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Mutiny on the Airwaves: How to be a Radio Pirate
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Mutiny on the Airwaves - Or, How to Be a Radio Pirate.
Every transistor radio by nature of its construction is at the same
time a potential transmitter . . . by circuit reversal. The development
from a mere distribution medium to a communication medium is . .
. consciously prevented for understandable political resons. The
technical distinction between receivers and transmitters reflects the
social division of producers and consumers.
-Hans Magnus Enzensberger, 1974
Everybody can own a TV and everybody can own a radio, but how
many of us own a TV or radio station? It is far from impossible,
and it's easier to do now more than ever, because we now have
camcorders, inexpensive audio equipment, and new wireless
technology helping us jump onto the airwaves and speak to each
other.
A Mr. Microphone is a radio transmitter, and a garage door opener
is a radio transmitter. Cellular phone conversations are picked up
by some TV sets. So it is not technology, but the political and
commercial potential of mass communications that is keeping
access to the airwaves out of the public's hands. The Federal
Communications Commission (FCC) has prevented most people
from transmitting by ruling that only those who can meet
exhorbitantly expensive standards of land and equipment
ownership can applly for licensing.
The airwaves are property only a few are licensed to use, but with
technology that's within everybody's reach, you can trespass onto
these spaces. It is not as though there is no room for it. Every empty
channel on your TV set, and every empty frequency on your radio
dial, could be filled with programming, if more people knew how to
hot wire the airwaves.
Tetsuo Kogawa, a Japanese media activist, faxed us his design for a
cheap FM radio transmitter. He's been doing pirate radio and
television for years in Japan, and his "narrowcasts" cover a college
campus with his device. You should be able to build it for $20-50.
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How to use the "Black Box"
by Tetsuo Kogawa
Prepare the following materials:
tape recorder with mini plug cable coming from audio out.
12v/500mA, or 12v DC power supply, or 12v regulator for car
battery power. radio antenna, preferably vertical dipole, with
enough wire to reach antenna from place of transmission. the
"Black Box."
<Picture: if you don't have graphix, you'll wanna dowload the
schematics. The URL is
http://www.phantom.com/~schuyler/schematix.gif and most text-
based browsers, when faced with a URL that's an image, will offer
to download it for you.>
To build the system:
1.Extend the pole of a rod antenna to 85cm across. This is the
length for 88MHz on your radio dial. 2.Attach the antenna to a
plastic or wooden stick (not metal) at least 1 meter in length, using
duct tape. 3.Connect the wire between the antenna and the Black
Box using the coaxial cable connector. Make sure the connection is
right; if you use the Black Box without doing so, the power
transistor may get damaged. 4.Fix the antenna on a high place, like
a rooftop or a tree. The higher the better. 5.Connect the audio cable
from the headphone jack or line out to the audio in on the Black
Box (check that the colume is down on the tape player).
6.Everything OK? If so, connect the 12v power to the Black Box
(never mic up plus and minus!). One watt should be at the 12v.
7.Start your tape player, tune your radio to 88MHz, and you will
find the signal. Bring up the volume little by little until you're
reached the appropriate level. Now you are and independent
narrowcaster.
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The good thing about 88MHz is that you get farther range with less
power than at higher frequencies. Also 88.0 is much less likely to
be occupied by a stronger transmission, because it is an unpopular
location, "the far left" of the radio dial.
Kogawa also recommends using a number of these transmitters. By
having one transmitter pick up the signal from the initial broadcast
about half a mile away and retransmitting it so that other
transmitters can pick it up, you can begin to cover a substantial part
of a city.
A pirate group in Wisconsin called WANTED recommends using
carrier-current, which sends your signal through the electric current
that comes to your home and brings it to any radio in the area that's
plugged into a wall socket receiving power from the same
transformer. Usually one transformer covers several blocks, or one
skyscraper. It works by just plugging your transmitter into a wall
socket.
If you want to get your antenna really high, attach it to a helium
balloon, like the US government does for transmission of TV
Marti, which invades Cuba's wavespace. In fact, since the US
government broadcasts 24 hours a day across borders into nations
whose governments totally oppose its reception, regardless of what
licensed programming might be on the frequencies, you could say
the feds are the biggest lawbreakers of all. So it's all-American to
be a broadcast pirate!
One pirate told me that he used a car battery to power his
transmitter in an apartment in the Bronx, placed teh antenna on the
roof of the building, and hand a loose cable connecting the
transmitter to the antenna through his window. That way, if there
was danger of getting caught he would just pull out the cable from
the antenna, and push the whole system under his bed. This made it
very safe because the FCC can track down the origin of a
transmission in 15-20 minutes, but to get a search warrant for every
residence in an apartment building takes days or weeks. So if you're
in a city, transmit from a large apartment building. They are also
good because you can put your antenna very high up.
WANTED, in Wisconsin, sometimes directly overrides the
commercial television and radio networks within a radius of two or
three miles by transmitting simultaneously from several vehicles,
which makes detection by the FCC much more difficult. WANTED
recommends locating your equipment in a panel truck and
transmitting from an antenna on a nearby rooftop. They have been
broadcasting TV intermittently for three years, and have not gotten
caught yet.
The equipment to broadcast television is a bit more extensive and
expensive than radio but not very hard to work with. Your biggest
expense most likely will be your camera, or your jail sentence. Just
kidding! If you transmit less than 15 minutes at a time, you can't get
tracked down by the FCC. They usually need to be clued in to your
transmissions by your own attempts at publicity or a complaint
from someone picking up your signal. Most people get off for their
first offense.
The first fine is $750, or one year's worth of ham sandwiches.
Xav Leplae is a member of Paper Tiger Television.
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