DeLay was better known to the world as "Dave Rabbit," the slick-tongued DJ behind Radio First Termer, a pirate radio station he ran from a Saigon whorehouse during the Vietnam War.

DeLay later explained that RFT was born out of a rocket attack on the air base at which he was stationed; the attack killed a close friend and made DeLay hyper-aware of his own mortality, as well as the folly of the conflict in Vietnam. The broadcasts were DeLay's way of paying tribute to his friend and all the "front line" soldiers who risked death every day for a questionable purpose.

With gear purloined from the Air Force and the informal protection of military police, the three-hour broadcasts originally debuted on January 1, 1971 on both the AM and FM bands. The studio-space was padded with blankets and mattresses to dampen the sex-noise from the brothel in which it was located, and "rent" to the madam came in the form of supplies pilfered from the base exchange.

Radio First Termer's format was "hard acid rock" - music that the Armed Forces Vietnam Network had censored from its playlist, but a perennial favorite of the troops. DeLay regaled listeners with dirty commentary straight from the walls of military latrines and tips on how to avoid bad batches of drugs in Saigon. Shows were also chock full of clever spleen-venting at the stupidity of military higher-ups and the Vietnam War itself. In many ways, RFT provided the first quasi-public media outlet for the troops, by the troops, through which they could express their explosive disdain with the war.

Unfortunately, Radio First Termer would only broadcast for 21 consecutive nights. After wrapping up the show on January 21, 1971, DeLay and his co-conspirators got word that unsympathetic military administrators were close to unmasking the station and jailing its principals.

That was the end of the show, but not of the legend: Radio First Termer tapes would continue to circulate, especially in military circles, for decades. Almost 35 years to the day after RFT left the air, DeLay conducted an Internet search for media related to the Vietnam War. To his surprise, he found several sites and articles dedicated to his Saigon station, and discovered that his legacy was still alive.

That sparked a Radio First Termer revival. DeLay and a production crew traveled to Baghdad, Iraq in 2006 to resurrect the station in a one-off broadcast from an "undisclosed location." DeLay also podcast weekly until a month before his death, and did several more shows this way for troops in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

In today's media environment, where soldiers blog, tweet, and can otherwise communicate with the outside world somewhat regularly (though not without some risk of discipline), there will never be another voice that captures soldiers' dissent with unjust wars quite like Radio First Termer.

This consumer perspective on the technology is essentially unchanged from similar surveys done over the last few years - and in some key categories, like brand-awareness and basic functionality, the number of listeners familiar with HD Radio has actually declined.

None of this bodes well for broadcaster uptake (less than one in four U.S. radio stations broadcast in HD) or the fiscal viability of the technology's proprietor, iBiquity Digital Corporation. Furthermore, at this year's Consumer Electronics Show, HD Radio was a relatively low-profile player as the promotion of new in-vehicle "infotainment" systems featuring streaming media platforms stole the spotlight.

This development is in direct response to the desires of drivers, the youngest of whom consider Internet access to be the most important aspect of any in-vehicle infotainment system. There's no substantive signs that the indifference of radio listeners to HD technology will change anytime soon.

It is well past time for U.S. broadcasters to think seriously and critically about alternatives to digitizing the airwaves.

The bottom line: f*cking with your smartphone on an airplane has a clear potential for danger. The report uncovered nearly three dozen incidents of interference from onboard passenger electronic devices last year. The interference affected communications and navigational systems; though none resulted in an accident, critical flight-management systems were compromised.

When you're hurtling through the air several miles off the ground in a pressurized aluminum tube, a margin of safety is a relative thing. Individually, portable electronic devices may pose little danger, but when dozens or hundreds of them are in operation on a single plane, you can see how the risk of interference can rise. (Interference itself is not cumulative in such a situation - it's a question of the proliferation of potentially interfering sources.)

Last decade, the FCC considered removing its own regulations that prohibit the use of portable electronic devices on airplanes, but decided to keep the prohibitions in place because "the technical information provided by interested parties in response to the proposal was insufficient." Granted, the FCC's concern is focused on the potential for interference from an aircraft to ground-based communications systems, but when you're dealing with an aviation situation, isn't it best to err on the side of caution?

What's worse, there are ample penalties available to exercise against scofflaws, but they are very rarely utilized. These range from fines to suspension of wireless service and even arrest. However, in today's aviation environment, where cost and convenience trump all and the flight experience is something that one endures more than they enjoy, I get the sense that passengers and cabin crew alike simply can't be bothered to enforce compliance.

