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MP3 Transmitters Now Legal In the UK
SilentOneNCW writes "From December 8th, it will be once more legal to own and operate an MP3 Transmitter in the UK, primarily used to convey music between an MP3 player such as Apple's iPod to your home or car stereo. The device was originally banned because their transmissions can override and interfere with legal radio stations, which is prohibited by the Wireless Telegraphy Act of 1949. Strong consumer demand for the devices and pressure from Liberal Democrats were among the primary motivators for the amendment."
No, most all of them can be tuned to any frequency in the FM band. The ones like the Belkin TuneCast and the iTrip are within the legal power limits. Units made by companies like Ramsey (do a search for Ramsey FM10) are theoretically legal, as long as you don't use a transmitting antenna with too much gain. So, if you really wanted to, you could get one of these, add the proper (or improper) antenna, and easily exceed the allowed power output for an unlicensed transmitter. Not that I'm recommending this, you understand. I'm just saying that it can be done.
I'm thrilled about this and I don't live in the UK. I use fm transmitters like this to do audio installation art and performances of electronic music.I have a dozen tiny fm receivers and a few transmitters so i can route signals out from laptop/battery powered effects/violin/cheap mp3 players playing loops/home made gadgetry through the speakers that i can spread out through the place i'm performing, it's not particularly loud but i use the electronics to augment not replace the sound of an acoustic instrument usually. It's cheap, highly effective and portable, i can turn any place i like into a performance space, since a lot of places with interesting acoustics often don't have electricity available and aren't suitable for running a bunch of cables around for a large multichannel system this opens up a lot of performance opportunities to me. (also the far away radio transmission sound works for the music I do and the interference between transmitters is fun to exploit as a sound source, especially when i use a couple receivers to feed the output back into the system. people's movements within the space i'm performing change the behavior of the system as well which can be nice as well, makes the whole space responsive) and now I can do this sort of thing in the UK as well. yay!
I can't wait! I can just imagine the converstation on channel 16 when somebody releases a buggy one.
"Mayday Mayday Mayday. This is RMS Titanic, RMS Titanic, RMS Titanic. We are sinking. Over."
"When you walk through the storm, ..."
Hold your head up high,
And don't be afraid of the dark
(Or the (less interesting) equivilent in DSC)