bellutta@uunet.uu.net (Paolo Bellutta) (09/03/89)
I noticed that American radio stations names starts with W or K. Someone told me that if the station started in AM it has a name starting with W otherwise (FM only stations) it starts with K. Is it true? Is there a (historical?) reason for that? I'm just curious. Paolo Bellutta I.R.S.T. vox: +39 461 810105 loc. Pante' di Povo fax: +39 461 810851 38050 POVO (TN) e-mail: bellutta@irst.uucp ITALY bellutta@irst.it [Moderator's Note: Actually, the dividng line between W/K is the Mississippi River, with those to the east taking 'W' (some exceptions) and those to the west taking 'K'. I am referring now just to broadcast stations in our AM (530-1610 kcs) or FM (88.1 - 107.9 mcs) bands. The Mississippi is a very large river which runs the length of the USA, separating the states of Iowa and Illinois; Arkansas and Mississippi/Tennessee; and others. Other types of radio services use both W and K, depending. Canada, our neighbor to the north prefixes all radio stations with 'C'; and Mexico to the south uses 'X'. What prefix is used in Italy? PT]
msmith@hardees.rutgers.edu (Mark Robert Smith) (09/03/89)
The United States is also assigned all callsigns beginning with N
("Navy" used to own them), and all callsigns beginning with AA thru
AL. However, these are mostly assigned to utility stations like the
Navy and ships, and amateur radio operators, so you won't find any
broadcasters with these calls.
Mark
--
Mark Smith | "Be careful when looking into the distance, |All Rights
61 Tenafly Road|that you do not miss what is right under your nose."| Reserved
Tenafly,NJ 07670-2643|rutgers!topaz.rutgers.edu!msmith,msmith@topaz.rutgers.edu
You may redistribute this article only to those who may freely do likewise.roy%phri@uunet.uu.net (Roy Smith) (09/04/89)
> Other types of radio services use both W and K, depending.
Don't airplanes use N prefixes for their call signs?
--
Roy Smith, Public Health Research Institute
455 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016
{att,philabs,cmcl2,rutgers,hombre}!phri!roy -or- roy@alanine.phri.nyu.edu
"The connector is the network"al@uunet.uu.net (Al Donaldson) (09/04/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0343m03@vector.dallas.tx.us>, (Paolo Bellutta) writes: > I noticed that American radio stations names starts with W or K. Fifteen years ago when I used to work in the radio and TV business, stations actually USED their call letters when doing the station ID. The minimum form included the call letters and the location, e.g., "W-K-R-P, Cincinnati", usually on the hour and half-hour. For TV, this information could be given either on audio or video. But over the past several years there seems to be a trend of replacing the legal call letters with catch-phrases and names that will appeal to the audience, e.g., "COOL", "ROCK", "EASY". Now this has always been done to some extent or other. For example, KLIK, a station I worked at in Jefferson City, Mo, used to pronounce the call letters "CLICK", sort of nerdish in retrospect, but it was certainly unique. There was obviously some competition for call letters that were easy to remember and compatible with your market image, e.g., KOOL, WROK, KEZY, etc. But now it seems that every major market in the country has an EASY or a COOL radio, and there's a whole generation of people who probably think that is the real name of their favorite station. Part of this is probably due to saturation of the name-space -- as with site names, all the good ones are taken, so stations with largely unpronounceable call letters like KZQE or WHCJ (to pick a couple at random) might become "EASY" or "COOL" respectively. But the biggest reason is probably the franchising of the radio industry that took place several years ago, with canned sounds, playlists, jingles, and so forth -- just like the fast food industry, you can get a Big Mac, fries and EASY almost anywhere you go. It seems that call letters are rarely used anymore, except perhaps when filing to the FCC for a license renewal :-). Al Donaldson al@escom.com (703) 620-4823
6675%mneuxg@uunet.uu.net (U.K. Tony) (09/04/89)
USA commercal radio stations have call letters begining with a K or W. In general the K stations are west of the Mississippi River. W stations are east of the Mississippi. There are some that do not comform. WFAA is in Dallas, TX. KVA & KDKA are in Pittsburgh, PA, and there are others. They all have call letters. Just do not be confused by on-air idents of "Q-102". This is just marketing hype. Tony
GREEN@wharton.upenn.edu (Scott D. Green) (09/05/89)