Facebook, Twitter, and all of the folks in your address book will still be there when you land. Give it a rest.

Radio Survivor's Paul Riismandel has a good overview of the report and its findings. More detail below on salient points:

Snapshot of the LPFM service. The majority of the 835 active LPFM stations identified by the FCC were built in 2004 and 2005. (In contrast, the average full-power commercial FM station is 30 years old.) The average power of an LPFM station is 75 watts, and average antenna height is 21 meters (the maximum power allowed is 100 watts, and max antenna height is 30 meters). The two most popular programming formats for LPFM stations are Religion (49.4%) and Miscellaneous (32.9%).

LPFM listenership is infinitesimal. The FCC's examination of 2009 Arbitron ratings "revealed that LPFM stations are listened to by less than 0.2 percent of the radio-listening population and that LPFM listening represents less than 0.1 percent of total radio listening." More than half of all LPFM stations are located outside of the ~300 Arbitron-ranked markets, in "mostly rural areas covering only 19.2 percent of the U.S. population."

Of those LPFMs in radio markets measured by Arbitron, more than two-thirds have a listenership too small to be accurately measured. On average, "13 LPFM stations would need to enter both the Arbitron Metro and contour of [a] full-service commercial FM station before the effect on [the commercial station's] Arbitron ratings would become discernible."

The "LPFM Industry" is a marginal one. The FCC concluded that "LPFM stations do not currently have, and in the future are unlikely to have, a demonstrable economic impact on full-service commercial FM radio stations." LPFM stations "operate with very small budgets, rely on mostly part-time and volunteer staff, do not have measurable ratings, have limited population reach, and do not generate significant underwriting earnings."

Interference hurts the little guy. The geographic coverage of a full-time commercial station is about 55 times larger than an LPFM station. As part of the study, the FCC conducted in-depth interviews with eight LPFM station mangers: "All but one...stated that the low power of the station poses a significant problem and that they would like to operate at a higher power." Many "were concerned about problems with reception in their existing coverage areas. Some...emphasized in-home reception issues, noting that LPFM...signals often are unable to penetrate the walls of a home." LPFM station managers "also expressed frustration with interference from full-service commercial FM stations, especially in unfavorable weather conditions."

If anything, this report definitively debunks the hype and propaganda commercial and public broadcasters used so effectively to stymie the promulgation of a meaningful LFPM service in the first place. The next - and most likely last - opportunity to apply for new LPFM station licenses may occur by this fall.

From a record high of 447 enforcement actions clocked in 2009 and 2010, field agents executed just 184 in 2011, against fewer than 100 stations total. Massive drops were seen in the number of station-visits and warning letters issued.

Although the 2011 stats will rise slightly after the FCC discloses its activity for the last two weeks of the year, the activity-crash is unmistakable.

On the fiscal penalty front, the FCC issued 18 Notices of Apparent Liability and nine Forfeiture Orders in 2011, ringing up $168,400 in actual fines handed out. This actually represents an uptick from previous years; the agency hasn't been this fiscally punitive since 2005 - the year its field enforcement "surge" began.

Whether these fines are actually collected is another matter entirely. In addition, plumbing the numbers reveals interesting subtleties, such as the fact that the FCC resolved nearly half of its fiscal attacks last year for a pittance. In Florida alone, a $20,000 NAL was knocked down to $500; a $15k NAL settled for $300; and two $10,000 NALs were squabbled to $250 and $350 respectively.

Geographically speaking, the perennial hotbeds of unlicensed broadcasting were well-represented, though California stole the #2 spot from New York - extremely illustrative of the collapse in field activity. The FCC made contact with pirate radio stations in two dozen states and Puerto Rico.

What the FCC failed to make up for in quantity it slightly redeemed in quality. This year's enforcement activity touched many long-standing members of the microradio movement. Stations that have been on the air for more than a decade, such as Free Radio Olympia, Berkeley Liberation Radio, Free Radio Santa Cruz, and Mbanna Kantako's Human Rights Radio, received pesky visits and letters from FCC agents, though all shrugged them off.

