Not just that, it's required by federal law to announce the callsign once an hour, in both radio and OTA television. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Station_identification#United_... (If you watch sports broadcasts on OTA TV you might notice a subtle overlay pop over the content at the top of the hour)

Made more sense in the analog era, when tuning was done by twiddling a potentiometer and you never quite knew exactly what frequency you were on.

Many years back Clear Channel would simulcast hurricane coverage across most of their stations in Florida, resulting in them all identifying as "Newsradio 610 WIOD Maimi". (Though a YouTube search suggests iHeartMedia now pitch- and speed-bends to say all the legal identifiers very quickly.)

Because of course it is. Facepalm moment right there.

I guess they could have just used them the other way around, to simplify things a bit (West Coast - W, East Coast - K).

The thing is, I realized now why people care about this stuff:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_signs_in_the_United_State...

> Other stations downplay their call letters, in favor of an easily remembered slogan. This is also the standard practice in most other countries.

I have NO idea what the radio call letters are for any radio in Romania. Nobody I know does. We just know them as RockFM, MagicFM, EuropaFM, RadioZu, whatever.