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Bradenton Pirate ? 99.9 Freedom FM

Other than a second adjacency short-spacing issue with WQYK, he looks clean. There should be no formal complaints unless he starts splattering all over hell's half acre.
 
If I DF them, I'm not going to report it publicly. Why do the feds job for them? Back in the day I used to run a couple FM and AM pirates here in St. Pete. I never got caught, although Terry K located one of my transmitter sites once...

I wish someone was splattering 99.5 here, it'd be an improvement ;D
 
At least he realizes 99.9 is a pretty good frequency to use around the St. Pete / Bradenton area. Eckerd uses the frequency so you know you're good as a Part 15 or slightly more. I used to do the same thing.... but then all the people being busted and the fact that it's a felony scared me to internet only now.
 
Interesting. Wonder if he knows enough about what he is doing to keep the feds off him. I did some pirate radio back in the day for Pirate Radio 102.1 out of Temple Terrace, after the first raid in 97, back around 99-01 or 02. Also with a short lived pirate, 99.9, out of St. Petersburg in 03? 04? In my experience, you will eventually get caught. Of course, what you are playing, and saying, as a DJ can affect whether anyone cares or not. Both stations I was involved with played music that some would find offensive (punk, metal, hardcore rap) and neither station cared if DJ's swore on air or whatnot. This freedom 99.9 is playing a more contemporary top 40 type of setlist, so he may get away with it for a while. Good luck to him/her
 
Web page frameset contains a "vincentg0612" username for a WIX hosting account... Link to "Staff Mail" server goes to a Verizon FIOS static IP in the area... Facebook page references broadcasting in the 34208 zip code (Samoset area of town) in a post by the owner, and implies they've been doing so since at least January.

Certainly wouldn't be hard to track down with a subpoena requesting user information if the DF effort alone isn't enough.

Byron
 
Actually 34208 runs along the Manatee River to the north, south to at least 38 ave e... and from 1st Street East to ??? east....
 
I do it as a hobby, but the only ones I have ever published on these discussion boards are first adjacencies to stations to which I listen.
 
The first post regarding this operation was on 11/1. Out of curiosity I went looking the following day and found him fairly easily. C'mon, people. He's doing no harm to anyone. If we were still in the days of Cease and Desist orders, it would be one thing but a simple operation that hurts no one can now bankrupt somebody. Can we leave this man/woman alone until he actually causes some harm?
 
If you're not going to enforce the rules, why have them? Who is to be the judge as to whether somebody or some broadcaster is being hurt? If there is no problem with 99.9, can I have 100.3, and since there is no station in Tampa on that frequency, surely you'll have no problem if I boot up to 100kW? In this era of tight federal budgets, why not spike the FCC like we did the Civil Aeronautics Board several decades ago. Think of the savings! Let the broadcasters "police" themselves.
 
What ignorant drivel. Even the FCC knows their rules are too strict. That's why they're going to end up dropping second adjacency requirements for low-power operations like this.

And answer your own question regarding 100kw at 100.3. That's ridiculous on the surface. A low-power operation in the St. Pete area would work nicely, however.

The FCC is a joke. Talking about Washington now, not the field offices. Take a look at pending applications and be horrified at how long some of them have been gathering dust while the bureaucrats do nothing to earn their pay.

The rules are totally outdated, designed for yesteryear, and it often takes too long to get rid of the crap on the books. We were still filling out transmitter logs every 30 minutes for decades after you couldn't buy a transmitter that would operate as poorly as the rules would allow. We need a lot FEWER 100-kilowatters and a lot MORE 6-kilowatters (or under) to get the industry back to actually providing local service.

The blow-torches are offering no service beyond their metro areas and are wasting spectrum space that could be used by someone who wants to operate something other than an unmanned jukebox.
 
Before all the swapping a while back, I can remember working for WSRZ (106.3) when it was just 3,000 watts on a 250 foot stick on City Island and ALL LIVE AND LOCAL.... They even called themselves "YOUR HOMETOWN STATION"...What was wrong with THAT ???
 
>>What ignorant drivel. Even the FCC knows their rules are too strict. That's why they're going to end up dropping second adjacency requirements for low-power operations like this.<<

I was being a little facetious. However, I haven't heard on any board that the FCC thinks their rules are too strict. 99.9 may have broom closet sized power, but if a dozen more radio stations are allowed to enter the market with as much as 3000 watts, I'd think you would have an economic nightmare. Even if the signals could be kept from bumping into each other, formats would be sliced up so much it would be a localized form of internet broadcasting. Lots of choices and nobody able to make any money. And if the dozen new stations are all broom closet sized, they're not going to make any money anyway.