Enforcement against AM and shortwave broadcasters is also on the rise - this is most likely due to an increase in activity on these bands rather than a change in FCC priorities regarding unlicensed broadcasting. Nearly 10% of 2011's field enforcement activity was directed at AM and shortwave pirates - the highest yearly percentage in the Enforcement Action Database's 15-year history. In perspective, however, the relative risk remains small on those bands: just eight AM/SW stations were harassed last year, the majority of them on the expanded AM band.

It's been ten years since the FCC first promulgated the LPFM service, and eight since the first LPFM station took to the airwaves. For most of this period, the agency's enforcement strategy against pirate broadcasters has been administratively heavy, with field agents often taking a day-trip (or two) every month (or two) to track down radio pirates for the purposes of scaring them with paperwork. But the paper tiger obviously has better things to do, and what power it could bring to bear on the "pirate problem" seems to be in decline.

Powell attempted to do away with practically all media ownership restrictions on the basis of fundamentalist neoliberal principles alone, while Martin wanted to remove ownership limits on "legacy" media outlets (such as newspapers, radio, and TV stations) in order to "promote competition" between old media and new (i.e., Internet-based) outlets. Both efforts mostly failed.

Genachowski got his job primarily due to his business experience in Silicon Valley. Yet his tenure at the FCC has run hard aground against the sorry state of broadband in the United States, which hinders the Internet's potential as a system of democratic communication.

At the same time, the agency's 'net-centric policy focus has led to an astounding sense of indifference regarding the regulation of legacy media. In this regard, it comes as little surprise that Genachowski's proposal is reheated Bush-era hash.

Commissioner Michael Copps, who concludes his tenure at the FCC this week for the greener pastures of the lecture circuit, addressed this dilemma most succinctly:

[W]e have seen incredible growth in the broadband realm, ripe with exciting options and opportunities. What we have not witnessed is the breadth and depth online to replace what has been lost in "traditional" media. This becomes critically important when you look at the hundreds of millions of dollars that no longer flow into news operations, only a fraction of which has been replaced by Web newsgathering. [emphasis added]

Interestingly, Chairman Genachowski declined to articulate his own rationale for these rule changes. The FCC's Republican Commissioner, Robert McDowell, felt the Chairman did not go far enough, openly hoping that all media ownership caps be trashed eventually. And the FCC's most passive Democrat, Mignon Clyburn, made feeble gestures to notions of diversity in media ownership, yet assented to the Chairman's proposal in full.

Over the last decade, the general trend of promoting concentration in policies of media ownership has continued unabated, regardless of which political party controls the FCC. Is there any hope for a (non-judicial) reversal in the foreseeable future?

KORL owner George Hochman launched the multicasts exclusively for feeding analog FM translators, and each HD subchannel already has its own translator.

All of the analog relay stations signed on the air within the last year (one in May, two in September) and all broadcast at maximum power (250 watts).

KORL's a big stick: when moved its transmitting site five years ago, it displaced KXRG, the only low-power FM station in Honolulu. KXRG remained silent until April of 2010, when it returned to the air on a second-adjacent channel granted under a Special Temporary Authority waiver by the FCC.

LPFM stations can't (yet) be sited two clicks away on the dial from a full-power station, although FM translators can. This why KORL and its owners can dot Oahu with multiple translators, launching "new" radio stations that are nothing more than an analog repackagement of an HD signal nobody's listening to, while live-and-local niche radio such as KXRG must exist at the special pleasure of the FCC.

In a place where land is at a premium and the spectrum is already congested, this greedy proliferation of translators effectively makes any meaningful LPFM expansion impossible.

Back around the turn of the century, when Clear Channel amassed control of some 1,200 radio stations, it incited the public enough to inspire the LPFM radio service and rekindled the nation's media reform movement. Matt Lasar has noted that Clear Channel and Cumulus already enjoy an effective duopoly on the radio advertising market in nearly all the metropolitan areas where they currently do business.

Perhaps more importantly, Clear Channel's well on the way to cornering the market for broadcast radio-streaming: the collective might of more than 2,100 stations are now on board with iHeartRadio.

Of course, the Internet is a much different media landscape than broadcast radio, where the regulatory paradigm limits the number of permissible outlets and imposes some (mostly symbolic) notion of "public interest" on those who broadcast.

But a leopard cannot change its spots: Clear Channel's ongoing prioritization of streaming over broadcasting illustrates its aspirations to dominate broadcasting's newest platform.

