Has anyone else just not noticed this? Or perhaps it just passed me by when someone did notice it, for whatever reason. I’m crossposting this (LJ) so everyone I flist with sees it, so pardon me if you see this twice, but please:

WHY IS THERE WIZARD RADIO IN HP???

I am guessing it is there for plot reasons— so Molly could listen to it in CS. Because it sure as hell doesn’t fit into the HP world in a way that makes initial sense.

For instance, where is the broadcasting tower? I know little about radio, but I know that there has to be one. How do they know how to make a broadcasting tower, if there is one? Have they just co-opted a Muggle one? Because that would go against the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts law, right? And besides, how would any of them know how to operate it, anyway??

Second, if the tower issue can be smoothed over in a way that makes sense, riddle me this: how would people participate? Because, last time I checked, wizards didn’t know how to use Muggle telephones. Which are the one thing you can use to, hmm, call in to the show? This was what actually tripped me up initially; I can’t remember exactly what I was thinking about, but I suddenly realised that, duh, they can’t have a wizarding radio show, because how would people call in? Would they Floo in? Wouldn’t that just be an easy way to get kidnapped or piss someone off if you went to the wrong grate? Now, that actually does sound like it might be a solution to this part of the problem— I can just see people not wanting to live with Floo connections close to that sporadic bunch that belongs to a radio station. Imagine the huge amount of ‘wrong grate, mate’s you’d have to say XD.

And of course that gets me thinking about the fact that you mightn’t have the Floo network in the US— how hard would it be to control whose fireplace is hooked up and whose isn’t in such a big country? Would American wizards want to have their travel monitored in that way? My gut reaction (post American History class this semester— you’ve no idea how much it’s starting to come in handy when I’m writing) is no. And that by the time a majority of the wizards decided it might be a good idea, it would be too late and too expensive for the magical government to handle. So broom travel prevails, and wizarding radio is huge in America because wizards grudgingly use the muggle phone (which works incredibly well even with magical interference) and muggle communication technology, because bar apparation, portkeys, brooms and carpets (America draws them because the govt didn’t see the point of outlawing carpets especially if they were properly disguised per regulation— carpet racing and licensing brings in enough revenue that it makes no sense to just put a stop to it), American wizards have been stuck with using mostly muggle technology for communication and travel in some respects because the main forms of magical communication don’t scale as well as their muggle counterparts. So though an average wizard there would take a little longer to come in contact with most muggle technology, pretty much everyone there uses and follows it once the government has tested it and declared it safe for magical use.

So wizard radio is not hugely different from muggle radio in the US— you just have to have a special set to receive the signal. And you can call in using a telephone. So wizard radio afficionados in the UK are up on muggle technology— the American equipment isn’t illegal to import or use, by now— and constantly bewail the fact that their fave producers and shows are mostly US-made, and that most talent in the UK flows in that direction. And maybe this flow bleeds into the broom market— can you imagine how successful broommaking technology in the US would be? Because though it serves a market about as small as the one in the UK, that market is composed of very different people. Rich sports stars and sports teams get bleeding-edge type innovation, and others who use a broom because they really have to (live in impassable terrain, find it cheaper to get a couple brooms than to get a car, etc etc) get the new features added in after about two years of testing by professional fliers, for a far lower price. Because if you’re upper middle class and above, you can afford a muggle car and brooms, and naturally you have both, because there are times you have to see muggles, and will need your car, and times when you have to fly to someone’s place instead of Apparate or whatever, and will need a broom or carpet to get there.

Okay, so tower issue is solved for the US, but not the UK. ARRGH. Maybe the US idea for using the tower came from the UK idea of using the tower? Except the Ministry in the UK began to heavily regulate that because it was being used for bad purposes, and never bothered to take those strict regulations off the books, so they could have a nice tight leash on radio stations, and look the other way when a station complies with their demands and not do that when it doesn’t. So the radio industry in the UK is artificially stunted because of heavy government intervention, and has always lost talent to America or elsewhere.

Now, I think that makes sense, but would still love to see if anyone else has thought/posted about this. Remember a post? Have time to hunt it down? I will worship you for ever!

PS: Pardon my obvious plotty meanderings in here. But since the radio thing is important in AST along the line, I needed to think about it, and couldn’t cut out all of my thinking process from this post without gutting it entirely ;)

[	Tags	|	rambling writer, writetalk:a surreal tale	]
[	Current Mood	|	bouncy	]

And now, to continue in the grand tradition of using this journal for fannish purposes, a little discussion, inspired half by this post by snornackcatcher (“In which I draw a strained analogy between Fandom and Art…”) and half by the fact that I have been thinking extensively about pairings in the A Surreal Tale universe (hereafter “ASTverse”). As you likely know by now, I only have one main pairing in much the sense that fanwriters write pairings: Bellatrix and Severus, despite their differences, are together and showing few signs of splitting apart.

Not that I wouldn’t like them to at some point— think of how fun that would be to write, eh?

But I digress. So, for the ASTverse, count(pairings) = 1.

:muses: I’m relieved at the verdict, truth be told. I’m not entirely confident of my pairing-writing skillz just yet. Because though I’ve managed it with Bella and Severus, they and their relationship are totally different animals from what Antares and his Paired Half (can’t quite bring myself to say Halves. I just don’t see myself ever doing the threesome thing as a long-term thing) and their relationship are. So I am going to take a break, stop worrying about the subject, and concentrate on doing harm to my characters.

In other words, back to business as usual. ;)

Disclaimer: I am neither obligated nor especially likely to introduce any of the pairings or events discussed herein. I.e., I can and will change my mind, none of this is decided, etc etc ;).