I have something that really confuses me. Whats the difference between a unlicensed pirate broadcaster and a unlicensed part 15 radio station? I just do this broadcasting on my own spare time, I don't know if I have listeners or not. I would not want to be in any trouble with the FCC so I just keep my radio station quiet between me and my friends and be calm, cool and collected and not go far with the signal. I have been doing this broadcast hobby cause I like music and I want to practice my announcing skills. But since laws are getting out of control, I feel so nervous going public. I feel so isolated cause of the FCC calling part 15 micro stations "pirates" and shutting them down cause of sort of ulicensed operation even for a part 15 small mp3 or kit transmitter you enjoyed with. I hear about this royality thing, if thats going to affect me then I will just go off air and run on 2.4 GHz digital and bluetooth. I cannot believe that your station is going far without any interaction with the FCC or other agencies. I have seen other stations having the same problems with finding programming as far as I read. I feel I might be loosing interest in broadcasting, cause I don't think I have heard from anyone who has seen my website or has been in the area tuning in. And some people might hear it and think, oh its a pirate station playing something I heard on another station before and then talks about it to their friends and probably setting a time to call the FCC. I feel so nervous when I broadcast nowadays cause of the political problems. Also I hear the news about FM stations in FL and NY getting shut down left and right over hobby radio broadcasting even on a part 15 basis.
Please help me out and educate me that I hope we are not a pirate
station.
Adam E.
Radio Monitor and Hobby Broadcaster
73s
It can be done legally by following the rules set forth in the FCC's part15 regulations. Make sure you dont cause interference or air questionable content and you wont have a problem. The ones who get caught are in violation usually for running too much power or too much antenna. The stations that get checked and not busted dont get listed anywhere,so who knows what the ratio is? Be legal,then be brave,go public if you are ready and have fun with it. I do..
73 and Regards,Lee
"I feel so isolated cause of the FCC calling part 15 micro stations "pirates"
The FCC has never refered to legitimate Part 15 operators as pirates.
WDCX AM1610 Part 15
John
Owner-Operator-Chief Engineer-Program Manager
Short answer - $7,000.00 to $10,000.00 according to the information on this site:
The not very funny answer is that if you're using FM and anyone can hear you you're probably not Part 15 compliant 🙂
The long answer has more to do with philosophy, and is a bit preachy.
Personally, I'm a strong advocate for experimentation under Part 15 rules and I often argue stridently to try new ideas and to maybe even test a concept or two that stretches the rules a bit.
FCC regulations stipulate that in order to consider an act a violation it must be willful and repeated. The term "willful" has been interpreted to mean simply that the acts or omissions are committed knowingly. The term "repeated" means the commission or omission of such act more than once or for more than one day.
With that in mind, I sometimes try a configuration that might not be exactly as described in Part 15 once, or for less than one day. I have also been cited by the FCC for an experiment that turned out to be a bit outside the lines and I resolved that.
All of my decisions and actions are still guided by Part 15 rules. The ultimate goal of my efforts is to discover the best uses of Pat 15 permitted broadcasting activities, uses that in their final form will still pass FCC field agent inspection.
In my opinion, philosophically that's quite different from disregarding the regulations from the outset and engaging in activities that are simply not permitted under any circumstances. Exceeding the Part 15 regulations willfully and repeatedly is prohibited by the FCC. Using artists' material without permission is prohibited by copyright law. Those are unpleasant but genuine realities.
Also remember the people like commentator Rush Limbaugh and Washington DC's Don Geronimo have talked at length about practicing their radio skills on Part 15 AM transmitters broadcasting inside their own homes.
In my opinion, if you want to entertain your neighbors set up an AM transmitter (more legal range) and play music from local artists who give you permission to use their music.
Also in my opinion, if a radio career is what you're after, make a demo MP3 and send it to the stations in your area. There are still lots of evening and weekend shifts that need air talent. As far as I know that's the only experience that really counts anyway.
Experimental broadcasting for a better tomorrow!