It used to be that the FCC was Very Particular about how a station identified itself: the "official" ID had to run within 2 or 3 (I can't remember) minutes of the top of the hour. An official ID consisted of the Call Letters followed immediately by the city of license. And they meant "immediately": "WABC, New York" was legal; "WABC in New York" was not. If an AM and FM station shared the same call sign, that needed to be included as well: "WCBS-FM, New York". The FCC is a *little* more lax now - the hourly ID only needs to run once per hour; it doesn't matter when. Another factor in how the stations ID themselves is how the ratings service credit the stations for listeners. Used to be that the station only got credit for a listener if the listener listed the FCC call sign in the listener log. Now, I believe that the stations get credit for Easy-101, Hot Hits 98, TalkRadio 77, etc. etc. Stations would much rather build their identity thru a logo-trademark kind of thing (even if it is franchised or purchased from a Format Company), than a sterile set of 4 letters, so you will often find, on these heavily formatted stations, that the "legal" ID is buried in the middle of a jingle touting their logo. -scott
dmr@csli.stanford.edu (Daniel M. Rosenberg) (09/06/89)
vrdxhq!escom.com!al@uunet.uu.net (Al Donaldson) writes: >In article <telecom-v09i0343m03@vector.dallas.tx.us>, (Paolo Bellutta) >writes: >...over the past several years there seems to be a trend of replacing >the legal call letters with catch-phrases and names that will appeal >to the audience, e.g., "COOL", "ROCK", "EASY". Now this has always >It seems that call letters are rarely used anymore, except perhaps >when filing to the FCC for a license renewal :-). I'm pretty sure that stations can call themselves anything they want most of the time, except for their top-of-the-hour legal ID. Every station *has* to give a legal ID at the top of the hour, and that is (invariably, I think) the call letters and transmitter location. For instance, K-ROCK in New York (an offshoot of Infinity Broadcasting's KROQ in Los Angeles, I believe) calls itself K-ROCK over and over again. "92.3 K-ROCK," "K-ROCK New York." But, at the top of the hour (+/- 5 minutes) they always say, somewhat sheepishly, "This is W-X-R-K, New York." At our radio station, I can -- and frequently do -- call it anything I want for station ID's. "This is Postmodern 90.1" or "You're attuned to FM 90.1, Stanford University." But at the top of the hour, I *have* to say, "KZSU, Stanford." Dan -- # Daniel M. Rosenberg // Stanford CSLI // Eat my opinions, not Stanford's. # dmr@csli.stanford.edu // decwrl!csli!dmr // dmr%csli@stanford.bitnet
edg@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Edward Greenberg) (09/06/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0347m07@vector.dallas.tx.us> vrdxhq!escom.com!al@ uunet.uu.net (Al Donaldson) writes: >But over the past several years there seems to be a trend of replacing >the legal call letters with catch-phrases and names that will appeal >to the audience, e.g., "COOL", "ROCK", "EASY". Now this has always They're still required to ID once an hour with their call letters and city or service area. Any use of other non-call letters is just advertising. KLOK was always Clock-FM, but once per hour, approximately on the hour, it was K-L-O-K San Francisco. -- Ed Greenberg uunet!apple!netcom!edg
quan@hplabsb.hp.com (Suu Quan) (09/06/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0343m03@vector.dallas.tx.us>, mcvax!irst.it!bellutta@ uunet.uu.net (Paolo Bellutta) writes: > I noticed that American radio stations names starts with W or K. Someone > told me that if the station started in AM it has a name starting with W > otherwise (FM only stations) it starts with K. Is it true? Is there a > (historical?) reason for that? I'm just curious. Trying to remember some pieces of when I was in the Navy some 20 years ago. I believe any station using the radio waves must take their call sign from an internationally allocated name space. For large countries like the US and USSR, the name space is generous. I think the US alone uses W*, K* and some other combinations. Little countries use a more restricted name space : ie Vietnam use XVV* (I recall someone saying that Mexico's name space is X*, its probably a subset of X*). When ever talking to (or receiving Morse-code messages from) an unknown station, we usually go to a book that will tell us who the other guy is. For the most part, the data carries no intelligence information: "HMS Elizabeth the 4th, UK" And also, the names are note restricted to 4 characters, nor are they restricted to alphabetic characters alone (numbers are used too). -- <standard apologies for asking standard dumb questions above > Suu Quan (TELNET/415) 857-3594 quan@hpcmfs.corp.HP.COM HEWLETT-PACKARD, Corp Manuf Factory Systems quan@hpcmfs Palo Alto, CA 94304 suu quan /HP0080/04
bellutta@uunet.uu.net (Paolo Bellutta) (09/08/89)
Fred R. Goldstein sent a very complete answer to my question. Since he lost
the copy of his message he asked me to forward it to the net:
I have to thank him and all of you for the resposnses.
