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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Ladybranch, post: 34144, member: 44&quot;]I suspect London also. From the following article this phenomenon didn&#039;t occur in the U.S. because we were too preoccupied with the radio. Seems the newspapers in Britain did all they could to keep public radio broadcast from happening because of the fear of revenue lost.</p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;By the end of the first year, Electrophone had forty seven customers. One reason for its success was the slow recognition of the broadcast potential of radio in Britain. Although U.S. inventors were experimenting with public broadcasting, no such experiments seem to have taken place in Britain at this point. Marconi&#039;s work on radio was still exploring the military and shipping communications possibilities, rather than public broadcasting. Some experimental broadcasts to ships at sea had been tried but interest died out with the start of World War 1. </p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;Electrophone subscribers had increased to around 600 by 1908 and the company covered performances from some 30 churches and theatres.</p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;During the war, recuperating servicemen were given free access to Electrophone, and so many people became aware of the the potential of the system. In the U.S., however, this interest was directed to radio broadcasting rather than the telephone lines. In 1922 Western Electric opened its radio station WEAF in New York, and made time on the station available to customers for a fee. Thus the evil of advertising came to broadcasting. It worked, though, and the writing was on the wall for Electrophone. </p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;In Britain resistance to broadcasting was especially high from the newspapers who saw their position and advertising revenue being challenged. Against them were the companies who could see a lucrative market in radio transmitters and receivers , including the powerful Marconi and GEC companies.....&quot;</p><p><br /></p><p><a href="http://www.telephonecollecting.org/Bobs%20phones/Pages/Essays/Electrophone.htm" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.telephonecollecting.org/Bobs%20phones/Pages/Essays/Electrophone.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.telephonecollecting.org/Bobs phones/Pages/Essays/Electrophone.htm</a></p><p><br /></p><p>--- Susan[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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