http://www.abc.net.au/radio/digital/
Today being July 1 is the first official day of digital radio in AUstralia. Never mind the fact that ABC DiG, ABC Classic, SBS Radio 1 and SBS Radio 2 have already been in operation for three years, also we'll conveniently ignore the fact that Britain has already had digital radio for 10 years, and worse XM and Sirius Satellite Radio already meant that you could have been listening to digital radio from another country for 6 years.
In 2003 I was listening to the whole spectrum of radio stations in the UK in a Vauxhall Corsa - a Corsa! That car was sold here as a Barina for goodness sake. GM's cheapest car in its lineup already had had digital radio as standard as early as 6 years ago.
Whilst radio stations are congratulating themselves on how well they've adopted "new technology" bear in mind that the radio stations themselves spent a great deal of time putting in submissions as to why they couldn't adopt it; mainly on the grounds of cost.
Australians always seem to get everything last. Despite what tech-strong companies tell you, they're more content to bicker over standards for a commercial advantage than actually provide the customer with new technology.
Let's see just how bad we've been, shall we?
Radio - 4 years
8MK Detroit - 1920
3AR Melbourne - 1924
TV - 21 years
NWDR Berlin - 1935
GTV 9 Melbourne 1956
FM Radio - 35 years
RCA NYC - 1940
2JJ - 1975
Colour TV - either 21 or 8 years
NBC - 1954 (NTSC)
BBC2 - 1967 (PAL)
ABC - 1975
Internet - 2 years
MCI Mail - 1988 (open to commercial use)
OTC - 1990
3G Mobile - 2 years
NTT DoCoMo - 2001
3 Mobile - 2003
On the face of it, we should be getting quicker with our adoption of new technologies. As the world gets ever more connected, then those technologies should equally pass around the world on a more or less equal timeframe. Why then have we spent the best part of 8 years dithering about the adoption of standards, when the parts of the industrial world are already ahead of us?
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