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Pirate Radio Stations Challenge Feds
Thundgelmir writes "Yahoo news has an article about how pirate radio is taking on the FCC. It describes the growing trend of low-power FM stations, and their crusade to be heard across the country and around the internet." From the article: "Over four days, a dozen men and women shyly bumped shoulders as they studied schematics and tinkered with romex connectors, resistors, microphone cords, meters, sockets and capacitors — the stuff of illegal radio stations. 'We're not stealing anything. We're claiming something that's rightfully ours,' he says. His goal is to create FM radio stations faster than the FCC can shut them down ... 'It's always been our position that if enough people go on the air with their stations, the FCC will be overwhelmed and unable to respond.'"
How so ? Last time I checked, one needed a licence to broadcast on the FM frequencies.
-Jar.
Together, We Can Make Slashdot Better. I Do NOT Mod ACs. - Check Me Out
It would seem that the solution to pirate radio is very simple. Look at why they are circumventing the regulations in the first place: expenses and rules. And more the former than the latter.
The FCC's complaint is interference with licensed stations and/or emergency/critical services. So push prices down for low-wattage transmitters, and the FCC might find that they get more small radio stations following their rules... and that has got to be cheaper than crews in million dollar vans running all over the country playing whack-a-mole.
Now we have a new era with a new medium. The consuming public demand/expect that their requirements are met. The interesting question is whether the established media is as reactionary as in the 60's or whether they can meet the needs that the pirates meet.
init 11 - for when you need that edge.
Well-said, thank you. As to the established media being able to adapt ... in recent history, they've started to show an interest in catching up to their innovative rivals. So this could play out VERY interestingly. But, I fear, whenever the MPAA or RIAA are involved, it may degenerate into a witch-hunt.
:)
So I hope this all just concerns news and talk radio! lol
...connectors, resistors, microphone cords, meters, sockets and capacitors -- the stuff of illegal radio stations...
Good grief.
To think, we're rapidly approaching the point where possession of a resistor makes you { potential radio pirate | cracker | terrorist | public enemy number one} in the eyes of the media.
I didn't say it was a perfect system. But how would you feel if somone set up a pirate cell cervice and you couldn't call out becuase of interference? You're paying for the service to send and receive phone calls, won't you be a little upset if the peope down the street are talking for free interupting your service?
That which does not kill me only postpones the inevitable.
But let's extend it. Pirate IP addresses! I should poison the arp cache on the router and redirect fileserver requests to my own workstation. After all, I am not stealing anything -- I have a natural right to use 172.16.20.104! And if some other users can't get their work done, well, tough luck. Haha, look at these silly network admins trying to track down the problem! They'll are overhelmed and unable to respond! Ooh, now how about pirate license plates. I like my professor's. It has a good ring to it. Yeah, he might be inconvenienced when I get caught by that red light camera -- but I am not stealing anything! And next day, I will just paint a new set of numbers on the plate! No way will they cops ever catch me! Hm, what else. Oh, let's try pirate usernames. Let's hack the forum and get a username I like. Yeah, someone else might be using it already. But who cares, it's not like I am stealing anything... And if the admin blocks me, I'll just go through to the backdoor I installed and get myself another username! They will never shut me down!
The airwaves are a community resource. The FCC was created to control and parcel out the use of the radio spectrum for the best use by the community. Having said that, I know that big money is now involved in braodcast and frequency allocation - amateurs are having to fight off big money interests all the time. However the possibility to cause harm with poorly made and engineered equipment is more likely to create anger than sympathy.
If these people want a voice, take it to the internet. Streaming audio and video using the same studio equipment is possible and if the message has validity the word will spread. The technology is mature and anyone with broadband can do it. It's not as dramatic as getting arrrested and fined and your 'cause' getting press time I guess.
Too lazy to create a sig...
Wow. I thought your post would be redundant, but apparently it's the only one that makes this proposal so far. All of this crap about "sticking it to the man"... the problem is that there are a bunch of people who want to set up low-power FM radio stations that anybody with an FM radio in the area will be able to listen to. Give them a chunk of the spectrum, set some reasonable power limits (perhaps based on the population density of the area) and be done with it. Problem solved, as you say.
http://outcampaign.org/
Alternately, they could just pick an unused FM frequency in their area; it's not like it's terribly hard to do. With the exception of a few saturated markets, almost any major area is probably going to have some free spots on the dial where, if you wanted to set up shop as a pirate station without interfering with anyone, you could.
Or heck, why use FM? Practically any radio these days that can get FM also can receive AM, even if people rarely use it; consequently most places have vast regions of the AM broadcast band unused. (Although, you'd need to watch your power levels at night...)
Then the complaint-driven nature of the FCC would work for you: no harm, no foul. As long as you don't step on the toes of somebody who actually has a license, they're probably not going to give a crap.
Having dealt with the FCC before, I can tell you it's hard enough getting them to do anything when there's clear interference to an established, licensed radio service; if there wasn't any interference it would probably take them a long time to send out one of their investigators and track you down.
