launch of EchoStar-2 in mid-1996. (Reuters and "Tele-satellit") SEA LAUNCH--Hughes Space and Communication Co. has ordered a series of at least 10 commercial space satellite launches from Sea Launch, an international joint-venture company that plans to conduct launches from a floating platform in the Pacific Ocean. Sea Launch is jointly owned by the Seattle-based Boeing Commercial Space (responsible for overall project management), Norway's Kvaerner AS (responsible for maritime resources), NPO-Yuzhnoye from the Ukraine (which builds the two stage Zenit rocket), and RSC-Energia in Russia (which builds the upper stage of the Sea Luanch rocket). Sea Launch has also announced that it has completed the purchase of a large semi-submersible platform, and has authorited Kvaerner Rosenberg in Stavanger, Norway, to convert the 430 foot long former oil rig to serve as a sea-going launch platform. Long Beach, California is the potential US home port. (Curt Swinehart) INDIA--Viewers in the United States will soon be able to watch India's state-owned television network Doordarshan, via Panamsat. Doordarshan's signals will be relayed via the PAS-4 Indian Ocean satellite to a British Telecom station near London, and then transmitted via PAS-1 to the United States. (Curt Swinehart) LITHUANIA--Lithuanian Radio and Television has signed an agreement with Deutsche Welle to rebroadcast Lithuanian Radio programs in English and Lithuanian on shortwave to North America via DW's Julich transmitting station, beginning January 1. (Sigitas Zilionis, "Lithuanian Broadcast News") CYBERSPACE: TRAVEL CHANNEL--The Travel Channel can now be found on the WWW: http://www.travelchannel.com SATCO DX--Satco DX, in co-operation with "TeleSatellit", has started an interactive frequency chart, "covering all satellite channels worldwide" (except that it currently lists only European satellites): http://www.sat-city.com NASWA--The North American Short Wave Association, North America's oldest shortwave broadcast-only club, has launched NASWeb, its home page on the WWW: http://www.mcs.com/~ralph/html/naswa/ NET RADIO--Minneapolis-based net.radio corporation has begun broadcasting its second Internet radio format. "Maestro", a classical format, debuted on December 24, using RealAudio: http://www.netradio.net/ (Curt Swinehart) BLOOMBERG--The business news service Bloomberg has teamed up with Xing Technology to deliver Bloomberg Information Radio over the Internet, using the Streamworks format. WBBR AM 1130 from New York is being carried 24 hours a day. For more information and the Streamworks program check: http://www.xingtech.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sweden Calling DXers/MediaScan is the world's oldest radio program about international broadcasting. Radio Sweden has presented this round-up of radio news, features, and interviews on Tuesdays since 1948. It's currently broadcast on the first and third Tuesdays of the month. Radio Sweden broadcasts in English: To Europe: 17:15 hrs 1179 and 6065 kHz 18:30 1179, 6065, 7240, and 9655 kHz (also Africa/Middle East) 21:30 1179, 6065, and 7230 kHz (also Africa/Middle East) 22:30 1179 and 6065 kHz (also Africa/Middle East) 23:30 1179 kHz Asia/Pacific: 12:30 hrs 9835, 13740, and 15240 kHz 01:30 hrs 7120 kHz North America: 13:30 hrs on 11650 and 15240 kHz 14:30 hrs on 11650 and 15245 kHz 02:30 and 03:30 hrs on 7120 kHz Latin America: 00:30 hrs on 6065 and 9850 kHz The broadcasts at 17:15 and 18:30 hrs are also relayed to Europe by satellite: Astra 1C on ZDF's transponder 33 at 10.964 GHz, audio subcarrier at 7.38 MHz Tele-X via TV5 Nordic/Femman's transponder at 12.475 GHz, audio subcarrier 7.38 MHz Radio Sweden is also relayed to Europe via the World Radio Network on VH-1's transponder 22 on Astra 1C, audio 7.38 MHz, daily at 22:00 hrs CET. Radio Sweden can also be heard on WRN's North American service on Galaxy-5, on WTBS's transponder 6, audio 6.8 MHz, daily at 21:30 and 00:00 hrs Eastern time. Our new World Wide Web page is at: http://www.sr.se/rs A multimedia version of this bulletin can be found at: http://www.sr.se/rs/english/media/scdx.htm Sound recordings of interviews from previous programs can be found at: http://www.sr.se/rs/english/media/media2.htm Sound files of Mediascan are archived at: ftp.funet.fi:pub/sounds/RadioSweden/Mediascan. You can also find the programs among the offerings of Internet Talk Radio at various sites, including: ftp://town.hall.org/radio/Mirrors/RadioSweden/MediaScan Radio Sweden news (recorded at 01:30 hrs UTC daily) as well recordings of MediaScan are available in the Real Audio format via the World Radio Network, at: http://www.wrn.org WRN programming is carried live over the Internet in the Streamworks format. The WRN server is at Internet Multicasting at: town.hall.org Contributions can be sent to DX Editor George Wood by fax to +468-667-6283 or by e-mail to: wood@rs.sr.se Reports can also be sent to: Radio Sweden S-105 10 Stockholm Sweden Contributions should be NEWS about electronic media--from shortwave to satellites--and not loggings of information already available from sources such as the "World Radio TV Handbook". Clubs and DX publications may reprint material as long as MediaScan/Sweden Calling DXers and the original contributor are acknowledged. We welcome comments and suggestions about the electronic edition, Sweden Calling DXers, and our programs in general. The mailing list for the Electronic Edition is now open to general subscription. If you can send e-mail over the Internet, send a message to: subscribe@rs.sr.se You ought to get a confirmation message in reply. To unsubscribe from the list, send a message to unsubscribe@rs.sr.se To get a copy of Radio Sweden's English program schedule, write to: english@rs.sr.se And for general questions, comments, and reception reports, our e-mail address is: info@rs.sr.se ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Thanks to this week's contributors Good Listening!  ************************ George Wood wood@rs.sr.se Radio Sweden http://www.sr.se/rs S-105 10 Stockholm tel: +468-784-7239 Sweden fax: +468-667-6283 ************************