More on Pirate Radio
Jeff Herman
>1. We all do stoopid(tm) things when we're young. Someone admiting they
> ran a pirate radio station when they were younger is hardly a capital
> offense automatically requiring the death penalty. Granted, it may be
> a federal crime, but most of the time its fairly adolescent, and on
> the total realm of things, I think generally un-important.
Michael, one of the fellows spoke of being on the ham bands for 5 years
without a license and seemed to condone the practice; the other talks
of wanting to put a 5 kW xmtr on the ham bands... And these guys aren't
youngsters.
>In fact, looking objectively at the situation there is something to be
>said for "pirate" radio stations. Many of them are small neighborhood-type
>arrangements running a few milliwatts. Maybe if the FCC were less anal
>retentive about extremely low-power operating guidelines, and make the
>application process relatively simple and costless, many of these
>"pirate" stations would actually be legit.
This issue of pirate stations has been thoroughly and thoughtfully
discussed on rec.radio.broadcasting. The major concerns are not that
these folks are bypassing the regulations concerning licensing
but that they would ignore power and antenna restrictions. A
tight operating budget would mean low-quality transmitters
possibly causing interference to other services (how many are
of them are engineers?). How many would keep their signal confined
to their service area? Who determines what frequency one uses? What
if a dozen people in one neighborhood each wanted to have a
station? Who would coordinate their activities? Would they randomly
choose a frequency? There are still controls over program content
supposedly to protect children - would any of these broadcasters
confine their programming as such?
Many fear that the FM broadcast band would become another citizen's
band - only with 1-way broadcasts rather than 2-way `communications'.
_____________________________________________________________________
Question: Where do Hawaii residents go for vacation? Lake Tahoe,
Nevada, of course! Listen for NH6IL/7 QRP on 3579 (national
colorburst QRP freq.) and 7040 kHz for the next 3 weeks. Got
to get off this island occasionally, you know.
No talking behind my back, now.
>-- Michael P. Deignan
>-- Population Studies & Training Center
>-- Brown University, Box 1916, Providence, RI 02912
>-- (401) 863-7284
Jeff NH6IL
Ed Ellers
That did bother me, too, but I think it's entirely possible that he's going to
throttle it down to the legal limit; AM transmitters are usually designed to be
run at a fraction of their full power for nighttime operation. (It does seem
like a pretty impractical HF rig, though...)
BTW, betcha can't tell us what the EXACT "color burst" frequency is, as defined
in the FCC rules. Wanna try it?
-- Ed Ellers, KD4AWQ
Jeff Herman
>
>BTW, betcha can't tell us what the EXACT "color burst" frequency is, as defined
>in the FCC rules. Wanna try it?
>
>-- Ed Ellers, KD4AWQ
I had to look at one of my colorburst crystals: 3579.545 kHz.
For those who don't know what this is, in your color TV there is a
crystal oscillator operating at this very convenient frequency (which
is the difference between the video carrier and the subcarrier). QRP'ers
have taken this xtal and designed some nice 80M xmtrs around it. 3579 kc
has become the national c.b. (that's colorburst) QRP CW frequency.
So, if you have a junked color TV, or if think only junk is on TV,
yank that xtal out.
If any of you folks want some simple 80M QRP xmtr circuits for your
c.b. xtal, email me and I'll pass them along to you. Do it before
Tuesday 21 Dec. or after 9 Jan.
Jeff NH6IL
Ed Ellers
Actually, the FCC defines it just a hair higher -- it's 63/88 times precisely
5 MHz, which works out to 3579.5454... kHz. The 5454s go on to infinity.
Doing it this way allows major TV studio facilities to use rubidium or cesium
frequency standards, whose extremely tight frequency tolerances allow several
studios' master oscillators to be kept in phase more easily.
Interestingly enough, there's one TV station in the U.S. whose color burst is
part of THE official timekeeping chain. The NIST doesn't have a good clear
shot from the master clock in Boulder to the WWV transmitter site in Fort
Collins, so they feed the clock's 5 MHz output by microwave to one of the
Denver TV stations and that station (I've forgotten which one) derives their
color subcarrier from it; a TV tuner at WWV feeds a special decoder to
extract the color burst signal and lock WWV's carriers to it. The actual audio
goes on a leased phone company line.
Dana Myers
>In some article on r.r.a.p Michael P. Deignan stated:
>
>>1. We all do stoopid(tm) things when we're young. Someone admiting they
>> ran a pirate radio station when they were younger is hardly a capital
>> offense automatically requiring the death penalty. Granted, it may be
>> a federal crime, but most of the time its fairly adolescent, and on
>> the total realm of things, I think generally un-important.
>
>Michael, one of the fellows spoke of being on the ham bands for 5 years
>without a license and seemed to condone the practice; the other talks
>of wanting to put a 5 kW xmtr on the ham bands... And these guys aren't
>youngsters.
Well, it seems that Jeff might be editorializing just a little. Bly
responded to a post on alt.radio.pirate which asked "Does the FCC catch
you?". His response was cross-posted to rec.radio.amateur.policy, so
the alt.radio.pirate group has enjoyed a snippet of hamster policy
rhetoric, which, frankly. should not have been cross-posted.
