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T
tvnetdude
Guest
Nick said:
It may be illegal every non-comm ever licensed has had to protect channel 6. IF they are running 5KW they pretty much have to be using a certified rig. I have never seen a 5KW pirate rig on he market. If they were interfering with the aircraft band they would have ben shut down by now.
March 26 said:
I liked this line:
"Agents met with a resident at this address, who granted them access to
the basement of the building where the transmitter was located. Agents
inspected the transmitter and determined that, based on the model and
serial numbers, it was the same unit that was previously installed at
One Westinghouse Plaza."
Same transmitter...different place! ;-)
tvnetdude said:
Just because it was posted on wikipedia that they're running 5kW doesn't mean it's true. I don't believe Nick is anywhere near Boston, so probably hasn't seen exactly how the signal performs. It's nowhere near as strong as a regular 3/6kW class A FM, but I'd compare it's coverage with 90.3 WZBC, if it was on a clear frequency.
I have noticed with quite a few radios with narrow filters that it is not centered on 87.70, but rather on 87.74. This might mean that they're using some kind of old channel 6 exciter. They are however running FM stereo, so that may shoot down that theory.
Skynet74 said:
That's not the way it's regulated. You cannot transmit a field strength of more than 250 uV/m at a distance of 3 meters from the antenna, per section 15.239(b), in the FM band.
jlehmann said:
yeah i was walking around on a path south of the great blue hill, programming 88.1/89.3/89.7/90.3/91.7/95.3/95.9/96.5/98.9/99.7/101.3/102.9/105.3 into a Cowon, since i cant find my sansa clip (smaller than a pack of matches) and 'hot 97' came in best around 87.8.
on my walkman, since im so much closer to them than WMBR, it often locks onto Hot 97 and makes it hard to get 88.1
Hot 97 really is into their branding. They ID themselves more than a legal station!
Their production value is very very good. Their use of technology (web stream, extensive website, offsite internet feed to transmitter?) is spectacular for a pirate. This aint no hippy in a basement babbling over Jefferson Airplane! I dont even like dancehall reggae yet i'll sit and listen for a half hour because the way they present music is.....amazing. When they disappear I will truely miss them.
Their production value is very very good. Their use of technology (web stream, extensive website, offsite internet feed to transmitter?) is spectacular for a pirate. This aint no hippy in a basement babbling over Jefferson Airplane! I dont even like dancehall reggae yet i'll sit and listen for a half hour because the way they present music is.....amazing. When they disappear I will truely miss them.
A couple hundred feet at best. Even some of the Talking House "real estate" transmitters and FM modulators for XM/iPods are pushing it. Part 15 FM is good if you're looking at broadcasting your 'favorites' to your back yard. Part 15 AM can provide much better range if done correctly and legally.
Skynet74 said:
It's perfectly understandable and unambiguous English. It's also the FCC's reminder that radio is a creature of technology, and understanding how the technology works is far more important than plugging things together to make them work so that others can hear "my favorite music." Radio stations don't exist in a vacuum. Other radio stations use the same spectrum, and in order to have a system of broadcasting that works, rules are made that prevent stations from interfering with each other. It is not, as some on this board and elsewhere would like to believe, all about "corporate radio" programming formats they don't like.
Comply with the rule (either learn how to use a field-strength meter and rent one, or hire a knowledgeable engineer who knows how to use one) and you won't have a problem.
A
ArtSpooner
Guest
The term "pirate" indicates illegal to me. Why is there any debate? If you owned a business and paid your taxes, got all the necessary permits, inspections, insurance etc. and played by the rules, how would you react to a competior opening up across the street, who paid no taxes, no permits, etc? This seems to be a tough enough industry that doesn't need crap like that.
I assume that these stations make their living by advertising. I would go after the advertisers. I know they can't be told where to advertise (at least not yet) but does anything prohibit the FCC from publicizing the name of the illegal advertisers and implying a lack of honesty on the part of these companies? A little negative publicity could hurt in the middle of a recession..
