A legendary figure in pirate radio history, Carlos Juan Camacho Jr., died June 8 in Tampa. Camacho operated La Primerisima 89.3 FM from his home in Ybor City in Tampa, Florida, playing salsa and merengue music in the 1990s. The station was raided by officials from the Federal Communications Commission on April 13, 1998. Radio Amore, another unlicensed Tampa radio station was also raided that day by the FCC. That station was run by the Rev. Alberto Acosta who broadcast on 90.1-FM from a Baptist church. That raid came four months after three other pirate stations -- The Party Pirate, 87X, and Lutz Community Radio -- in Tampa were taken down by SWAT teams and the FCC. Tampa was a hotbed of pirate radio at the time, and the FCC's Tampa office busted more unlicensed stations than any other office in the country. Camacho did a do-it-yourself triangulation to locate 87X and meet Kelly Kombat, who was running that pirate station. "He proceeded to take me under his wing and school me on proper signal stabilization, how to use a limiter, how to tighten guy wires, and various other techniques in the operation of a 'professional pirate radio station,'" Kombat wrote of Camacho on Facebook after his death. "Carlos spoke in a thick rapid-fire Nuyorican accent, always with great enthusiasm about music and radio and family." Camacho was born in Puerto Rico on June 9, 1950. He ran the Red Plum Event Hall in New York, hosting performances from salsa stars including Hector Lavoe and Johnny Ventura. Camacho's obituary says "He made the first sound truck known as the 'Come Pava' in Puerto Rico," and also that, "He was an electrical technician and an alarms specialist and at the same time he followed his dream of having his own radio station, which he successfully broadcast for several years."

Former President Donald Trump's social media service "Truth," which he started after he was kicked off Twitter for lies and misinformation, is not a place one can be banned for their beliefs, right? “I created TRUTH Social and TMTG to stand up to the tyranny of Big Tech. We live in a world where the Taliban has a huge presence on Twitter, yet your favorite American President has been silenced. This is unacceptable,” Trump said in a press release last year before his site launched, bragging about the lack of censorship. Now Mike Masnick reports at Techdirt that Trump's Truth site is banning users for trying to spread some “truths” about the January 6 hearings. "My Truth Social account was just permanently suspended for talking about the January 6th Committee hearings," Travis Allen, a political commentator on social media and self-described information security analyst, posted on Twitter on June 9, the day the first public hearing on the attempted coup of the United States was held. "So much for "free speech." This is censorship!" he wrote. Jack Cocchiarella posted on Twitter a similar story on June 10. "I was suspended from Truth Social for posting about the January 6th hearing last night," he wrote. "Donald Trump is scared of free speech." And this is not the first time that cancel culture has come to Trump's version of the Truth. In February, Techdirt reported, "Trump's social network is rapidly banning users it doesn't like, without telling them why." And the site's terms of service state that they may ban users: "We reserve the right to, in our sole discretion and without notice or liability, deny access to and use of the service (including blocking certain IP addresses) to any person for any reason or for no reason." Of course, no one has a constitutional right to a Twitter or Truth account, and companies are allowed to do what they want, even if Donald Trump doesn't want you to believe that truth.

Karl Bode reports in Techdirt that antitrust and telecom experts warned that a Sprint and T-Mobile merger would result in layoffs and higher prices. Now that the merger is approved and the number of major U.S. wireless services has been reduced from four to three, employees are being laid off and consumers are paying higher prices as predicted. T-Mobile almost immediately laid off more than 5,000 employees after the merger was approved. Now, over the last few weeks, AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile have all raised costs to consumers. The telecoms are passing the price hikes off as "fees" and blaming them on everything except reduced competition. For instance, Verizon increased the “administrative charge” it places on millions of user wireless bills from $1.35 to $3.30. “To be clear, this is not a price plan increase for consumer lines,” a Verizon spokesperson told Fierce in a statement. “From time to time, we review and make adjustments to fees to defray some of Verizon’s administrative and telco expenses and costs of complying with regulatory requirements. To that end, Verizon Consumer will implement a change beginning in June.” AT&T also raised rates from $6 to $12 a month on different mobile service plans. T-Mobile also raised its upgrade and activation fees by $5. And if all three telecom services are raising rates, what is a poor customer to do? Change carriers? Read more about this story in Techdirt.

