Sometimes futurists don’t look far enough into the past before proposing their next big idea.
Case in point: Eliot Van Buskirk seems pretty excited about the pending expansion of the LPFM radio service, and he suggests that stations look into crowdsourcing their programming: “using music apps to control low-powered radio stations within small urban (or suburban, or even rural) areas” seems like a great way to program a station on the cheap, and it would most likely sound like nothing else on the dial.
Initial reaction to the idea is mixed. But it’s not necessarily new: pirate radio’s already been there and done that, more than a decade ago. Continue reading “Crowdsourcing Community Radio”
Tag: minneapolis
Radio Re/Volt: Quickie Summary
Paul @ Mediageek has the complete rundown, with pics and the appropriate links to everywhere relevant to our adventure in Minneapolis. As conferences go, it was on the fun side: way too many people you want to get to know, way too little time. Tetsuo was certainly awe-inspiring, but so was Kyle Drake, Free Radio Twin Cities, free103point9, the audience reception to Making Waves, and the hardy contingent of midwest pirates who converged on the scene to represent. I got to drink with none of them. But still, a good time. If we manage to get hold of the recordings made of the conference sessions they will get online somehow, at the very least through Radio MCAD, the gracious host of it all.
Making Waves Review Online
It’s four pages of glowing text action seeded with something like 10 clips from the film. Its producer, Michael Lahey, is generous like that: he’s even opened up some crash space for the Mediageek and I on our visit to Minneapolis this weekend for the RAD conference. Seriously, though, it’s the best documentary yet on the subject and it’s good to see it’ll be screened at the conference. If you’re into microradio you get a good full hour of quality storytelling from Tucson that’ll make you (somewhat) proud. Contact Michael directly if you’d like a DVD.
RAD Conference Ahoy
Wrapping up the Walker Arts Center‘s summer installation on microradio (Radio Re-Volt: One Person.ooOne Watt) will be a free two-day conference. RAD: Radio, Access, Democracy takes place at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design on October 29-30.
Microradio luminary Tetsuo Kogawa will give the keynote address and free103point9 will be in the haus with a special interactive performance. Michael Lahey’s new microradio documentary, Making Waves, may also get a special screening. Continue reading “RAD Conference Ahoy”
Links: Separating Transmitter from Studio
The act of broadcasting without a license is a very public thing; it is going on the air that makes it a crime, not what a pirate station does once it’s on. Because of this, a delicate game of balance has to be played by pirate radio station operators. As a pirate garners more notice from a community, the risk of having the powers-that-be notice also rises. But if nobody knows about the station, then what good can it do?
To try and prevent (or at least partially blunt) the eventual enforcement action, pirates have experimented with unique ways of “protecting” their studios. After all, transmitters are replaceable; dedicated people are not.
The easiest way to protect a studio is to separate it physically from the transmitter. Radio authorities find pirates by the signals they produce, and the place where those signals are coming from is the first place they’ll visit. If that place is not the studio, it forces enforcement agents to at least take one extra step to catch a pirate. Continue reading “Links: Separating Transmitter from Studio”