The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1922-11-12
BROADCAST|NGNO now.
BEGINS IN BRITAIN
Final Obstacles Removed at
Joint Conference lust Before
Lloyd George Resigned
nx wARnn D. WELLS

ny wARRE b.. WELLS
London. November 4.-The British
listener-in should be able to get his
general election results this month
by radio. Fortunately for the radio
amateur-for otherwise there would
have been still another hold-up-the
week which brought the resignation
of the Lloyd George government
brought also the successful end of
negotiations between Postmaster
General Kellaway and the radio COM
panies. AS consequence. the
"BroadcastIng wireless Telephone
company" is TO be registered forth
with.
This decision, which win enable
broadcasting to begin Immediately,
was taken at a meeting of radio
equipment manufacturers here. The
Broadcasting company" says an Of
fetal explaining the delay, has to
face an annual outlay of 100000. and
the trouble has been TO formulate a
scheme which a body of hard-headed
business men can be assured will
make ends meet. That is all the
Broadcasting company hopes to do"
1T must be remembered" he added,
that this new company is literally
creating a new industry, and its con-
trolling heads must act with that IN
their minds. And on the other side
of the question, they have to guar
antee good program every evening
for two otherwise the manufacturers
will never sell sufficient apparatus
to cover the outlay involved"
How Expenses Will be Met
How is this 100000 annual ex-
pense toAbe recovered? First of all,
from the half share OF the license fee
of 10 shillings granted by the post
master general; secondly. from per
centage of the sales made by mem
Der firms"
The company which has under
taken to equip. control and maintain
eight broadcasting stations in the
British Isles is being floated on a
capital basis of 100000 thalf mill
lion dollars) in f1 shares. Six big
companies already have guaranteed
and viii put up Immediately rather
more than half of this amount. The
remainder is left open for subscrip-
ton by other firms joining the COM
pany, who are not bound to take up
more than one share, but must make
deposit of ESQ. The postmaster
general had made IL a condition of
government approval of the scheme
that every firm in the country ca
pable of producing cheap and eff
cient receiving sets should be allowed
to become a member of the company
on reasonable terms.
only British Equipment
Another condition of membership is
that the manufactures VINO comes
into the combine must undertake that
all of the apparatus he sells--aside
from batteries, accumulators and
serial euuipment-shallb be of British
manufacture. Defending this condi-
ton against criticism, the postmas-
ter general has explained that his de-
clsion was taken without any regard
to fiscal considerations. 1T is no use,
he said, having a receiving set IN
your house unless there is some
broadcasting service which II can
receive If / had allowed licenses
to be issued in respect of any instru-
ment, whether British or foreign, IL
is absolutely certain that there would
he no British broadcasting service
provided Those who demanded that
foreign instruments should be IL
censed were in effect demanding that
British capital should provide the
| service while foreign manufacturers
secured the benefit"
Scheme strongly Criticized
Just the same, there is still heard
a good deal of criticism of the
scheme. The committee of the Radio
association, a body which looks after
radio amateurs interests largely on
the experimental side, has passed
resolution "deploring the fact that
thousands Of license holders were en-
tirely ignored in settling the form
which broadcasting is to take, ana
that the general public is receiving
no adequate protection against the
growth of a monopoly"
There is no doubt that the Broad
casting company is monopoly, ana
pretty close one, but, anyway,
England is at last to have broad
casting service. The Marconi station
in London will be the first to start,
and Godfrey Isaacs says that IL
should be a matter of only few
days before a start is made A TEN :
porary station at Manchester VIII
follow Immediately a beginning has
been made in London. and by degrees
other stations will open at Birming-
ham, Newcastle, Glasgow, Aberdeen
Cardiff and Plymouth.
One of the chief functions of the
broadcasting company is to arrange
the program to be transmitted. In
time its service will include con-
certs, lecture5, speeches. weather re-
ports, educational matter and per-
haps a certain an cunt in the way OF
news items. At the out the trans
missions will consist OF olos con-
tributed by leading musicians, as
we'll as orchestra features. The
transmission of news will, according
to the postmaster generals decision.
only be permitted If arranged by
agreement with the newspapers. Be-
fore the political crisis arose, how
ever. he had undertaken to convene
meeting between the Broadcasting
company and newspapers looking
toward a settlement (which Is just
to the press anu is in the interests Of
| this new TO- m of communication
made substantial advances The
spot price of cotton has had an ex-
traordinary upturn. Automobile
manufacturers are making extensive
preparations for larger business In
the spring. Income and profit OF
the telephone companies show record
earnings for the first eight months
| of the year. Thrift is apparently on
| the increase.
Unmoved by Election