Andrew Jones reports for Space.com that astronomers have discovered a second persistently active fast radio burst. There have been about 500 fast radio bursts -- intense, brief flashes of radio-frequency emissions, lasting for milliseconds -- found since the phenomenon was discovered in 2007. But only two are associated with a persistent radio source, and this one is within the fringes of a dwarf galaxy nearly three billion light-years from Earth. What causes these highly energetic transmissions is a mystery. Astronomers guess that the average FRB releases as much energy in a millisecond as the Sun puts out in three days. Most use radio frequencies around 1400 MHz; while a few have been detected at lower frequencies in the range of 400–800 MHz. "The big surprise for me was realizing that the new FRB seems to be such a perfect 'twin' to an earlier discovery," Casey Law, an astronomer at Caltech. "Perhaps some would have preferred to say that the first such association [between an FRB and radio source] was a coincidence, because it was hard to explain. Now the second example shows that this is a real and critical part of the life of an FRB." Di Li, of the National Astronomical Observatories of China (NAOC) and lead of the Commensal Radio Astronomy FAST Survey which detected the latest fast radio burst, told Space.com via email. "I personally favor an evolutionary picture in that all sources repeat, but the activity level drops precipitously as the source ages. Since FRB 20190520B is only the second of around 500 known FRBs to have a so-called PRS counterpart and both are extremely active, they could, in this hypothetical evolutionary picture, represent FRBs' youth, which lasts not very long." Read more about this story at Space.com.

The Federal Communications Commission approved the renewal of the WGXC FM license to Wave Farm on May 25. The message from the FCC read, "This is to notify you that your Application for Renewal of License 0000182419, was granted on 05/25/2022 for a term expiring on 06/01/2030." This is the second time WGXC's license was renewed, after the station first went on the air on February, 2011. Wave Farm, the licensee for WGXC, is a non-profit arts organization that works with transmission artists from around the world. "Transmission" artists work with some part of the radio dial, including shortwave radio, baby monitors, webstreams, CB radios, and other broadcast forums.

Paul McLane reports for Radio World that broadcasters who use public airwaves to make their own money face 13 percent increases in fees in fiscal 2022 from the Federal Communications Commission. For-profit radio stations pay small fees to the FCC to pay for regulating the industry that makes millions of dollars selling advertising on the public's airwaves. A station that can reach six million listeners, for instance, will have to pay less than $24,000 in fees to keep minting millions from the public's airwaves. A small Class A station that reaches fewer than 25,000 listeners has to pay $1,105. “Unfortunately, the commission continues to unlawfully require broadcasters to subsidize the Commission’s broadband activities,” the National Association of Broadcasters said in a statement that stretches credulity. “For these local stations that are still recovering from the pandemic and face unique economic challenges in today’s media landscape, such an unjustified increase is devastating and risks undermining the unique locally-focused service that our communities rely upon. NAB stands ready and willing to work with the commission to ensure a fair and lawful payment regime.” Anyone with an opinion on FCC fees that “may promote or inhibit advances in diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility, as well the scope of the commission’s relevant legal authority,” can file comments in the FCC’s online system. In the Proceeding field, refer to MD Docket No. 22-223. Comments are due July 5, and replies July 18. Read more about this story at Radio World.

Scharon Harding reports for Ars Technica that New York's state legislature on June 3 passed the Digital Fair Repair Act, a bill requiring digital electronics manufacturers, such as laptop and smartphone manufacturers, to make diagnostic and repair information available. Consumers will be allowed to fix many radio-related items, or have them fixed at independent repair shops, instead of being forced to buy a new model or go without. Medical devices, home appliances, agricultural and off-road equipment, or public safety communications equipment is exempt from this bill, so John Deere tractors and dishwashers still can't be fixed by consumers in New York if Gov. Kathy Hochul signs the bill. "Nothing prevents third-party repairers from being technically competent to complete digital repairs other than the lack of information being withheld by manufacturers," the bill states. "In too many instances, repairs of digital items are intentionally limited by the manufacturer." New York Assemblymember Patricia Fahy said the bill would "help to reduce the 655,000 tons of toxic e-waste produced [and] typically discarded in a single calendar year here in New York state." A previous study from the U.S. Public Interest Group predicted that the average New York family would save around $330 per year and reduce electronic waste by 22 percent with the right to repair. Now right-to-repair advocates hope other bills like this one will be passed elsewhere. Read more about this story at Ars Technica.

