“The Public Radio” — Your Favorite FM Station in a Jar
So, here’s something I’m posting purely for fun after watching this exchange on Twitter a week ago:
(Loosely related: the Town Ace's radio can only pick up a single local radio station: 89.1 KMHD, the local jazz station. Turns out all I ever wanted from a radio was a radio that can only pick up the local jazz station)
— Cabel (@cabel) September 30, 2020
Only Neven may appreciate how well you just trolled me
— Cabel (@cabel) September 30, 2020
That’s right, “The Public Radio” is a pre-tuned single-station FM radio (created by Spencer Wright and Zach Dunham) that’s housed in the simplest possible enclosure: a mason jar.
It sounds weird but it’s actually totally sweet and cool and I won’t hear a word crosswise! (Is that a real phrase? My brain just spits these things out sometimes.)
Built into the mason jar screw ring is a humble assortment of components: a small but high-quality FM receiver, a tiny speaker, a telescoping antenna, a power/volume knob, and slots for two AA batteries (regular or rechargeable). It really doesn’t get any simpler.
The jar it comes with is a squat little thing, but the radio does fit onto any wide-mouth mason jar, in case you feel like experimenting with the sound.
When you go to buy the radio, you’ll be asked what country you’re from and which tuning frequency you’d like it to be set at. (Don’t worry, you can change the station later if you move or travel to a new city.)
This a wonderful novelty gift for anyone you know who has a go-to station they listen to all day, whether it’s…well, public radio or something else.
The only real “catch” is that it costs sixty bucks to buy, although if you’re already balking at that figure, Wright wrote (😏) an explanatory blog post back in 2018 about why it costs that much.