[EAS] Source of the "scary" text in Suffolk Co

[Clay Freinwald]

Art wrote - 

I'd suggest that the in-band approach is in itself problematic.  Is it
really desirable that, in order to move an alert at all, we have to
interrupt program for everyone?  Would our program directors agree?  How
about people in other parts of the listening area?

When an out-of-band RDS signaling scheme was proposed back in '95, AM
stations objected that they shouldn't be "cut out" of EAS.  Well, it's
twenty years on now, and much has changed (I almost wrote "much has been
learned" but I'm less confident on that point.)  Let's face it, being part
of the signaling daisy chain maybe isn't such a grand privilege

The in-band approach was a  carry-over from EBS.   Back in those days the
Feds were more in a mood to warm over the existing system than adopt
something new.   Additionally there was the matter of money- Who was going
to pay for those out-of-band systems anyway?     We (here in WaState) have
always felt that the Daisy Chain was a system prone to failures that should
not be carried over.    Then there is a compatibility issue with NWS ...but
that is another story.     Certainly today we have the ability to come up
with a much more elegant system that does not P.O. programmers...but the
problem of who is going to pay is still with us. ...As is the notion that
everything must be reverse compatible.

Clay