Karl Bode reports in Techdirt that 5G streaming technology has barely been installed in the United States and the hype for 6G technology has already begun. First, the story reports that the rollout of 5G technology in the United States has been slower than elsewhere. And even when 5G has been built out in the U.S. it is "actually slower than existing 4G networks" often. On the plus side, there is no evidence that 5G causes cancer or COVID-19, as some conspiracy theorists claim. Bode writes, "it’s pretty clear that the technology is more of a modest evolution than a revolution, and 5G hype overkill (largely driven by a desperate desire to rekindle lagging smartphone sales) is a far cry from reality." So take that all into account as you listen to corporate shills hype the 6G technology coming in 2030. "By the time quantum computing is maturing for commercial applications, we’re going to be talking about 6G,” Nokia CEO Pekka Lundmark said. “By then, [2030], definitely the smartphone as we know it today will not anymore be the most common interface.” Read more about this story in Techdirt.

Inside Radio guesses at what will become this year's song of the summer, the song endlessly heard on radios at street parties, around pools, and on vacations. Currently, Harry Styles' “As It Was” and Lizzo's “About Damn Time” are the song's most likely to become the song of the summer of 2022, according to radio industry experts. But the 2022 song of the summer might come from a previous year, "As catalog music has shown an increase in streaming since COVID, accounting for 70 percent of listening according to Luminate, streaming of current titles has fallen another 3.5 percent in 2022 to date," the story reports. Two songs of last year's summer, Dua Lipa's “Levitating” and Olivia Rodrigo's “Good 4 U,” rank number 24 and number 29, respectively, on the current Mainstream Top 40 airplay chart. “A combination of older streamers tuning in, younger listeners discovering decades-old hits through the explosion of social-video platforms like TikTok, and listeners turning to familiar tunes for comfort during the pandemic lockdowns all led to a rise in such nostalgia listening,” The Wall Street Journal's Anne Steele writes. So Billboard's Gary Trust says, “It’s hard for any one song or one sound to dominate streaming like it used to be.” Read more about this story at Inside Radio.

Jon Brodkin reports at Ars Technica that on May 31 the U.S. Supreme Court over ruled a Texas law banning “censorship” on social media on a 5-4 vote. Amy Coney Barrett, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Brett Kavanaugh, and John Roberts voted to over turn the Texas law, while Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Neil Gorsuch dissented, and Elena Kagan voted against but did not sign on to Alito's dissent. The Texas law said, "social media platform may not censor a user" based on the user's "viewpoint" and defines "censor" as "block, ban, remove, deplatform, demonetize, de-boost, restrict, deny equal access or visibility to, or otherwise discriminate against expression." The law was largely created because Twitter banned former President Donald Trump. The Texas law, "would have been a disaster for social media users and for public discourse," said John Bergmayer, legal director for consumer advocacy group Public Knowledge. "It would have ordered social media platforms to host and distribute horrific and distasteful content, and to turn a blind eye to hate, abuse, and coordinated misinformation campaigns. The main result of these policies would not be to enhance free speech, but to keep people from speaking by driving them away from toxic platforms." Read more about this story at Ars Technica.

France 24 reports about civilians hiding in basement bomb shelters in besieged Ukrainian cities such as Lysychansk, where they rarely see the sun and mostly rely on the radio for information. And just what channel is tuned in makes all the difference. "The Russians on the radio just said that they have captured Bakhmut. Is that true?" Natalia Georgiyevna anxiously asked about a nearby city. "We do not really know anything," her neighbour Viktoria Viktorovna responds from a corner cot positioned just outside a beam of light that's the only brightness in the dank cellar. "I guess we still have the Ukrainians here, no?" she asks, as unidentified voices on the radio fade in and out. "The Russians are saying they are winning and the Ukrainians are saying they are," Natalia Georgiyevna said. "When we still had the internet, we could watch the news. But now... I have no idea who these voices are or where they come from."

Mike Masnick writes in TechDirt about how politicians are blaming words sent by radio waves for the multiple murders at schools, grocery stores, houses of worship and other so-called "soft" targets around the nation, rather than guns. For instance, Republican Georgia Senate candidate Herschel Walker said on Fox News last week that the solution to school shootings involves "a department that can look at young men that's looking at women that's looking at social media." Click here to play an excerpt of Walker's statement. Of course, Masnick points out, a government department that is looking into the speech of people also is taking away constitutional rights. Meanwhile, The Washington Post lists all the social media sites used by the recent mass shooters. "Both the Uvalde, Texas, shooter and the one in Buffalo, used a combination of disappearing video-app Snapchat, Instagram direct messages, chat-app Discord, and social-app Yubo to meet people and share their violent plans with acquaintances. In the case of the Buffalo shooting, the gunman also used video streaming platform Twitch to publicize his deadly attack," Masnick wrote. "It’s weird to blame the tools for the actual communications, but that always seems to be the focus." Read more about this story in TechDirt.

