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Enforcement efforts against unlicensed broadcasters have stepped up nationwide. Just two days after recent protests at the National Association of Broadcasters radio convention in San Francisco concluded, Humboldt (CA) Pirate Radio received three visits from FCC agents.
Then, Radio One Austin (TX) was raided by law enforcement and had its station equipment destroyed; and a station in Michigan was sent a letter to stop broadcasting or face the consequences.
But the most dastardly blow was the silencing of Human Rights Radio in Springfield, Illinois. Continue reading “Trading Shots With the FCC”
Category: Microradio
NAB Meets Media Democracy
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In September 2000, extraordinary events took place in San Francisco, where the National Association of Broadcasters held its annual Radio Convention. For the first time, people took to the streets to voice their concerns with the state of the media.
As rapid consolidation in the American radio industry drastically reduces the diversity of voices on the dial, listeners are noticing the change. More ads, less information. A booming bottom line, but nary a pipsqueak of real news and issues we need and can use.
It’s a dangerous trend. When the people can’t communicate with each other on a mass scale through a free and democratic media, then just how free and democratic can a society be? Continue reading “NAB Meets Media Democracy”
The Dark Side Regroups
Life has not been kind to the microbroadcaster as of late – it’s almost as if the radio industry is goading free radio fighters into a conflict when the two camps clash head-on next week in San Francisco.
First came word early this month that Micro Kind Radio, a microradio station in San Marcos, Texas – who’s been on the air 24 hours a day seven days a week since 1997 – has been shut down due to a temporary federal court injunction.
This showdown was long in coming: more than two years ago, after unsuccessfully attempting to intimidate one of the founders of Micro Kind with an $11,000 fine, the FCC served Kind with a cease and desist order. The station responded by filing a lawsuit of its own claiming the FCC’s licensing rules ran afoul of the First Amendment right to freedom of speech. Continue reading “The Dark Side Regroups”
New Strategy: First Moves
As the FCC begins processing the first wave of new low power FM station licenses, microradio advocates who feel the government hasn’t gone far enough to open access to the airwaves are shifting into offensive mode.
Just last month, A cadre of former, current and future unlicensed station operators gathered in San Francisco and created the Micropower Action Coalition (MAC). MAC is designed to further organize microradio into a cohesive movement with firm goals in mind.
There are six points to MAC’s Action Platform; one of them was tested in battle this month, and the preliminary results look promising. Continue reading “New Strategy: First Moves”
Broken Blackout Breaks Back
Napoleon Williams has taken his share of punishment for running his own radio station, and then some. He’s faced trumped-up charges, the loss of his children, and strong-armed police – all for stepping up and speaking truth to power.
Now, after fighting for nearly 10 years, Napoleon Williams is off the air and on the run.
The saga begins on August 21, 1990 in not-so-racially-harmonious city of Decatur, Illinois: That is when Williams signs Black Liberation Radio on the air for the first time. The motive: Expose and force change in the attitudes and policies that were a source of constant tension within the community. Continue reading “Broken Blackout Breaks Back”
Strategy Session
During the last weekend in May, while many Americans were relaxing at the expense of those who gave their lives for their freedom, soldiers in a lower-profile domestic war gathered to plot their next moves in their fight.
The “Micropower Council of War” was called by Free Radio Berkeley founder Stephen Dunifer; if it were not for his ongoing battle with the government (through the courts), there would have been no blossoming of unlicensed radio stations – and no widespread microradio movement.
When the FCC announced its plans to re-legalize a low power FM (LPFM) radio service, Dunifer was one of the first to discount the move as political hype. Continue reading “Strategy Session”
The Carrot and the Stick
In any three-way war, the enemy of your enemy is your friend.
The Federal Communications Commission’s initiative to legalize low power FM radio was a something many unlicensed broadcasters had supported (and worked to demonstrate) and some formally petitioned the FCC to undertake the initiative.
During 1999, while the FCC fleshed out its plans for LPFM, agents in the field claimed to have closed down 154 “pirate” stations.
While the agency won’t publicly admit it, in the wording of its LPFM rules was buried a small caveat to currently active unlicensed broadcasters that they could qualify for a license if they desired, so long as they shut down immediately. Continue reading “The Carrot and the Stick”
Party Pirate Gets Broadside
On Friday, Tampa’s Party Pirate 102.1 received a double whammy from the FCC.
The day’s issue of the Federal Register included a terse announcement from the agency that Leslie “Doug” Brewer and his two-way radio business had been fined $10,000 for allegedly selling an “unauthorized FM radio transmitter” above the legal Part 15 power limit. According to the FCC, an undercover agent placed the order and made the purchase.
Also on March 3, Doug Brewer found out that a Federal court ruled in favor of the FCC in its seizure of two-way radio equipment stemming from the November 1997 raid of his station. The government gets to keep thousands of dollars worth of equipment not remotely related to FM piracy as “spoils” from their military-style raid on his home. Continue reading “Party Pirate Gets Broadside”
Radio Cops: Beefup or Breakdown?
Just one day before the Federal Communications Commission approved the creation of a low-power FM service, Chairman William Kennard spoke to a group of telecommunications companies and laid out his vision of what the FCC’s new “enforcement ethic” would be in the year 2000 and beyond.
A couple of months ago, the FCC reorganized its resources and created a whole new Enforcement Bureau – consolidating all of the agency’s enforcement activities into one central organization.
Under the old hierarchy, the regulation of telephones, cable companies and radio stations were handled in different FCC bureaus – and each bureau had its own enforcement agents. Now, those agents share a bureau of their own. Does this portend good or bad news for pirate stations? Continue reading “Radio Cops: Beefup or Breakdown?”
Square One
Various news outlets – some radio-related and others mainstream – say the Federal Communications Commission will move toward a vote to make low power FM radio a reality this week. Many advocates who’ve worked long and hard to see this happen are shouting victory.
On the surface, it’s a heady development – but a closer look at the details shows it’s really not much different from the status quo. There is no cause for celebration; we’ve tried to work with the system, and – mark my words – it will let us down.
Whatever happens this week, it will be one big lie. Continue reading “Square One”