The United States Senate recently passed a bill which granted a brief reprieve to online radio stations in the United States. The House of Representatives had already unanimously passed the same bill three days earlier. The bill now goes to the President for his signature.

The bill itself doesn’t set any royalty rates for radio stations. What it does do is allow the online radio stations and the copyright holders to negotiate without requiring Congress to approve the final deal. The two sides still need to come to an agreement before February 15, 2009.

If online radio in the United States is shut down, that still won’t affect radio in the rest of the world. I’ve found that people are far more willing to listen to foreign radio stations, even some odd ones, than I think they would have been in the past. Perhaps years of truly dreadful radio has made them more open to experimentation. But I think it will be a shame if online radio innovation is relegated to outside the United States.

Now DISH Network has released the DTVPal Plus, which costs $20 more than the DTVPal. This time, the DTVPal Plus seems to be a different unit from the DTVPal and the TR-40 CRA. The main advantage of the DTVPal Plus seems to be an improved tuner for weak digital signals.

I think it is safe to say that the DISH Network’s strategy for converter box releases could be described as haphazard at best. If you’re interested in the DTVPal Plus, you can order it at the official DTVPal site.

As part of the plan, most AM radio stations in the country would move to the expanded FM channels and broadcast in digital mode (presumably DRM+). The new band would be divided to allow for the former AM stations, low power stations, and other uses. The AM band, now free from overcrowding, could be used for fewer station or for some other purpose.

This is just a proposal and probably nothing will come of it. Some see it as competition to the 26MHz.us proposal, although I don’t see why the two couldn’t coexist. I’m unsure whether I think the BMC plan would be a good idea or whether it would create more problems than it solved.

Radio World has two good articles about the proposal:

• Engineers’ Group Has an Idea: Move AMs to Channels 5 & 6
• Nuts and Bolts of BMC’s AM Migration Plan.

Of course, not everyone was pleased. Some have criticized Chrome’s lack of a built-in email client. But that makes sense when you consider that Google wants Chrome to showcase their lineup of web applications. Remember GMail?

Some have complained about the installer, the lack of plug-ins, and other weaknesses. Many of those criticisms are valid, but others strike me as odd. I think that a free program which is still in beta should be forgiven for a few deficiencies.

Google seems to be committed to Chrome, and I would expect many of the complaints to be addressed before very long. Keep in mind that this version of Chrome is just the beginning for Google and they are planning for the long term. As for me, I appreciate having a new alternative to Internet Explorer for those of us who don’t like Firefox.

“One way of landing a client is to fish him out of the river. Which is exactly how I commenced my confidential file on a character named Richie Stimson.”

Barry Craig happens to be on hand to rescue Richie Stimson after he drives his car into the river. Richie is current husband and former chauffeur to Natalie Stimson, a Park Avenue millionaire. Richie claims that he wasn’t drinking, but that he has spells where he gets “dopey all of the sudden” and foggy in his head, with the feeling that he wants to shut his eyes. He claims that he drove through the guard rails during one of those spells.

Craig bills Richie $100 for his ruined clothes and shoes, not expecting payment. He is surprised to receive a check for $1000 from Natalie Stimson with a request for a meeting.

In talking to Natalie, Craig learns that the plunge into the river wasn’t Richie’s first accident. For example, several weeks earlier he fell two stories from a window and was saved only by falling on a terrace on the 26th story. According to her, six doctors have examined Richie this year, with the most recent concluding that he is a “normal neurotic” who is just accident-prone. Her own theory is that Richie feels out of his element in the rich Park Avenue environment and needs someone who “talks his language”. She feels Craig can be that someone and hires him to be Richie’s friend for $4000 for one month.

Everything goes well for a while, with Richie attending burlesque shows just like he did before his marriage. But Craig suspects that something else is wrong, especially after a talk with Richie’s brother. He claims that Richie is a snob and has always been a schemer, but that he has never been accident-prone.

After one final accident, Barry Craig is forced to untangle all of the the lies and discover the real cause for Richie’s problems.

Featuring Paul Dubov, Betty Lou Gerson, Jack Carroll, Jack Moyles

This episode was first broadcast on NBC radio on January 5, 1955. You can download it from the Internet Archive here:

Download Barry Craig - Angel of Death - January 5, 1955

Now the TR-40 has been reborn as the TR-40 CRA. You can read the DISH Network press release here. The TR-40 CRA price is $40, which is $20 less than the DTVPal, even though it is the same unit! It says so right on the TR-40 CRA FAQ page:

What is the difference between TR-40 CRA and DTVPal?

TR-40 CRA is a special limited production version of the DTVPal. Offered at the government coupon price of $40, the TR-40 CRA includes the highly-acclaimed features and functionality of the DTVPal.

DTVPal has garnered much praise in recent months and is recommended as a “top choice” by CNET. DTVPal’s amazing features and consumer-friendly technology make it a great value at only $19.99 with a $40 government coupon.

With a limited supply available, you should probably act soon if you want to buy a TR-40 CRA.

Their fusion reactors, or fusors, aren’t used for power generation. That’s because a fusor consumes more energy than it produces. Fusors have been used commercially as neutron sources, but the interest among these researchers seems to be improving the device itself.

I am amazed that so many people would have the dedication necessary to build such an unusual device. I’m also amazed that fusors haven’t been banned by authorities frightened by the idea of a homemade nuclear reactor. In reality, the dangers would be limited to the extremely high voltages used and the possible production of x-rays.

If you’re interested, there are a number of web pages devoted to the topic, including Fusion is Easy and Fusor. Thanks to Scott Haley for the pointer.

With the prices for FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Array) chips coming down all the time, FPGA development has become affordable for the electronics hobbyist. I was looking around at starter boards and saw several recommendations for the Digilent Spartan-3 Starter Board. At $99, it is one of the cheapest boards available, yet it has some pretty impressive features. Take a look at what you get for your $99:

• Xilinx Spartan-3 FPGA with twelve 18-bit multipliers, 216Kbits of block RAM, and up to 500MHz internal clock speeds
• On-board 2Mbit Platform Flash
• 8 slide switches
• 4 pushbuttons
• 9 LEDs
• 4-digit seven-segment display
• Serial port
• VGA port
• PS/2 mouse/keyboard port
• Three 40-pin expansion connectors
• Three high-current voltage regulators (3.3V, 2.5V, and 1.2V)
• 1Mbyte on-board 10ns SRAM (256Kb x 32)

It even comes with power supply and programming cable, neither of which is included with many boards. It is designed to work with Xilinx’s free WebPack, a good set of FPGA programming and simulation tools. You will need to learn VHDL or Verilog, but there are many good books and tutorials available. I would recommend Circuit Design with VHDL as a good choice for learning VHDL.

If you have any interest in experimenting with FPGAs, then this looks like a good board to investigate.