ProPublica takes a deep dive into the rollout of 5G wireless technology and how that affected airplanes. The Federal Aviation Administration objected to the Federal Communications Commission’s authorization of 5G networks near airports, but the story paints both agencies as incompetent industry toadies. There is no problem with the 5G technology, but with the altimeters of planes. They are often older, and not designed for our new digital world with more radio signals whizzing all around. The FAA was concerned that altimeters on planes, used in automated aircraft landings, would accidentally receive 5G radio signals, and not give pilots proper readings. Aviation experts warned of “catastrophic failures leading to multiple fatalities," the story says. In January, an agreement was struck, with Verizon and AT&T temporarily not turning on more than 600 5G transmission towers near the runways of 87 airports and reducing the power of others. ProPublica trace the entire story revealing "profound failures" at the FCC. On July 5 the temporary agreement expires, but aviation officials say it would take at two years to replace the older altimeters. "The rhetoric of the FCC chief is almost identical to that of the industry she regulates. As recently as last month, Jessica Rosenworcel, the Biden-appointed FCC chair, dismissed aviation concerns as, in effect, a shakedown — a ploy to get telecom companies to fund a nationwide upgrade of airplane equipment," the story says. Even if another agreement is struck in July, "T-Mobile and other wireless companies are approved to roll out additional 5G service at the end of 2023, using a C-band frequency even closer to the one used by the airplane safety equipment," ProPublica reports. “The wireless companies have made it very clear they’re not going to agree to an open-ended situation,” one FAA official told ProPublica. “They seem willing to go past July 5, as long as they know how far past. But they’re making clear their patience is not infinite.” Click here to read the entire ProPublica story.

Inside Radio reports that National Public Radio host Terry Gross won this year's Peabody Institutional Award. Gross started in radio in 1973 at public radio station WBFO in Buffalo. In 1975 she moved to WHYY in Philadelphia as producer and host of Fresh Air, which was then a local, daily interview and music program. In 1985, WHYY expanded a weekly half-hour edition of the show nationally by NPR. "Fresh Air" became a daily, one-hour in 1987. The show became the first non-drive time show in public radio history to reach more than five million listeners weekly in the fall of 2008. The video above includes Stephen Colbert introducing Gross for the award.

Jo Constantz claims at Bloomberg that New York City removed its last freestanding public pay phone from city sidewalks on May 23, moving it into the Museum of the City of New York exhibit, “Analog City.” The phone booths, at many locations, are being replaced with digital Wi-Fi kiosks. “Truly the end of an era but also, hopefully, the start of a new one with more equity in technology access,” Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine Tweeted. The digital kiosks include free phone-call capabilities, interactive maps, and USB charging stations. While New York City may be removing all of its pay phones, they are still on sidewalks elsewhere. Right on the sidewalk on N. 4th Street in Hudson across from the WGXC studio, there is a pay phone.

Matthew Rozsa reports at Salon that the radio signals that humans have sent the farthest distance may be having problems getting any further. On Sept. 5, 1977, NASA launched the Voyager 1 space probe, which has now traveled 14.5 billion miles away from Earth. Radio signals to and from the Voyager 1 now take 20 hours and 33 minutes to reach each other. Voyager 1 is so far away it has left our universe, and is now in the interstellar void of the Milky Way. But it is losing power, and the interstellar void seems to be creating havoc. "The interstellar explorer is operating normally, receiving and executing commands from Earth, along with gathering and returning science data," NASA said on its website. "But readouts from the probe's attitude articulation and control system (AACS) don't reflect what's actually happening onboard." Suzanne Dodd, project manager for Voyager 1 and 2 at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, explains further. "We're also in interstellar space – a high-radiation environment that no spacecraft have flown in before. So there are some big challenges for the engineering team. But I think if there's a way to solve this issue with the AACS, our team will find it." The Voyager 1 probe is so far into space that astronomers can now hear the "hum" that our solar system produces as the spacecraft travels outside of it. The hum is "interstellar gas," also known as plasma waves, "It's very faint and monotone, because it is in a narrow frequency bandwidth," said Stella Koch Ocker, a doctoral student in the Department of Astronomy and Cornell Center for Astrophysics and Planetary Science. "We're detecting the faint, persistent hum of interstellar gas." Scientists may keep hearing that hum through 2025, when the radioisotope thermoelectric generators will no longer have enough energy to keep transmitting. Read more about this story at Salon.

