Shortwave Listening - Practices

Practices

Listening to shortwave broadcast stations for news and information programming is common, but for many shortwave listeners (abbreviated as "SWLs"), the goal is to receive as many stations from as many countries as possible, also known as DXing. "DXers" routinely test the limits of their antenna systems, radios and radio propagation knowledge. Specialized interests of shortwave listeners may include listening for shortwave utility, or "ute", transmissions such as shipping, sailing, naval, aviation, or military signals, listening for intelligence signals (numbers stations), or tuning in amateur radio stations.

Listeners often obtain QSL cards from ham operators, broadcasters or utility stations as trophies of the hobby. Traditionally, listeners would send letters to the station with reception reports and requests for schedules. Many stations now accept E-mails or provide reception report forms on their Web sites. Reception reports give valuable information about propagation and interference to a station's engineers.

There are several publications dedicated to providing information to shortwave listeners, including the magazines Popular Communications and Monitoring Times in the United States, and the annual publications Passport to World Band Radio (now, regrettably defunct) and the World Radio TV Handbook (WRTH). In addition, stations can provide broadcast schedules through the mail or E-mail. There are also shortwave radio programs dedicated to shortwave listening and DXing, such as the U.S. based World of Radio and DXing With Cumbre, but recently these programs have been curtailed or dropped by many international broadcasters. As of 2007, Radio Habana Cuba still hosts a program called DXers Unlimited.

While no one knows the exact number of SWLs, most estimates place the number in the millions. In 2002, according to the National Association Of Shortwave Broadcasters, for estimated numbers of households with at least one shortwave set in working order, Asia led with a large majority, followed by Europe, Sub Saharan Africa, and the former Soviet Union, respectively. The total estimated number of households worldwide with at least one shortwave set in working order was said to be 600,000,000. SWLs range from teenagers to retired persons to David Letterman, who has mentioned on several occasions how much he enjoys listening to shortwave, particularly broadcasts by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).

In developing countries where domestic medium wave and FM networks are not as advanced as North America, Western Europe, Japan and some East Asian countries, shortwave is a means of receiving local and regional programming. In China and Russia for example, several domestic radio channels are retransmitted onto shortwave for the benefit of listeners in remote provinces. In other developing countries, shortwave listening is used as an educational tool in classrooms to expose students to foreign news, music and cultural information to help improve listening comprehension, gain a native perspective and awareness of regional language variations, broaden students international worldviews, and vocabulary expansion. Poor sound reproduction, unreliable signal quality, and inflexibility of access are seen as disadvantages.

Some humanitarian organizations like Ears to Our World distribute portable, self-powered shortwave radios to less developed parts of the globe, enabling people in remote, impoverished parts of the world to get educational programming, local and international news, emergency information and music. Recently, the group was involved in sending radios to Haiti so victims of the 2010 Haiti earthquake could stay abreast of local disaster recovery efforts.