sanscript: -The closing of the FM radio net in Norway-

I don't have a specific article to ref to, nor is it exactly new... but in short:

The politicians in Norway, against every expert / specialists warning and other major tech national groups, decided to close down the FM net, and force everyone over to DAB (a technology that is vastly inferior to both FM and internet radio).

That's what we get from not having 100% transparency on every lobby-meetings... and the other countries are not wrong when they are shaking their heads to this decision.

Not to mention that DAB is from the 80's, streams at a lower quality bit-rate, needs a broader bandwidth, hasn't the same coverage as FM, and is already out-shined by wireless internet radio (be it 3G, 4G, 5G et al). As a topping on the cake; the price on DAB client is excruciating high... 150-350 USD is not unusual for a car setup. Even higher if it's a new car with a built-in radio system and you want to replace it all instead of having a simple DAB-to-FM receiver/sender.

And subsequently, millions of perfectly working radios are needlessly thrown into an already high garbage mountain.

GameRager: They're likely doing it for reasons that are also held by those pushing 5g & pushing for the planned dismantling of 3g....money/profit at the consumer's expense.

sanscript: And like BBC, we have something called NRK, Norwegian Radio Broadcasting, they wanted more money.

Not only do they get money from our tax money, they also are allowed to extort even more money out of us twice a year, a "licence fee". Luckily, this is now being removed, but they still managed to get it from somewhere else, from house taxes!

It's all about power; even small radio stations are almost not allowed to continue in fear of "stealing listeners"... worst is that there has never been so rate of listeners as now.

Even BBC/Sweden/Denmark decided not to - why can't NRK reverse their decision and just keep both? *puke*

Luckily there are some strong force in play to try to open it again...

GameRager: Article 11 - Kardashian shamed for having cornrows and not being black

I mean c'mon......can't one use hairstyles made by others without it being called cultural appropriation?

This reminds me of all those chefs that wanted to open asian/mexican food restaurants and people complained they weren't asian/mexican themselves so it was somehow bad/wrong.

DadJoke007: To be fair, people who cry about cultural appropriation must be very few. Most people, no matter political stance, enjoy when their culture is appreciated outside of their own sphere. It must be the best kind of praise there is when the domestic culture is embraced by other people.

GameRager: FWIW, I notice most complaints about cultural appropriation are made by moral busibodies who find it their missions in life to get offended at other people's/culture's expense......like those who get upset at Cinco De Mayo/St Patrick's Day celebrations/outfits & wearing certain halloween costumes.

DadJoke007: Getting offended by proxy is a serious issue and should not be taken lightly. ;-)

GameRager: Well it shouldn't(though it also shouldn't be taken too seriously).....especially when such people usually easily influence today's decision makers(corp/gov't) nowadays.

DadJoke007: Anything of ideological or cultural value that can't stand ridicule needs to get ridiculed. When people try to claim that something is so valuable/sensitive that it's beyond criticism or ridicule, it can get dangerous. It's important that such ideas gets knocked down a peg or two.

firstpastthepost: Exactly, the fact of the matter is that cultural appropriation is often beneficial to members of the community being appropriated from. Some people's definitions of this are so broad as to be pointless. For example, if I go to another country and buy a piece of local art I am supporting a person's livelihood buying tourist merchandise. But some people would call that cultural appropriation. There seems to be a disconnect between logic and people's aspirations to the point that they don't see the difference between appreciation and appropriation. The difference should be obvious, if you're doing it to mock someone it's distasteful, if you're doing it to praise or enjoy something it should be fine. I don't understand why this has gotten so complicated, especially given the fact that the people complaining, for the most part aren't of the culture they are trying to defend.