Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
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Re: Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
#2I like pirate radio but it's illegal by definition.
They completely fail to mention that spectrum is limited and that you are probably causing interface for someone else.
The right thing to do would be to give them free or subsided licenses.
Re: Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
#3Back in the day I listened to a pirate station that broadcast out of Arizona. Similar to what the article mentioned, that station was run by people who were passionate about music, camping, and what was going on with respect to the National Forest service and the BLM with respect to public lands.
Objectively, they met all the mission requirements that the FCC at the time said they stood for, use of the common air waves for the public good. Their 'crime' was that while they operated a great station the lack of regulatory control meant they were 'at risk' of doing something "bad." They eventually got shut down, the world was not a 'better place' for it.
Re: Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
#4I like pirate radio but it's illegal by definition. They completely fail to mention that spectrum is limited and that you are probably causing interface for someone else. The right thing to do would be to give them free or subsided licenses.
If the spectrum is otherwise used for cancers like advertising then I wouldn't consider interfering with it to be a bad thing.
In addition, I don't think these "pirate" operators have any nefarious intentions and wouldn't wish to actually interfere with any station (as it would be counter-productive to their own listeners, since the existing station would scramble their own broadcasts too) so I am not sure this has ever been a real problem.
Re: Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
#5I'm completely unfamiliar with this, but could they not get HAM licenses and operate on amateur radio frequencies? Or simply turn what they are doing into a podcast?
Or is the issue that their target audience only has access to AM/FM radios?
Re: Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
#6The FCC's purpose from its inception was to centralize power in the hands of a few powerful capitalists. In a free country, why would the national government have complete control over a radio station that broadcasts solely within a single state or city?
https://reason.com/2017/04/05/roosevelts-war-against-the-pre...
Re: Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
#7Back in the day I listened to a pirate station that broadcast out of Arizona. Similar to what the article mentioned, that station was run by people who were passionate about music, camping, and what was going on with respect to the National Forest service and the BLM with respect to public lands. Objectively, they met all the mission requirements that the FCC at the time said they stood for, use of the common air wav…
Was getting in compliance too burdensome for them?
For every well-behaved pirate, there’d be many ill-mannered pirates if you didn’t seize their operations.
Re: Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
#8If anything, I think there's a lot of value for having people broadcasting on a community level.
In the era of the internet and hyper-connectivity, we've lost that sense of community and having local broadcasters that don't work for companies and don't have corporate agendas is a step towards restoring it.
The available local broadcast frequencies just need to be shared by people in the community and there has to be a strong sense of accountability for mess ups
Re: Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
#9FCC interview: https://www.fcc.gov/news-events/podcast/pirate-radio
They minimize the regulatory burden and emphasize the dangers of interfering with air traffic control, and suggest internet streaming as an alternative, among other interesting tidbits.
Re: Pirate Act: what the law says and how it threatens pirate radio stations
#10I'm completely unfamiliar with this, but could they not get HAM licenses and operate on amateur radio frequencies? Or simply turn what they are doing into a podcast? Or is the issue that their target audience only has access to AM/FM radios?
That, plus Ham radio basically doesn't allow broadcasting. Ham radio communication is (more or less) intended to be between parties that communicate with each other. There are some exceptions, like telemetry, but Ham isn't intended to replace commercial broadcast stations.