Paolo Bellutta
I.R.S.T. vox: +39 461 810105
loc. Pante' di Povo fax: +39 461 810851
38050 POVO (TN) e-mail: bellutta@irst.uucp
ITALY bellutta@irst.it
From: goldstein@delni.enet.dec.com (Fred R. Goldstein)
Subject: Re: Radio Station Names (Wxxx - Kxxx)
> In article <telecom-v09i0343m03@vector.dallas.tx.us>, you write...
> >I noticed that American radio stations names starts with W or K. Someone
> >told me that if the station started in AM it has a name starting with W
> >otherwise (FM only stations) it starts with K. Is it true? Is there a
> >(historical?) reason for that? I'm just curious.
The International Telecommunications Union allocates prefix codes for
radio transmitters. The United States is pretty fastidious about
assigning such "call letters" to every sort of service, including
broadcasters. In other parts of the world, broadcasters may simply use
names (i.e., "Orwell Radio" in Ipswich, UK) or non-ITU call signs (the
ones beginning with "2" in Oz; "2" is assigned to the UK.) But some
services, such as Amateur Radio and aviation (the same prefix codes are
used for airplane registration), strictly follow ITU allocations.
You can find a complete list in a number of Amateur Radio publications,
such as the ARRL Logbook and the Callbooks. ITU prefices are allocated
in three-character blocks, although usually only the first one or two
characters is significant. For example, W, K, and N are entirely USA,
so N-anything is USA, but AA-AL are USA while AMA-AZZ are shared among
various countries (such as Pakistan AP and Argentina AZ). Italy owns
the entire "I" range. France owns all of F, the UK owns "G", "M", "2"
(2AA-2ZZ) and much of "V" (for overseas posessions). The USSR owns "U",
"R" and a bunch of smaller blocks.
There are three patterns for the first two digits. The oldest are
letter-letter (AA-ZZ). After WWII they added number-letter (i.e., 4X
and 4Z for Israel, 9Y for Trinidad, 3DA-3DM for Swaziland and 3DN-3DZ
for Fiji -- that's the only case where the third character counts!).
Eventually those ran out so they use letter-number (i.e., J3 for
Grenada, Y2-Y9 for East Germany, Z2 for Zimbabwe). Note that
letter-number is only possible when the first letter is not entirely
owned by one country. Thus W, K, R, G, I, etc. can't be the first of a
letter-number, but A, C, and D can.
How countries make use of these is up to them. Canada uses Cxxx for
broadcast, but VE for most Amateur. Sometimes amateurs use special
event prefixes, just for fun, so we have to look on the master list to
see what country it is.
fredwales@cs.ucla.edu (Rich Wales) (09/09/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0359m02@vector.dallas.tx.us> mcvax!irst.it!bellutta@uunet.uu.net (Paolo Bellutta) writes: You can find a complete list in a number of Amateur Radio publications, such as the ARRL Logbook and the Callbooks. ITU prefixes are allocated in three-character blocks, although usually only the first one or two characters is significant. . . . How countries make use of these is up to them. Canada uses Cxxx for broadcast, but VE for most Amateur. Canada has been allocated the following prefixes: CFA-CKZ; CYA-CZZ; VAA-VGZ; VOA-VOZ; VXA-VYZ; and XJA-XOZ. Interestingly, radio and TV stations of the Canadian Broadcasting Cor- poration (CBC) have call letters starting with CB -- even though the prefixes CBA-CBZ belong not to Canada, but to Chile. (Other Canadian radio and TV stations have call letters starting with CF through CK.) -- Rich Wales // UCLA Computer Science Department // +1 (213) 825-5683 3531 Boelter Hall // Los Angeles, California 90024-1596 // USA wales@CS.UCLA.EDU ...!(uunet,ucbvax,rutgers)!cs.ucla.edu!wales "Work _for_?!? I don't work _for_ anybody! I'm just having fun."
