Gee, I dunno. It seems the whole house connected to the electrical grid would form the world's
greatest long wire antenna.

Bob Swinney
"whit3rd" wrote in message
...
On Nov 15, 8:46 am, "Bill Noble" wrote:
"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message

One of the classics -- which I haven't seen for at least a decade,
probably
because of the rise of cable TV -- was the little box that "Turn[ed] your
house wiring into a giant antenna!" It was an AC plug with a small
capacitor.

... Of course the magic box was over priced,
but at least there was some validity in the principle

Some, yes. Much, no. If you use 'your house wiring' as an antenna,
it is an antenna that is re-aimed/adjusted with every appliance
plugin.
Dipole "rabbit ears" that you can hand-position are far superior. A
second point of superiority, is that you can chose a place for the
antenna that is
not next to the local wildlife. Squirming kids can do amazing things
to the near field of an antenna, and the whole house antenna's
near field is ... the whole house.