All signs are that the comment/reply comment rigmarole in this instance is a formality. As at least one industry lawyer has noted, the fact that the FCC's scheduled the comment period for a short three weeks before Christmas - and a week for reply-comments to be filed between Christmas and the new year - means there is little likelihood that a robust record of public debate will be assembled over this latest wrinkle in the HD Radio saga.

This is a shame, because there's (still) no consensus among broadcasters about the net benefits and detriments of HD Radio. Nearly ten years of operation suggest little benefit, and while digital signal-related interference has occurred it has not been widespread enough to materially disrupt the industry. Boosting the power of FM-HD sidebands increases this risk: of course, proponents say there's little potential for harm, while the staunchest critics are quick to pounce.

The ongoing problems are manifold. As with the entire process of HD Radio's development and proliferation, there's been no independent analysis done of this tweak to the technology, which means the only data on which the FCC will base its decision comes from the technology's proprietors, who have not been averse to playing fast and loose with the science of digital broadcasting over the years. (The FCC gave up its scientific independence a long time ago.)

This is also but the first in two techniques proffered to re-engineer a more robust FM-HD signal. The second "improvement," the use of single-frequency booster networks, will eventually allow FM-HD broadcasters to build entirely new digital-only booster stations to increase reception quality. iBiquity and the NAB are well on their way building the case to convince the FCC to have their way on this as well.

There are no magic bullets for a digital broadcast technology which is flawed by design.

Roberts has engaged the services of an attorney, who is arguing that since the FCC has no evidence of him actually operating the transmitter, there's no credible grounds for a forfeiture. The agency disagrees, noting Roberts' extensive work as Pirate Cat station manager, fundraiser, DJ, and all-around public face, as well as his prior (and dubious) claim that unlicensed broadcasting is exempt from licensure under certain extenuating circumstances.

Roberts and his attorney claim that the FCC's expansion of what is considered "operation" of an unlicensed radio station sets a dangerous precedent that could expand the pool of liability when it comes to pirate broadcasting more generally. This is conceivable, but the agency's in no material condition to ramp up its enforcement efforts even if it had the authority to cast a wider net, so it's not a very credible threat.

I respect the resistance Roberts is putting up in fighting the fine, but it's unlikely to amount to much. It's axiomatic that publicity can bite a pirate in the ass, and Roberts has had more than his fair share of it.

Pirate Cat Radio was launched in Roberts' bedroom in 1997 and later moved to San Francisco. He's been quite the media-seeker for his activity over the years, featured repeatedly in newspapers and on television, and proudly claims to have received more than 120 warning notices from the FCC over the course of the station's operation. At one time, the Pirate Cat enterprise even included a rare pirate TV station.

Roberts has also parlayed his experiences with Pirate Cat elsewhere in the world of community radio. In 2010, he maneuvered himself into a position of control at a licensed community radio station in Pescadero, California. Details are not completely clear, but an attempt to "merge" the resources of Pirate Cat and KPDO, as well as a fundraising campaign ostensibly dedicated to purchasing FM frequencies in the Bay area, went down in flames, leading to the ouster of Roberts from both stations (Pirate Cat has since renamed itself Mutiny Radio and continues to this day).

In the midst of this, Roberts left the country for the UK on family business, and while there has reportedly been active in underground broadcasting.

I'm sorry that the FCC finally caught up with Roberts, but he still has a good chance of getting off the hook in the end, considering the FCC's abysmal success rate at collecting on pirate fines. In all, it's been a good run - most pirates can't claim 14 years of quality operation.

MediaCorp was the first broadcaster in southeast Asia to launch DAB service (1999). It was also quite blunt about the rationale to end it: "[T]the growth in listenership...has remained stagnant. On the other hand, the rapid growth in the number of listeners through online streaming and phone app[s]...has shown that these platforms are serving the listeners more effectively than the DAB platform."

This company was the exclusive purveyor of DAB in Singapore.

Singapore is just the latest in a growing list of countries who are ditching the digitalization of radio broadcasting. Finland discontinued its DAB service in 2005, the same year Sweden halted further investment in its digital radio infrastructure. Canadian broadcasters began phasing out DAB transmissions last year. Germany, having discontinued funding for its DAB infrastructure in 2009, re-launched the service with an improved variant of the technology (DAB+) this summer, but does not have high hopes for it. Portugal turned off its network this year, and Spain has drastically reduced its commitment to DAB. France, one of the countries that helped develop DAB technology, continues to postpone its launch.