danny@uunet.uu.net (Danny Wilson) (09/15/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0348m04@vector.dallas.tx.us>, roy%phri@uunet.uu.net (Roy Smith) writes: > > Other types of radio services use both W and K, depending. > Don't airplanes use N prefixes for their call signs? Airplane registration numbers use N in the United States only. This is their national code. Canadian (and German, Japanese) etc. all have different prefixes. Danny Wilson IDACOM Electronics danny@idacom.uucp Edmonton, Alberta {att, watmath, ubc-cs}!alberta!idacom!danny C A N A D A
U5434122@uunet.uu.net (09/20/89)
Can some kind soul please tell me if there is any rhyme or reason to radio and television station call signs in the USA? What are the 'K' and 'W' for? In Australia, each state has a number: 2 New South Wales 3 Victoria 4 Queensland 5 South Australia 6 Western Australia 7 Tasmania Postcodes in the state are of the form Nxxx, where N is the state number and xxx are three digits. Radio station call signs are of the form N-cc for AM and N-ccc-FM for FM eg in Sydney (NSW) there are 2BL, 2WS, 2ABC-FM, 2JJJ-FM, 2-DAY-FM etc and in Melbourne (Vic) there are 3LO, 3AK, 3MMM-FM (triple M) 3-FOX-FM (the Fox) etc. The call signs of country stations usually reflect their location, eg 3GL in Geelong, 2PK in Parkes. This means that if you hear the call sign of a radio station, you instantly know which state it is from, and can hazard a guess at the area too. Is there a system in the USA? Daniel u5434122@ucsvc.unimelb.edu.au [Moderator's Note: We covered this pretty extensively several issues ago. Check old messages with the 'Radio Station Names' title. In a nutshell: The first letters are assigned all over the world by international agreement. The United States gets W and K mostly; Canada gets C; Mexico gets X, etc. In the United States, broadcast stations in the eastern part of the country use W. In the western part of the country, they use K. The W or K is followed by two or three other letters, assigned by the Federal Communications Commission. The dividing line between W and K is the Mississippi River, a large body of water which runs the length of our country from north to south. There are some exceptions to the W/K rule, but not many. The two or three letters following the W/K are often specifically requested by the station. If they are not already assigned the FCC will usually give them out. Frequently they will be the initials for the name of the owner, or have some other significance to the owner of the license. Quick examples in Chicago: WGN = World's Greatest Newspaper (owned by Chicago Tribune) WLS = World's Largest Store (from long ago when it was owned by Sears Roebuck) WMBI = Moody Bible Institute WCFL = Chicago Federation of Labor WBBM = We Broadcast (from the) Broadmoor Ballroom WVOA = The Voice of America (in Red Lion, PA -- not Chicago) Every country gets one or more letters assigned for the first letter. In Equador, the starting letter is H; thus a very loud shortwave station heard all over the world from Quito, Equador is HCJB. And who will be the first TELECOM reader who knows what those letters mean? :) PT]
wales@cs.ucla.edu (Rich Wales) (09/21/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0388m07@vector.dallas.tx.us>
munnari!ucsvc.unimelb.edu.au!U5434122@uunet.uu.net describes radio
station names in Australia:
Radio station call signs are of the form N-cc for AM and
N-ccc-FM for FM eg in Sydney (NSW) there are 2BL, 2WS,
2ABC-FM, 2JJJ-FM, 2-DAY-FM etc and in Melbourne (Vic) there
are 3LO, 3AK, 3MMM-FM (triple M) 3-FOX-FM (the Fox) etc.
The call signs of country stations usually reflect their
location, eg 3GL in Geelong, 2PK in Parkes.
This means that if you hear the call sign of a radio station,
you instantly know which state it is from, and can hazard a
guess at the area too.
There is apparently no international requirement that radio stations
all have call letters conforming to the international (ITU) plan. If
there were such a requirement, Australian stations would have call
letters starting with AX, VH-VN, or VZ.
For that matter, the Australian call signs mentioned above overlap all
over areas of the naming space reserved by the ITU for other countries.
For example, 2PK (indeed, *all* calls starting with a 2) "should" be in
Great Britain; 3AK ought to be in Monaco; and 3MMM belongs in China.
Of course, Australia is not alone in ignoring the ITU list. In Canada,
the radio and TV stations of the CBC all have call letters starting with
the letters CB -- which, under international treaty, must mean that the
CBC is really based in Chile. :-} (Canada doesn't own *all* of the
"C..." call letter space, you see -- only CF-CK and CY-CZ, in addition
to VA-VG, VO, VX-VY, and XJ-XO.)
