[ddingus]

I am not sure what we would do with the AM band. If it were me, I would very strongly convince half the stations to go dark. Allow the remaining ones to broadcast 10khz, which for some radios and their lucky owners would be a nice, attractive, more compelling signal. Loosen up regulations a bit and see what happens.

Disasters warrant keeping the band for basic news and reporting if nothing else.

FM already has improved audio. Perhaps the same looser regs would bring more people in.

[lormayna]

Whom that listened AM are not listening AM for the sake of audio quality, but for catching remote broadcasting station or pirates.

[ddingus]

That is true.

I have often demonstrated that with a thought experiment where there are two stations, one high quality but boring, the other crappy quality, but compelling.

Which one do most people listen to?

But, there is more to it than that. Higher fidelity opens the door for better AD rates and a broader array of appropriate programs.

A smaller number of stations = more per station, very generally speaking.