FCC Chairman Michael Powell wants to accelerate the licensing to get more low-power FM radio stations on the air. Low-power FM was launched a few years ago to provide non-commercial programming to audiences in a radius of 3.5 miles.
This sounds like a good idea. It would allow more diversity of ownership and encourage more local content. What are the pro’s and con’s?
While there is certainly no harm in the licensing of more low power FM stations, the airwaves are owned by the people, I don’t see how this is going to offset the information monopoly many fear from deregulation. It is a pure diversionary tactic. There is no way a mom and pop radio station that’s signal will last three minutes from fade in to fade out in the average commuter’s drive to work, can compete with the more traditional 100,000 watt FM signal. They may encourage more local content, but who will listen?
Besides, I don’t see FM staying around as a mainstream format for radio with the growing popularity of coast to coast satellite radio. What mom and pop broadcaster could afford XM? Turner and Murdoch could, we couldn’t.
3.5 mile limit? Who would bother to go through all the trouble to setup an interesting broadcast that will only be heard by a relatively small number of people? I’m probably missing something here.
I agree with E72521… this is just a hand-waving attempt to draw attention away from Powell’s relaxed media ownership rules.
Spokane’s top 14 stations are owned by only 3 companies, and mainly programmed out of state using prerecorded voices. Citadel changed one of the most popular stations, 105.7, from modern alt-rock (KAEP) to classic rock (KZBD), perhaps in some vain hope of competing with Clear Channel’s KKZX. Soon after, Clear Channel changed the format of their competing station, 103.1 KCDA, and now the sound that was common to KAEP and KCDA simply can’t be heard in town anymore. The new KCDA has no live DJs, just a recorded voice after each song announcing the title.
But I guess we’re supposed to think increased corporate puppeteering is OK, because now it’s slightly easier to set up your own station that no one will hear.
A 3.5 mile radius could cover Manhattan from the Battery all the way up to 125th St. or so. It could include any single neighborhood in New York City. It could include many smaller cities and town. E.g., I was raised in New Rochelle, N. Y., a city of 75,000. A radius of 3.5 miles could include New Rochelle and the nearby cities of Mount Vernon, Pelham, Pelham Manor and Eastchester. That’s a potential audience of around 250,000 people.
These stations could allow a focus on news and issues relevant to a specific locality or community.
I think its an awesome idea - This would allow more community oriented broadcasts and would help get rid of the centralized and re-broadcasted monotony currently on the air.
Slightly related - England has banned the use of the FM transmitter attachment for the iPOD. Its used to send music over radio waves from the iPOD to your car stereo. Reason: It violates regulation stating that transmitting any radio signal means you need to register as a broadcaster.
Doens’t the FCC allot some bandwidth for low-power TV as well? Seems I read about this a few years ago…most of the allotmant was never used. I’d like to have my own TV station…I’d feature:
-Crank TV: a wholre hour devoted to the Kennedy Assassination theorys
-"the “Coral Calcium Show” Watch “Dr.” Bobn Barefoot tell you how to cure cancer, diabetes, heart disease, etc.
-Obscure Religious Programming: let’s have the “Cao Dai” Church and Scientology
Sound good? How do I get an FCC licence?
Well, Powell’s increased emphasis on it might be such an attempt, but the idea predates Powell’s Chairmanship. In fact, IIRC, low power FM was one of Kennard’s priorities as Chairman.
December
Very true. I’m all for it. Go for it. Just don’t feed me a line that it’s going to offset allowing a media conglomerate’s ability to dominate my selection of programming. Correct me if I’m wrong, but we’re talking about noncommercial licensing. I don’t understand how this scheme is going to produce anything worth listening to. It’s not clear to me exactly who would be lining up at the FCC with their life savings to set one of these stations up. This won’t even be in the same league as local access cable IMO. And while you are correct that in the Northeast corridor there is the potential of reaching hundreds of thousands of people with a low power transmitter, here in little Orlando such a broadcast would at best reach several subdivisions on a clear day. With no cite I’ll go out on a limb and say that the vast majority of FM listeners are in their cars making it very impractical to develop a base of listeners. And again, I reiterate my feeling that FM will not be a dominate format in the next decade. And finally, isn’t there pretty much bipartisan opposition in congress to relaxing ownership rules?
I don’t know the licences would be handed out.
In your case, I’d expect Mickey M. to be first in line.
This distance from Orlovista to Azalia Park looks like around 7 miles, so a 3.5 mile radius could include all the area between them
That’s an excellent point. Something new and creative would have to be done.
I can imagine a lot of bedroom communities setting up their own stations. I can imagine a lot of automated stations being set up by communities in the city - we have community rec centers, why not community radio? They could air schedules for parks, skating lessons, broadcast community sporting events, offer broadcasting courses for kids and let them have their own Saturday morning show, etc.
There’s a ton of potential in this, if you don’t think of them as ‘low powered stations doing exactly what high powered stations do’.
Does the FCC do anything for free? Possible but not probable. Anyone know? And I don’t see the local Radio Shack selling the kits within my budget. And the local zoning ordinances in this zip code are very prohibitive regarding transmitters on one’s roof top. I guess it is conceivable to rent space on a cell tower if you can afford it. Since I can’t collect advertising revenue, I’d need to figure out a way to pay for it all on my own.
You are correct on both points. Go back to your map and locate The Magic Kingdom. I live in a community called Dr. Phillips, located about 2.5 miles as the crow flies from TMK (great fireworks show from the back yard every night). The Rat already has low-powered transmitters for visitors to get info as they drive in. I cannot receive this signal from my property, but I cannot attest to the exact power of their signal. I can tell you that the 50,000 watt FM station that I regularly listen to in my car from Orlando gets static from time to time around here. I can’t receive Universal’s or Seaworld’s low-power signal either (great fireworks show from the front yard every night), but they use AM. I’d bet the FCC has similar distance rules for both formats.
I see no practical way of this becoming a way of providing an alternative to ClearChannel, Infinity et al.