I would submit that there are too many stations with too few competing broadcasting companies. If the FCC wanted to make a positive change, reinstate ownership limits, thereby forcing clusters to whittle down to 2 or 4 stations in a market. With real competition, I'd bet the programming would improve, and the need for pirates would diminish. If CC had ownership limits, they certainly wouldn't keep 1450 and 1320. If the guy who is programming 99.9 had the chance to really have some power with one of those AM's (and yes, I realize it is AM) would they? Or would they rather just stay on a broom closet sized FM? And if it sound fidelity one is after, internet streams of AM stations come through crystal clear. In that case, just market the AM as the in-the-car portable version of the internet stream.

Just trying to offer a constructive thought...
 
well sounds like unless he/she knows how to bounce around his/her signal around town without getting feds on 'em might have a chance. otherwise, in this day and age...

i guess there is a reason I only dabble in internet radio anymore.
 
SCMcKinney said:
I was being a little facetious.  However, I haven't heard on any board that the FCC thinks their rules are too strict.
Click to expand...

The phrase "too strict" is mine but it is a reasonable assumption with the Commission considering tossing out second-adjacency distance requirements for low-power operations. Whether my phrasing or theirs, that has to be the general thrust of their thinking under the circumstances.

SCMcKinney said:
Even if the signals could be kept from bumping into each other, formats would be sliced up so much it would be a localized form of internet broadcasting.  Lots of choices and nobody able to make any money.  And if the dozen new stations are all broom closet sized, they're not going to make any money anyway.
Click to expand...

I don't think making money is the general raison d'etre for the neighborhood stations.

SCMcKinney said:
I would submit that there are too many stations with too few competing broadcasting companies.  If the FCC wanted to make a positive change, reinstate ownership limits, thereby forcing clusters to whittle down to 2 or 4 stations in a market.  With real competition, I'd bet the programming would improve, and the need for pirates would diminish.  If CC had ownership limits, they certainly wouldn't keep 1450 and 1320.  If the guy who is programming 99.9 had the chance to really have some power with one of those AM's (and yes, I realize it is AM) would they?  Or would they rather just stay on a broom closet sized FM?  And if it sound fidelity one is after, internet streams of AM stations come through crystal clear.  In that case, just market the AM as the in-the-car portable version of the internet stream.
Click to expand...

I agree 100 percent. But it won't work. The costs involved in "going legit" are far too high for a small operator, especially when discussing an AM station. While we're going back to yesteryear with your proposals, we also need to go back to the days when I could fill out my own application on a page or two and prepare my own engineering submissions. And we need to get rid of all of the bullshit that has appeared over the past several decades for no other reason than to give the bureaucrats the appearance that they're actually doing real work. The Public File is at the top of that list. We need to go back to the days of no license/application fees, especially for AM. All of this stuff combines to be a regulatory choke-hold, economically, to people like me who have spent their entire lives in broadcasting and who still believe in public service.

At this moment, I know of a 10k AM on a low frequency in a decent market that can be had for $250k (maybe even less, that's the asking price), including land, buildings, equipment, license, the whole shimola. I wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole due to the economics of keeping it on the air.

So...when the rules get to be burdensome...some people just choose to ignore them. Rosa Parks was tired and refused to stand in the full back of the bus when there were open seats up front. It's the American way.
 
Laws are written for those people who think others are like them that can not govern themselves.

Laws do not prohibit anything from happening.

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!
 
And ALL of this discussion for a medium that is consistently being torn apart by other, more popular forms of audio entertainment. Some poor dude wants to run a big jukebox, and many say it is clean, and non-offensive. It won't be an "economic nightmare" except for the licensed stations that can't do it as well as this person who just wants to "do good radio" but that's a problem..many of us old radio hounds yearn to OWN our OWN radio station

There are some available AM stations in Florida that one could get as a fire-sale for auction prices of around 17 thousand bucks. Some are even less than that. But then to do it legally..there is cost of equipment, electric, tangible taxes, BMI and ASCAP fees, insurance, tower maintenence, license fees, land taxes, occupational licenses, and staff. And you had better know plenty about transmitters and electronics or youll be paying a contract engineer a bargeful to try and keep the old beast running...IF it hasnt had water damage, or some PCP leakage that rendered it a bio-hazard that has to be environmentally and safely "dealt with" (read as: disposed of)

Then you will be having to try and sell to a shrinking number of local businesses who have possibly had a run in with the former folks who ran the station, and soon nobody wants to even recognize you are there..no listeners, and no sponsors..just you and YOUR STATION. Then you notice the cracked insulator on the base of one of the towers that just might send it toppling down on the other one, and possibly crash into the Home Depot shed that is the transmitter shack..and maybe the studio..and maybe cause a fire or kill somebody. All this to OWN our own station? This is our DREAM... Yeeeesh!


However there is a better way. On the web there are FAR more potential listeners, and that's what these guys running pirate stations want...they want a stage..not to make a profit. So why risk the potential felony here? Just build out a decent Internet based station and PROMOTE it. There will be many more possible listeners..better fidelity, and no risk of losing several thousand bucks and gaining a police record..OR is THAT the fun of it? The RISK..the needling of corporate broadcasting? I just don't know. The rewards that this "pirate" might be gleaning better be worth it.
 
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