Thanks for the information there. I really appreciate it. Mainly for now. This transmission is not meant for the neighbors, its a real private broadcast that is mainly for my radios in my house so I can listen to my own favorite music on my walkman outside. Also its meant for my own personal use and entertainment. I am here just to show off my radio station to my friends and family not the strangers outside the area even though they cannot receive it too well. Still it would be a good RDF or foxhunt experiment to see if a DXer can receive it well or not. Also a good way to see if you can receive the signal very far away the way the transmitter is performing as it should and to see if that yagi antenna can receive it if it can its fully qualified to receive any pirate radio station stronger than my signal. Remember my station is just an foxhunt experiment and plain old entertainment for to see if I can receive it far away. Like a radio beacon, but anyways its part 15 so its just an idea for a DXer. If I had a way I might just move up to the 900 MHz stereo region and just use wireless speakers and experiment on that frequency region with the antennas. Its a good challenge to DX part 15 AM stations and FM its very hard to do though
I see you guys got alot of money to spend on record company licenses and things that really mean alot to professional money making broadcasters, I don't not have that ability yet as of now just chunk change money. If you get real good at it why don't you try to submit an application for an LPAM or LPFM license to go 10 watts and more just like my nearby religious broadcasters such as WJLZ in Virginia Beach owning more than half of the FM spectrum to supply 3 LPFM stations across hampton roads blasting out intermod.
I just do my radio hobby as I want to and also not trying to violate the rules and regulations, by using big huge tower antennas and big power amplifiers and harris AM/FM station transmitters. My broadcasts are mainly for my friends and colleagues in the GCC, not meant for public performance and money making opportunities sorry about that but thats not what this was designed for. Its just a plain hobby broadcaster having some fun before I have to go back to workd. I can go off the air anytime I want if something is not right with the transmission or programming.
One of these days, if I tend to get rich quick like those other people on TV. I will be submitting for a LPFM license for to go 1 watt to 10 watts. Most radio stations are
owned by clear channel and other monopoly companies. Also I thought part 15 was
supposed to be for hobbyists and not just the professionals??? Like mp3 music
hobbyists. This is GCC radio that is mainly amatuer broadcasting not profit.
Adam Ebel
Hi Adam.
I've been to your website, both some months ago and just recently when you mentioned it in this thread. I've been to probably *most* of the station websites of folks that post on here, though I don't usually mention it.
Your site is interesting, though I kind of wondered about the names with "Global Communication Commission" since I'd usually think of a commission as some sort of a regulatory thing. But I don't have room to talk on names, since my station doesn't even really have one. LOL
So far as the record company fees, some people here would probably disagree with me, but personally, I'd think of the maybe 200 ft range of a hobby part15 FM station as being neither "public performance" nor "broadcasting" in the sense that laws covering broadcast address. To be public performance, you kind of need a public with listeners in it and at least most part15 FM hobby stations that are within the 200 ft approx limit for legal range would be an awfully hard case to prove as "loss of revenue". The purpose of the royalties/fees was and is to recompense the record companies (they like to say "the artists", but the artists see precious little of it compared to the record companies) for the presumed loss of revenue because if people can hear it on the radio they may not buy the records. The laws for broadcast royalties were made for commercial stations, which differ from what we are talking about here (at least for FM) in that they have power to cover a fairly good-sized geographic area and can all demonstrate a confirmed listener base to advertisers.
If you've never had confirmation of a single listener, I think they'd have a very hard time showing "loss of revenue" for a lawsuit. Sure, if you ask them if you should pay them then their answer will be "yes". And if you're the new geek-kid (I can use that stereotype since I was one) at school and you walk up to a bully and ask if they're the person you're supposed to give your lunch-money to, the answer will most likely be "yes". Kind of a no-brainer there. But as far as whether they actually have a legal right to actually demand it, I'd find that rather questionable.
It is not the same as with internet streaming, where it's very easy to make a digital copy of the mp3/etc file as it plays, and where a copy is being made on the listener's machine to be *able* to hear it (at least as a temporary file), nor is it the same as a business like a bar, restaurant or store playing music for its customers. But that's my opinion, others here will not necessarilly agree, and in any case it should not be construed as actual legal advice.
You can also sidestep the whole issue by playing material in the public domain, permitted by creative commons, or that you wrote and perfomed yourself. For that matter, if you know any bands, ask if you can play their songs on your station. While pretty much all commercial "top hit" music is under one or more of the organizations that collect royalties, there is an awful lot of lesser-known material out there by artists/bands that have nothing to do with the RIAA and etc and that would like to be on almost any startion they can get played on. That option takes more work, and not all would find it worth their bother, but it's what I do.
Daniel
I'll add a couple of comments here.
You could have a really good sounding AM or FM station and the cost is next to nothing. There are a number of plug ins for Win amp that pump up the sound and make it sound like the pros.