Is there a system in the USA?
As Patrick (our moderator) mentioned, there is no comparable system for
commercial radio or TV call signs in the US (other than the K/W split).
However, amateur radio calls in the US *do* indicate the general part of
the country; the digit indicates one of ten areas (which do *not*, how-
ever, correspond to the first digit of our "ZIP" postal codes). This
system isn't perfect, though, since if a ham moves, he gets to keep his
call sign even if his new residence is in a differently numbered part of
the country.
Patrick added:
In Ecuador, the starting letter is H; thus a very loud shortwave
station heard all over the world from Quito, Ecuador is HCJB.
And who will be the first TELECOM reader who knows what those
letters mean? :)
HCJB is run by an evangelical Christian group; the letters stand for
"Heralding Christ Jesus' Blessings".
Rich Wales // UCLA Computer Science Department // +1 (213) 825-5683
3531 Boelter Hall // Los Angeles, California 90024-1596 // USA
wales@CS.UCLA.EDU ...!(uunet,ucbvax,rutgers)!cs.ucla.edu!wales
"Then they hurl heavy objects. . . . And claw at you. . . ."
[Moderator's Note: Yours was the only answer in the queue as of 12:30 AM
Thursday. Therefore I declare you first, and the winner. Your prize is
a free, lifetime subscription to TELECOM Digest. Lucky you! I suppose you
also knew that WINB, Red Lion, is the World InterNational Broacasters,
another shortwave station. What about WOR, KOA, and KCMO? Here's a real hard
one for you: WNBC. What about KSL? Some are more obscure: the old WEFM here
in Chicago was named for Edward F. McCormick, president of the Zenith Radio
Corporation (where the quality goes in before the name goes on, remember?)
back in the 1940's, when WEFM was the first FM station in the USA. No further
messages re: HCJB will be printed unless the writer has something to say
besides explaining the call sign. PT]kaufman@neon.stanford.edu (Marc T. Kaufman) (09/22/89)
The Moderator Writes: > Some are more obscure: the old WEFM here >in Chicago was named for Edward F. McCormick, president of the Zenith Radio >Corporation... Naming stations for people is rather common. KRHM-FM (which no longer exists) in Los Angeles was named for the owners: Ruth and Harry Mazlish. Marc Kaufman (kaufman@Neon.stanford.edu)
danny@uunet.uu.net (Danny Wilson) (09/22/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0348m04@vector.dallas.tx.us>, roy%phri@uunet.uu.net (Roy Smith) writes: > > Other types of radio services use both W and K, depending. > Don't airplanes use N prefixes for their call signs? Airplane registration numbers use N in the United States only. This is their national code. Canadian (and German, Japanese) etc. all have different prefixes. Danny Wilson IDACOM Electronics danny@idacom.uucp Edmonton, Alberta {att, watmath, ubc-cs}!alberta!idacom!danny C A N A D A
klg@dukeac.UUCP (Kim Greer) (09/22/89)
>Every country gets one or more letters assigned for the first letter. In >Equador, the starting letter is H; thus a very loud shortwave station heard >all over the world from Quito, Equador is HCJB. And who will be the first >TELECOM reader who knows what those letters mean? :) PT] HCJB = Heralding Christ Jesus' Blessings This was about the second shortwave station I ever listened to when I first got the swl bug (I was about 13 yrs old). One of these days I'm going to dust off the set and stick up another antenna - but I think I will wait til after Hugo gets through dumping on us.