In the United Kingdom - the first country to launch a DAB service some 15 years ago - only 14 million DAB receivers have been sold. That's less than a million per year, not accounting for replacements. The U.K. has set a target goal for phasing out its analog radio broadcast service in 2015, but Culture, Communications and Creative Industries minister Ed Vaizey recently commented that this deadline is far from set in stone.

Singapore's move is of note because their broadcasters are the first to openly bet upon the Internet as radio's primary digital platform of the future. Other broadcasters are hinting in this direction, but nobody's willing to say it out loud for fear of endangering their spectrum subsidy. Is the dirty little secret about radio's digital future the fact that dedicated spectrum may no longer be necessary?

The Federal Emergency Management Agency, which was responsible for initiating the test, apparently did not properly engineer its outgoing feed to broadcasters, leading to an on-air mess when test-time came.

Here in Wisconsin, radio stations broadcast 30 seconds of garbled audio that effectively degenerated into static. Similar results have been reported in Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Rhode Island, and Kentucky. In parts of California and South Carolina, the EAS message was apparently cued more than once, leading to a loop/echo effect.

In parts of Texas and Ohio, there was simply silence between the alert and end-of-message tones. Elsewhere in Texas, as well as in parts of Oregon, Alabama, Connecticut and Georgia, broadcasters never got the alert at all.

On the TV side, instead of seeing the EAS test, many Time Warner Cable subscribers found their televisions force-tuned to QVC, while some DirecTV subscribers heard Lady Gaga instead of the test message.

The Emergency Alert System works pretty well at the local and state level, used regularly for events like weather warnings and missing child alerts. But for a nationwide emergency, it's obviously another story.

EAS replaced the Emergency Broadcast System more than a decade ago. EAS itself is
in the process of being upgraded; a new emergency alert protocol is being developed that will disseminate emergency information across more of the information infrastructure, most notably wireless phone networks.

Clear Channel says it'll take remaining talent and syndicate their shows across markets, using "custom breaks" and "localized content" to provide a patina of localism on affected stations - a practice otherwise known as voice tracking. The company has also appointed two dozen "Brand Managers" to oversee 11 national station formats.

This is nothing new for a company that made its mark on radio history through massive consolidation and homogenization; Matthew Lasar notes that, as heads roll, Clear Channel is still lobbying the FCC to relax radio station ownership limits.

Meanwhile, Clear Channel's radio revenues rose by 7% last quarter, to $1.58 billion.

This does not mean that the blood-letting is over at Clear Channel: learned word from inside the radio industry suggests that a round of firings in major markets is in the works.

You can thank Bob Pittman for many of these changes. Pittman joined the company last year and was made Chief Executive Officer just last month.

Pittman has an interesting history: widely known as the "father of MTV," he's had a long career spanning several media empires and has specialized in "digital innovation." It is not coincidental that Clear Channel's investments in its streaming operations rose while its attention to HD Radio dropped shortly after Pittman's entrance into the company.

Pittman explained the layoffs as necessary to cement the company's realization that "the world is different in 2011." What does this mean? "Any company started before the Internet is almost by definition outmoded in terms of its operational structure," he opined. Clear Channel has come to understand that smaller radio markets "don’t have an economic structure that allows them to do the same quality of programming as the big markets."

It is difficult to see how this strategy shares the same head-space with a perspective that proclaimed "radio isn't dying" just last year. Of course the world is much different in 2011 than it was in 1996 - you can blame the Internet for part of that, but in the specific case of radio much more blame falls on the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which effectively spawned the likes of Clear Channel and led to the very practices which bled smaller markets dry and destroyed the "economic structure that allow[ed] them to do the same quality of programming as the big markets."

It was a smart move for Clear Channel to create an online portal where all of the streams of its radio stations could be accessed in one convenient location - iHeartRadio regularly places high in the ratings for streaming radio listening. But by obliterating the uniqueness of its stations, does that not diminish the overall value of the portal? If the programming in New York is the same as in Nacogdoches, save for differences in the weather and traffic reports, what incentive do I, as a radio listener, have for exploring 800+ streams if they're all derivatives of a dozen master formats?

It may have been the radio business that helped catapult Clear Channel into the realm of media titans, but it's becoming increasingly clear that what Clear Channel sees as radio's future is moving further away from traditional broadcasting. The company's using its AM and FM properties as a way to drive interest toward its online platform, and the diminution of live and local talent is a large step in that direction.