Bly responded and said "well, I bootlegged on ham radio for five years
and never got caught". No, Bly didn't get into some long emtional
apology, he just said "I did it and I didn't get caught". Does he
condone the practive? I don't know. Given that Bly is licensed
as KA6MWT, look it up, it suggests he doesn't outright condone this
practice anymore.
Then, Mike Shoupe said some stuff, including the comment about a
couple of 5KW Am transmitters he has. He made some comment about using
them on amateur bands as a licensed amateur. The callsign database
suggests he is currently a technician class licensee, but I saw
nothing in Shoupe's post to suggest that (a) he plans to operate the
transmitters on the ham bands without the correct license and (b)
that he plans to operate the transmitters at the full 5KW output.
So, Jeff simply jumped off to some conclusions without knowing all
of the facts. Like a typical hamster cop, he convicted these people
without a fair trial. Good P.R. for the hamster "self-policing"
movement. Not!
>No talking behind my back, now.
Sure, Jeff, we'll just suspend rec.radio.amateur.policy activity
until you get back.
--
* Dana H. Myers KK6JQ, DoD 466 | Views expressed here are *
* (310) 348-6043 | mine and do not necessarily *
* Dana....@West.Sun.Com | reflect those of my employer *
* This Extra supports the abolition of the 13 and 20 WPM tests *
Dan Pickersgill N8PKV
> Well, it seems that Jeff might be editorializing just a little. Bly
> responded to a post on alt.radio.pirate which asked "Does the FCC catch
> you?". His response was cross-posted to rec.radio.amateur.policy, so
> the alt.radio.pirate group has enjoyed a snippet of hamster policy
> rhetoric, which, frankly. should not have been cross-posted.
>
> Bly responded and said "well, I bootlegged on ham radio for five years
> and never got caught". No, Bly didn't get into some long emtional
> apology, he just said "I did it and I didn't get caught". Does he
> condone the practive? I don't know. Given that Bly is licensed
> as KA6MWT, look it up, it suggests he doesn't outright condone this
> practice anymore.
>
> Then, Mike Shoupe said some stuff, including the comment about a
> couple of 5KW Am transmitters he has. He made some comment about using
> them on amateur bands as a licensed amateur. The callsign database
> suggests he is currently a technician class licensee, but I saw
> nothing in Shoupe's post to suggest that (a) he plans to operate the
> transmitters on the ham bands without the correct license and (b)
> that he plans to operate the transmitters at the full 5KW output.
Dana,
Jeff and I disagree on a number of topics. Some of which you and I DO
agree on. However, in the context of the posts that were on r.r.a.p. I
have to agree with Jeff in that no remorse was implyed nor reasonably
infered. Not even after the comment was made about the outlaw status.
All that it would have taken was a statement that "Hey, I have my
license now don't I...". However that was not the case. Flaunting outlaw
status is not 'good amateur practice' in any way, shape or form. To
express disgust is a common and, should be, expected response from a
group of LICENSED amateurs.
>
> So, Jeff simply jumped off to some conclusions without knowing all
> of the facts.
The response was to the commets as made, no _conclusion_ was necessary.
> Like a typical hamster cop, he convicted these people
> without a fair trial. Good P.R. for the hamster "self-policing"
> movement. Not!
A 'hamster' is a rodent. Considering the definition of rodent that
applies to Pirates not to Amateurs.
>
> >No talking behind my back, now.
>
> Sure, Jeff, we'll just suspend rec.radio.amateur.policy activity
> until you get back.
I infered a smiley. Did anyone else?
--
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| Dan Pickersgill N8PKV | 'Pots have handles, Magazines have |
| d...@mystis.wariat.org | Personals, Hams have Names' |
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| Crime in America is a thing of the PAST!!! |
| The Brady Bill is Law. |
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Dana Myers
LICENSED amateurs are expected to obey Part 97, not ride around passing
judgement on other amateurs. Somehow hams think that we are some big
posse called to make sure everybody keeps their noses clean. This simply
isn't the case. We're not authorized to go around declaring people
to be "outlaws" just because the people won't grovel at our feet over some
thing that happened in the past.
>> So, Jeff simply jumped off to some conclusions without knowing all
>> of the facts.
>
>The response was to the commets as made, no _conclusion_ was necessary.
Calling someone an "outlaw" is a conclusion, isn't it?
>> Like a typical hamster cop, he convicted these people
>> without a fair trial. Good P.R. for the hamster "self-policing"
>> movement. Not!
>
>A 'hamster' is a rodent. Considering the definition of rodent that
>applies to Pirates not to Amateurs.
Hmmm... you ain't been around radio long, huh? If you get to know radio
professionals, like people who own and operate moutain top radio sites,
or make a living providing comm services, you'll soon hear the term "hamster".
It is a descriptive term that has to do with the way hams conduct themselve
around professionals. It has to do with the self-appointed cop mentality,
among other things. Like any slang term, arguing over semantics is pointless;
if you walk into a 2-way comm shop in California and say "hamster", everyone
will know what you mean. If you don't like the term, too bad, try to understand
why it is used and avoid being a "hamster".