With that said, I don't advocate unlicensed radio in the FM band; there are better mediums to disseminate your message if you really have one to communicate, than FM radio. The "pirate radio" of the 60s in today's world would probably be on the Internet, where you don't have to worry about the FCC.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
The story takes the angle of the little guy bravely battling against unfeeling big government. And that's surely how pirate operators and their listeners see it. But if the range of your FM transmitter is only a few miles, why is it a federal matter? These frequency bands should be left to the states to allocate as they wish.
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
I agree that purposefully flooding the airwaves with interfering crap isn't a great idea, but someone needs to do something about the FCC. Do you realize that over-the-air broadcasts (both TV and radio) are pretty much the only forms of mass communication in the USA that are still subject to draconian censorship? I can say "fuck" out loud, in a book, in a movie, on a CD, on the internet, over the phone, but heaven forbid I say it over the airwaves! Ditto for nudity. I have Sirius satellite radio and on the hard rock stations I listen to not only do they not censor their music, but their DJs cuss regularly. It's clear that the vast majority of their fanbase does not, ahem, give a flying fuck. On TV, the situation is even more ridiculous because parents have access to the V-chip.
The FCC should not be in the business of censorship, period. The founding fathers explicitly gave us freedom of the press, and if they had known about radio waves they would have deemed those be free of censorship as well. The FCC has far overstepped its bounds (especially post-"wardrobe malfunction"), and if this is the only way to draw attention to the issue, so be it. I can only hope that these people operate their pirate radio stations in a responsible manner, on unused areas of the spectrum and at reasonable power levels. Provided they act responsibly, there's nothing wrong with breaking this law; indeed, I say that it needs breaking, it needs civil disobediance because it's a very ugly, glaring flaw splattered across one of the few freedoms the USA has actually protected quite well--better than most other Western nations, at least. (And before anyone starts ranting about how they allow nudity on British/French/German/Dutch/Australian broadcast TV, realize that more than a few movies and videogames have been outright banned in ALL of those countries. Other than child pornography and to a lesser extent beastiality, there's practically nothing you can't legally see/read/buy in America.)
Oh yeah, and the ownership rule relaxation is bullshit as well. It's not right that Clearchannel gets a government-approved (and protected) monopoly over half the fucking spectrum.
I can go from one end of the country to the other, listening to the same music with little if any regional variation, or for that matter care for regional issues or concerns.
This would be a more interesting point if not for the fact that based on the success of satellite radio, it would seem as though this is exactly what a large number of people want.
People don't want "regional variation," they want consistency. They want to be able to drive from Boston to Washington and still have the exact same palette of stations available, and they want them on all the time.
You may certainly disagree (and I'm with you), but both the current state of broadcast radio, as demonstrated by XM and Sirius (so it's not even some giant ClearChannel conspiracy), and historical indicators from other markets show that you're in the minority.
People don't want the "local roadhouse," they want McDonalds. They don't want Jack and Jill's Country Inn, they want Motel 6. They don't want the General Store, they want WalMart. Over and over the market has shunned independents -- even when they had a huge advantage to begin with -- in favor of consistent national chains; with the public only developing a nostalgia for the 'local flavor' after it was mostly gone. But regardless of their stated feelings, the public has over and over voted with their feet and their wallets.
Frankly I think it's surprising that independent radio stations have remained as long as they have, and that 'networking' (in the manner of VHF TV stations) didn't happen sooner. With more competition from consistent, branded satellite networks (and perhaps in the future, content delivered by cell network, etc.) I think in the future we can expect to see more consolidation of terrestrial FM stations into various "channels" that a person can listen to from one coast to the other. Either that, or it will lose its relevance as a mass communications channel and become more like the UHF TV band is today.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
The problem with CB radio is it uses a very long wavelength, requiring long antennas for an efficient transmission. It would be nice to have the 460MHz FRS, 2.4GHz, and 5GHz spectrum much wider so communities can freely hack more uses for them. The public spaces are so crowded and freedom to explore the potential is often limited.
It was eventually coopted and became the monolithic voice of corporate america instead of a medium of expressing thoughts, opinions and art. That applies to both FM Radio and the government itself.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
You are aware the effect of non-linear Amplifiers on a signal spectrum right?
The point is you have to be careful when you design your RF power-amp not in introduce any non-linearities as it can mean you generate noise on frequencies well outside those in the input signal.
Master of Peng Shui.Ancient oriental art of Penguin Arranging)
Smart pirates only use frequencies that aren't used in their surrounding areas. This way nobody complains and nobody cares for years. Only time the FCC will chase someone down is after a complaint or 40 have been filed for any sort of "public infraction". Meaning swearing, rebroadcasting someone elses programming, etc. Do nothing to get yourself in trouble, people will just think you're a new radio station in town.