You have a number of options beyond Part 15, find a nearby small radio station and see if they offer a brokered time slot. You can sell advertising and have your own radio show and the music licenses are already paid by the radio station. I think there might be some shortwave stations like WBCQ in Maine that offer time slots.
Internet broadcasting might be a idea, but recent reports have made this really expensive as they just jacked up the royalties. Its a option.
Get a ham license, of course you cannot broadcast...but it will give you additional training on how antennas work and how far legally you can get out for a a given frequency with a certain power. Its just good training ground, they recently made it possible to get a ham license to communicate on the HF ham bands without having to learn morse code.
Having a Part 15 station has its advantages, you can rebroadcast anything from your computer, MP3 player, cassette, whatever throughout the house.
Regarding music licenses, the consensus seems to be that if you broadcast for your house and entertainment only. That licenses are not needed.
It is possible to have several part 15 stations all with the same frequency spaced a certain distance apart. With this set up, although complicated and expensive , you can get your music licenses (BMI costs like $200 a year) and sell advertising and become a microbroadcaster for profit.
What transmitter to buy? If you want range, go part 15 AM. SSTran sounds far better than Ramsey's AM25. Both are around $100 and only available as a kit. Although you can find companies that sell them as assembled for $160 to $180.
I have both the Ramsey and SSTRAN, the Ramsey seems to have more distance than the SSTRAN, but my SSTRAN was soldered using the supplied wire antenna. There is another option than you can do using a outside antenna with a loaded coil antenna for the SSTRAN.
The Ramsey I have uses the loaded coil outside and I get several blocks during the day to only 150 feet at night. The SSTRAN with the wire soldered to the board option fades away as soon as I leave the house.
Go with the SSTRAN for sound quality and get the option for having that surface mount IC already installed...its only $3.00 more..its worth the small added expense.
If you want the best, most say the Rangemaster is the best at nearly $1000, but that unit is FCC approved. That is beyond my budget, but some have used those units to make a go with it as a for profit operation.
I do not have much advice for FM, those store bought MP3 FM transmitters seem to have very poor range for the money that they cost. For just $50 - $60 more you would be better off with a SSTRAN AM transmitter.
What I have read is that the FCC regulations seem to limit FM to 300 feet and 25 milliwatts ( 1/4 of the power of part 15 AM) . Thing is , it seems you could buy a transmitter with slightly more than legal power and run it through a lot of coax (150 feet or more) and the result would be the same as if you got a 25 milliwatt FM transmitter at the end of the coax due to the power loss of the long coax.
One could in theory have several Part 15 FM transmitters all spaced 250 to 300 apart in a line and they could be connected all together with a audio and power line. That could get expensive and impractical, and then it comes back to recommending the SSTRAN as the best way to go.
There of course is the experimental LF band where you can legally use 1 watt and a 50 foot antenna on 160 - 190 khz.
kyradio: "What I have read is that the FCC regulations seem to limit FM to 300 feet and 25 milliwatts ( 1/4 of the power of part 15 AM).
The FCC doesn't define either tx power or antenna gain for Part 15 FM, only that the greatest field strength 3 meters in all directions from the tx antenna cannot exceed 250 µV/m. That is the reason why the range is limited.
As has been posted here many times, even a 1 milliwatt tx with a simple 1/2-wave dipole will produce a field that is FAR above the FCC limit.
//
Why did Ramsey not limit the 25B at 10 milliwatts or even 1 milliwatt ? Then if Ramsey or any other manufacturer is marketing kits that has potential of exceeding the FCC limit, why then are they being sold?
Why did Ramsey not limit the 25B at 10 milliwatts or even 1 milliwatt ?
__________
A good question for the suppliers of Part 15 FM transmitters.
But the bottom line is that the user is responsible for non-compliance with the maximum field strength Rules applying to the use of Part 15 FM devices, given that there may be some recourse to the system manufacturer if the tx and antenna system was FCC-certified as meeting Part 15, the product was used in the configuration in which it met that certification, and was still found as non-compliant in a given installation. (This is not legal advice, just common sense.)
//
There would probably be more listeners in a nightclub or retail setting than there would be with the average part 15er. With a signal setup used within the guidelines of part 15, the signal would just simply not allow for that kind of listership where there could even be a possibility of "loss of revenue" for the artists. Realistically, it would be more trouble than worth to try to locate music from strictly local artists to be your main format.