Some people seem to like these stations, but some of those same people like Mustard and Johnson. How can they be taken seriously?
I assume that these stations make their living by advertising. I would go after the advertisers. I know they can't be told where to advertise (at least not yet) but does anything prohibit the FCC from publicizing the name of the illegal advertisers and implying a lack of honesty on the part of these companies? A little negative publicity could hurt in the middle of a recession..
Some people seem to like these stations, but some of those same people like Mustard and Johnson. How can they be taken seriously?
ArtSpooner said:
Most of these advertisers probably have no idea that the stations that they're advertising on are illegal. Most people outside of the broadcasting business have no idea about FCC regulations and licensing, etc...
The pirate operators are certainly not going to tell their advertisers that they're illegal, in fact, some of them lie outright with fraudulent claims that they are somehow legal, claiming that they're either "Part 15" (when they're running hundreds of times the power allowed under that designation) or that they're "LPFM" (which, when legal, must be a non-commercial designation).
I'm sure that most of these local businesses would be surprised to find out that the stations are illegal, and have no idea that they are participating in an illegal operation. Major local politicians (Patrick, Menino, and others) have appeared on certain pirate stations, even they are probably completely unaware that they're illegal.
The Feds need to go after the Pirates, Advertisers and Menino on a RICO charge
R
rapking
Guest
The Feds need to keep doing what there are doing (nothing ).
ArtSpooner said:
Small potatoes. You REALLY want these people off the air? Sic ASCAP, BMI and SESAC on them. They'll be begging for mercy in mere moments.
Saying the FCC should have "written that in English" is a lot like saying that you shouldn't have to learn how to drive a car; you should be able to just "turn the key and it goes". Spectrum is finite and it requires proper engineering for stations to share it appropriately without causing interference to each other.
That said, it's actually easier to decipher than you might think. The rule is 250 uV/m (microvolts per meter) measured at 3 meters' distance from the radiating antenna. It helps here to remember that for, say, a Class A FM (6000 watts ERP at 30m HAAT, or the equivalent) the rule is that the service contour is 1 V/m (volt per meter) measured at 28.3 kilometers (or 28,300 meters). One volt equals one million microvolts, so the legal limit for unlicensed broadcasting in the FM band is 0.00025 volts/meter measured at 3 meters. In other words, a tiny fraction of the power of your average radio station. So small that you're not really "broadcasting"...which is rather the point of legal, unlicensed transmissions in the FM band (governed by Part 15 of the Code of Federal Regulations). They're not supposed to be reaching a wide audience.
To really put it in layman's terms: I've had discussions with people in the know that have told me that if your Part 15 FM broadcast is audible at more than 250ft it's unofficially considered "illegal". After all, for legal Part 15 "broadcast" purposes, there is no reason why you would ever need a range greater than 250ft. In most cases, you'd never need more than about 25-30ft, actually. If you want more than 250ft, you need a license to operate...with all the benefits and responsibilities that entails. Dem's da rules.
If any pirate station is running a 5000 watt transmitter I'll eat my hat. It's VERY expensive (usually over $10,000) to purchase a transmitter over 1000 watts, and even that's pretty pricey. It's not easy to build a 5kW transmitter, either...quite hard to do it right without killing yourself or creating something that spews out spurious emissions all over the place and sounds like garbage, to boot. Theoretically, I could see a pirate getting a three-bay, vertically-polarized, full-wavelength-spaced antenna array. That will get you about 3.0 gain (I'm speaking quite roughly here) and that could mean a fairly hefty signal. But a 3-bay/F-W means at least 25-30ft of vertical real estate. That's kinda hard to obtain at all, much less hide.
It's also thoroughly unnecessary. On a reasonably "clear" frequency, even a 20 watt FM transmission will go 10-20 miles if you've got a little height and not too much terrain in the way. Our LPFM has 100 watts ERP and it'll go 15 miles in some directions...and it'd go further if it weren't for terrain and two (distant) co-channel stations. Saying you have 5000 watts sounds a lot more impressive...and from a marketing perspective, who listening is ever gonna know the truth?
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