brent@uunet.uu.net (Brent Chapman) (09/23/89)
kaufman@neon.stanford.edu (Marc T. Kaufman) writes: #The Moderator Writes: #> Some are more obscure: the old WEFM here #>in Chicago was named for Edward F. McCormick, president of the Zenith Radio #>Corporation... # #Naming stations for people is rather common. KRHM-FM (which no longer exists) #in Los Angeles was named for the owners: Ruth and Harry Mazlish. Kingman, Arizona, is a little town (population about 15,000) in northwest Arizona (closer to Las Vegas than to Phoenix) that has the rather strange distinction of having both KAAA-AM and KZZZ-FM... -Brent
peggy@ddsw1.mcs.com (Peggy Shambo) (09/23/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0393m08@vector.dallas.tx.us> "Marc T. Kaufman" <kaufman@neon.stanford.edu> writes: >The Moderator Writes: >> Some are more obscure: the old WEFM here >>in Chicago was named for Edward F. McCormick, president of the Zenith Radio >>Corporation... >Naming stations for people is rather common. KRHM-FM (which no longer exists) >in Los Angeles was named for the owners: Ruth and Harry Mazlish. It seems to me that WRGB (Channel 6, Schenectady, NY) was named for Roy G. Biv.. then again, I might be wrong? Anyone got something different on this? Actually I thought it kind of clever. :-) Peg Shambo | Anybody know of any IDMS/ADSO positions in peggy@ddsw1.mcs.com | the South of England? (London, Southampton, | Portsmouth, Bournemouth would all be nice)
msb@sq.sq.com (Mark Brader) (09/25/89)
> There is apparently no international requirement that radio stations > all have call letters conforming to the international (ITU) plan. If > there were such a requirement, Australian stations would have call > letters starting with AX, VH-VN, or VZ. > > For that matter, the Australian call signs mentioned above overlap all > over areas of the naming space reserved by the ITU for other countries. > For example, 2PK (indeed, *all* calls starting with a 2) "should" be in > Great Britain; 3AK ought to be in Monaco; and 3MMM belongs in China. When I visited New Zealand, I found that their radio stations also use call signs of one digit and some letters, the digit denoting which part of the country the station is in. Christchurch area stations began with 3, for example; I remember 3BZ. (Z pronounced zed, of course.) The person who pointed this out to me, however, also said that the *official* call letters of each station included a prefix which was the ITU code for New Zealand. I think that that was NZ -- some of them do have mnemonic value! -- so that 3BZ was really NZ3BZ but mostly did not mention that. So perhaps Australians do the same thing. It is not unknown for individual stations here in North America to adopt this approach; in Toronto, CKEY on 590 kHz is "KEY 590" in all its advertisements nowadays, and in Buffalo, WGR on 550 kHz is "GR 55" in theirs. There must be many other examples. (Hint: too many for it to be interesting for everyone to see the ones in YOUR hometown.) Mark Brader "'Settlor', (i) in relation to a testamentary trust, Toronto means the individual referred to in paragraph (i)." utzoo!sq!msb, msb@sq.com -- Income Tax Act of Canada, 108(1)(h)
michael@uunet.uu.net (Michael Katzmann) (09/26/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0391m04@vector.dallas.tx.us> Rich Wales <wales@cs. ucla.edu> writes: >In article <telecom-v09i0388m07@vector.dallas.tx.us> >munnari!ucsvc.unimelb.edu.au!U5434122@uunet.uu.net describes radio >station names in Australia: > > Radio station call signs are of the form N-cc for AM and > N-ccc-FM for FM eg in Sydney (NSW) there are 2BL, 2WS, > 2ABC-FM, 2JJJ-FM, 2-DAY-FM etc and in Melbourne (Vic) there > are 3LO, 3AK, 3MMM-FM (triple M) 3-FOX-FM (the Fox) etc. > > >There is apparently no international requirement that radio stations >all have call letters conforming to the international (ITU) plan. If >there were such a requirement, Australian stations would have call >letters starting with AX, VH-VN, or VZ. > The origin of this system is I think, related to the British system of broadcasting station callsigns. One of the first British Broadcasting Company stations (as it was then) was 2LO. This translated to the antipodes as the Melbourne station 3LO. The system was just perpetuated. Since (generally speaking) the MW stations from Australia (and of course the VHF stations) would not cause interference to any other countries (with the exception of NZ, PNG and Indonesia), the need to be under the international call sign system is less than for European and other countries. Incidentally some broadcasing stations (educational and similar) do follow ITU callsigns. One example is the University of New South Wales radio and tv stations that had callsigns of VL2UV and VITU respectively. email to UUCP: uunet!mimsy!{arinc,fe203}!vk2bea!michael _ _ _ _ Amateur | VK2BEA (Australia) ' ) ) ) / // Radio | G4NYV (United Kingdom) / / / o _. /_ __. _ // Stations| NV3Z (United States) / ' (_<_(__/ /_(_/|_</_</_ Michael Katzmann Broadcast Sports Technology. 2135 Espey Ct. #4 Crofton Md. 21114 USA Ph: +1 301 721 5151