OTOH, it is kinda fun to put the pirate on a very well known frequency and scare the crap out of people. Actually, there was a legal pirate (yes, i know that doesn't make sense, but hear me out) in the Twin Cities. B96 96.3 (KTTB-Glencoe) is the local hiphop/urban station in town, but barely. It's a rimshot 100kW outside minneapolis. KDWB 101.3 (Richfield 100kW) applied and won(!!) a translator on 96.3FM in the southeastern metro area. KDWB is the local top40, not so much hiphop, but they do play similar playlists... Now is this piracy? No. They played by the book.
Talk about how useful the FCC is. They don't even check for adjacent channels before issuing licenses. Also, the FCC did issue the call letters KUNT (Univ. North Texas) once upon a time. They recinded them within 24 hours. But, there is KUMM (Univ. Minnesota-Morris) is still on the air...
FCC. Go figure.
The "FCC as a bulwark against anarchy" argument is oversold, if only for the fact that spectrum allocation is a terribly inefficient way to share spectrum.
Then there is the fact that the FCC is an unelected bureaucratic exception to the First Amendment. Not only is the exception legally iffy, the FCC is insulated from answering to the public.
Then there is the way that spectrum has become an artificial kind of property, which leads to political favoritism in the way it is allocated, traded, paid for, and regulated.
There are a lot of reasons to think the FCC is in need of radical overhaul, and one should be very reluctant to dismiss people calling for reform without any evidence they are causing any harm.
I wrote parts of this stuff
I do have a Sirius Radio in my truck; I only use it when I am on the road and in areas where there is poor coverage from FM stations. Other than that I listen to one of the two college radio stations or to the local Pacifica station.
The great thing about community radio stations:
1 - They don't play the same songs over and over and over and over and over and over.
I can actually set my clock by what commercial or song plays at what time on the
local muddy channel station
2 - Local events and news
Does your national station tell you about the blood drive this weekend or how the
local High School football team did?
3 - Call your local community radio station, ask them a question about anything and
ask them to present it to the listeners. By the end of the hour you will have an answer
Do that with your muddy channel station, if its not national, or on xyz car dealers list
of acceptable topics then you will never even hear a mention of it.
4 - I love it when the national stations broadcast the traffic report for a different city here
by accident and then tell you that they are your home town station.
-- I am the NRA, enough said...
I think you have confused censorship with censureship. The former is the prohibition of expression, while the latter is merely removal of something the people don't want.
For example, prohibiting talk show hosts from criticizing the President would be censorship. OTOH, prohibiting a talk show host from criticizing the President using foul language is not. While you might not agree with them, the majority of the people in this country do not want to hear foul language on the radio, or see nudity on TV.
I know its probably hard to imagine having kids, being a slashdotter and all (cue William Shatner at trekkie convention: "Have you ever kissed a girl..."). However, most people do at some point have children, and the last thing they want is to hear their toddler repeating "fuck, fuck, fuckety-fuck..." because they heard it on the radio. Or somewhat worse, having their daughters go bulimic on them because they're trying to look like some bare-chested floozy they saw on tv.
The airwaves are a public medium. They belong to the people. As such, they should be used in a way which benefits all of the public, not just a certain subset who feel that foul language and nudity are desirable. Granted, such broadcasts might not include everything you'd like to see or hear, but at least they don't offend a large portion of the viewers/listeners.
One final point for discussion: If the Left can tell us that religion should be a private thing, can't the Right tell the us that obscenity and indecency should be private as well? I mean, if the Gospel of Jesus Christ is "offensive" because it disturbs someone else's worldview, then wouldn't vulgar speech and nudity be just as "offensive"? After all, it too disturbs someone's worldview.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
>There is a reason why anarchy isn't our choice of government
yes, that the govt would not allow us to make such a choice
my password really is 'stinkypants'
The vast majority of "pirate radio stations" are not interfering with licensed stations legitimately serving a particular market. In fact, a 10 watt transmitter like most of Dunifer's does not simply have the power to overpower a 100kW Class C FM station. In most of Los Angeles, where the only available slot was 104.7 MHz, it was not uncommon for a 50 watt station I was affiliated with to have problems with a station 50 miles away "interfering" on the same frequency. Were we causing "problems" for that station and their listeners? Hell, no.
Almost without exception, pirates are choosing frequencies that are not used locally, and operating stations that never exceed much more than 50 watts (most of them are in the 5-10 watt range). I can count on one hand the pirates who have even the technical competance to keep a high-power transmitter on the air, let alone actually own one.
Your analogy is not even correct. It is more likely to say that people are in a big outdoor auditorium, where the speaker is using a professional PA system, and the pirate radio operator has collected a bunch of his friends on a lawn near the back and is talking to them at a normal speaking volume.
An even better question is this. The "popularity" of unlicensed FM is only increasing. Isn't this an interesting sign to the professional broadcasters that there is a market segment they are not appealing to? Why are they not serving this market segment? Could it be that as a near-monopoly, they can ignore market forces?
There should be a broadcast spectrum that belongs to everybody. There isn't. That needs to change.