In the analog era of broadcasting, television stations transmitting on Channel 6 could also be heard on 87.7-FM. WRGB-TV in Albany, for instance, used to be heard on both Channel 6 television, and 87.7-FM, on radio receivers that could be tuned below 88. But since the full-power television stations switched to digital broadcasts, now all that is heard on FM there is static. In July 2021, all of the remaining analog low-power television stations, except 13, were required to convert to digital. That means there is just static on the dial, or pirate radio stations, on 87.7-FM around the country, except for 13 stations. That could change. The Broadcast Law Blog reports that the Federal Communications Commission has issued a draft Notice of Proposed Rulemaking for its June 8 open meeting on a proposal to authorize low-power TV stations operating Channel 6 to continue to provide an analog audio stream on FM radios at 87.7. The broadcast industry calls these stations "Franken-FMs," since they are both television and radio stations. More importantly, the FCC proposal also asks for comments about whether, with the elimination of most Channel 6 television stations broadcasting audio on 87.7-FM, the frequencies 82-88 MHz could be used for more radio stations in geographic areas where it is not currently used for TV services. So, in Albany, where you could once hear the audio from the Channel 6 TV station, a new FM radio station could possibly be broadcasting in a few years.

Current reports that in October last year South Dakota Public Broadcasting hired Stel Kline, who is transgender and uses they/them pronouns. They lasted at the radio network through April this year. “My position has been terminated despite being told there was nothing for me to improve on at a recent quarterly review,” Kline wrote April 18 on Twitter. “I was told the reasoning is that I am not objective and have a problem with authority." The working relationship did not begin well. An announcement of Kline's hiring in SDPB’s member magazine was to include the use of they/them pronouns and a reference to Kline’s drag name. But Current obtained an email from Fritz Miller, SDPB director of programming and communication, objecting to that. “I’m suggesting that we dump the ‘they’ pronouns and use their last name throughout the article,” Miller wrote. “… I understand and appreciate that Stel is comfortable with sharing that information, and is doing what they can to live their true self, but I fear that the more hate-mongering segment of our population will seize upon this stuff and make it the issue du jour.” Kline says, “Through this very first day on the job, it was just glaringly evident to me that personal bias clouds judgment in this workplace.” In January 2022 during a quarterly review, Cara Hetland, SDPB’s director of journalism content, told Kline that they had nothing to improve upon in their performance. But when Kline was fired, Hetland said their retweet of a Dec. 1, 2021, message by an NPR journalist was an example of inappropriate social media use. That Tweet was about a Supreme Court hearing about a Mississippi abortion law, that included a picture of a sign with text stating “women are not the only people who get abortions.” Previously Kline had been told to share their experiences as a trans person in South Dakota on social media. In another Tweet Kline wrote, “In my interview I was very clear that as a trans person I am unable to be impartial about attacks on my humanity. Objectivity is not a static identity, but when wielded as such becomes the language of those with the most power.... Declaring someone not objective is a selective practice used effectively to exclude POC / queer journos.” Read more about this story at Current.

Anyone who needs to know what time it is, and does not have a clock, or a watch, or any sort of computer, can still find out. The U.S. Naval Observatory still maintains a phone number, 202-762-1401, where anyone can call and hear the exact time. The Navy has several other time numbers, some just for modems. And Jock Elliott reports in the SWLing Blog that there are several shortwave radio stations also set up with only the time of day, repeating endlessly, as content. "The National Institute of Standards and Technology (part of the U.S. Department of Commerce) maintains a couple of stations devoted to broadcasting time announcements, standard time intervals, standard frequencies, UT1 time corrections, a BCD time code, and geophysical alerts 24 hours a day, 7 days a week," Elliott writes. WWV in Fort Collins, Colorado, is one station, radiating 10,000 watts on 5 MHz, 10 MHz, and 15 MHz; and 2500 watts on 2.5 MHz and 20 MHz. WWVH, based in Kekaha, Hawaii, transmits 10,000 watts on 10 MHz and 15 MHz, and 5000 watts on 2.5 MHz. "WWV uses a male voice; WWVH, a female voice. They are staggered in time so that they don’t talk over each other. While doing research for this blog, one afternoon on 5 MHz and 10 MHz, I could hear the female voice, followed by the male voice, so I was hearing both Hawaii and Colorado," Elliott writes. There is also a Canadian time station, CHU, transmitting 3000 watts on 3.33 and 14.67 MHz, and a 5000 watts on 7.85 MHz in English and French from Barrhaven, Ontario. And there is also a time station beaming from Moscow, Russia that transmits on 9996 and 14996 kHz. Read more about this story at the SWLing Post..