Twas the night before Christmas, and Radio World is debunking the Dec. 24, 1906 "Brant Rock Broadcast." "You may have read that 2006 marks the 100th anniversary of the first broadcast of speech and music," James O'Neal writes about the claim that Professor Reginald Aubrey Fessenden, "assembled a primitive AM radiotelephone transmitter and placed it on the air in the evening hours of Dec. 24 at his experimental communications station at Brant Rock, Mass. He transmitted music and speech on that occasion. Thus - the story went - he was the first ever to 'broadcast.'" O'Neal's lengthy story slowly erodes the contention one small fact at a time.

National Public Radio has an audio report by Saad Qasim, and Alex Chadwick about Sunni insurgents in Iraq running a 24-hour pirate television channel, called Al Zawraa. "The channel shows attacks on Americans and Shiites, as well as violence committed by Shiite militias," NPR says.

From Media Network weblog via Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union:

Afghanistan’s Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (ATRA) has acquired a new radio spectrum monitor to curb illegal radio usage in the country. Funded by the World Bank at a cost of U.S. $1 million, the country’s Minister of Communications Amirzai Sangin said the launching of the mobile spectrum station will allow Afghanistan to monitor illegal frequency users and operators, who are operating without permission from the ministry. The minister also said that the quality of broadcasting of local TV, radio stations and GSM frequencies in Afghanistan can also be monitored from the mobile spectrum station. “Thus, we will be able to enhance the quality of the broadcasting of these stations and help their broadcasting problems,” the minister added. According to ATRA officials, the station can monitor and control radio frequencies from 20 MHz [sic, presumably 20 kHz] to 3000 MHz. The station can also simultaneously monitor and evaluate the frequency and provide a real check or monitoring report of evaluation. (Source: Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union)

free103point9 AIRtime residency applications due April 1, 2007.

Do you, or would you like to, use the airwaves in your work?

Coined by free103point9, "Transmission Arts" is defined as a conceptual umbrella that unites a community of artists and audiences interested in transmission ideas and tools utilizing the electromagnetic spectrum for creative expression. Transmission practices harness, occupy and/or respond to the airwaves that surround us. There is an inherent "liveness" to this work. In a performance- based setting, audience members are newly engaged, becoming participants rather than passive viewers and listeners. Installation or sculptural transmission works are often dependant on the present, reacting to whatever occupies the surrounding frequencies in a single instance, or changing that information by adding new signals to the spectral environment.

The AIRtime workspace residency program at Wave Farm provides media artists with valuable space, physical and intellectual, to concentrate on new transmission works and conduct important research about the genre using free103point9's resource library and equipment holdings. free103point9's Study Center (see sketch, above) is under construction and will be partially functional during the 2007 residency season.

The AIRtime program serves artists by providing space for research and creation with technical support, and audiences through the presentation of works developed during AIRtime in conjunction with free103point9' s exhibition program PETS. Selected artists and projects are invited to install long-term outdoor installations as part of free103point9' s Transmission Sculpture Garden. The free103point9 Dispatch Series provides distribution for selected projects completed during AIRtime residencies. Artists-in-residence also interact with free103point9 Online Radio, presenting live on-air programming during their stay. free103point9 shares resources regarding preservation and archiving models with our residents. Artists are encouraged to archive recordings and other reproducible media with the free103point9 study collection.

Ten artists (or collectives) are selected from an open application each AIRtime season. Residency durations are flexible based on the schedules of participating artists, but typically last one week. The program is active July - October. Residents are provided with a stipend of $150. Meals are provided by free103point9 as well as local transportation for supplies. One resident is on-site at a time. Both program directors are available on site during the residencies for technical assistance and critical feedback.

Artists are required to archive completed works related to their residency with the study center research collections. A performance and exhibition program from works made during this residency period will be held at Wave Farm in Oct., 2007.

For a complete list of equipment, resources, and technical
support associated with the AIRtime residency program, see:
http://www.free103point9.org/airtime.php

To learn more about free103point9, go here:
http://www.free103point9.org/

To learn more about Wave Farm, go here:
http://www.free103point9.org/wavefarm. php

April 1, 2007 application deadline

free103point9 Online Radio
Tune in around the clock. www.free103point9.org
Transmission arts, creative radio, and more.

Packages: 5662 Route 23, Acra, NY 12405

By Tom Roe

Alas, another great radio station may be shutting down. Or turning off? Or you may be turning it off? Whatever, conservative students interested in playing the same 40 songs as all the other rock stations in town, want to excise all that is interesting and local about WRPI (91-5-FM, Troy, NY), the station on the campus of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. We are all for student control of student airwaves, but WRPI's large signal means the station owes the larger community something, and for a long time that meant letting students and faculty take the first show time slots, and letting members of the community fill in the rest, especially holidays when the school's campus is largely shut down. That's a smart system. RPI is a part of the Hudson Valley, and the community of the Hudson Valley should also be part of WRPI. Now, though, students are cutting news shows -- the rumour on the internets is that the 9 a.m. daily "Democracy Now!" will be shed soon -- in favor of an automation machine (!) playing the same 40 songs as all the other rock stations in town. New executive committee elections on Dec. 8 have some regular listeners and on-air talent nervous. How about let's keep a great diverse station the way it is? Write to WRPI Station Manager Gino D'Addario to let him know how important WRPI is to the entire community at wrpi-sm@rpi.edu. Or you can donate to Friends of WRPI, an advocacy group for "communiversity radio" to Friends of WRPI, PO Box 1656, Troy NY 12181.

Steve Pierce, president of the Friends of WRPI, wrote in a newsletter, “The community service/alternative programming philosophy that marked much of the last decade at WRPI (and perhaps much of its nearly 50 year history as a full power FM station) is now being challenged. Over the past two years, the on-campus awareness of the radio station’s importance to the community outside of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has eroded. While some students understand that WRPI is a 10,000-watt radio station reaching hundreds of thousands of people in three states and has an educational and non-commercial mission that extends far beyond the campus community, others don’t. . . . For years student leaders cultivated and supported a student/community partnership that produced a truly unique radio station. It is with deep regret that I note that partnership is in jeopardy now.”

From we make money not art:

The Ravezooka is a musical weapon that shoots powerful "hardcore" sounds based on your target's distance from the instrument. Squeezing the trigger handle initiates sound and a beam of light. As the user moves the Ravezooka around, the frequency range being played changes based on the distance of the person or object in front of the instrument. The closer the target, the lower the frequency range. The light emitted from the LED gives a visual clue as to what person or object is being targeted. Sliding the trigger handle back and forth modifies the distortion effect of the sound. The closer the handle is drawn towards the user, the greater the distortion. Volume is controlled by turning the potentiometer knob on the side of the Ravezooka. The sound of the Ravezooka is generated by MIDI data collected from the sensors and is played through a guitar or bass amplifier from the computer. The sound resembles an analog synthesizer manipulating sine wave frequencies with the aggressiveness of a machine gun. Developed by Lesley Flanigan and Benedetta Piantella Simeonidis. Check out the final version of project at the ITP Winter Show, on December 17 and 18, 721 Broadway at Waverly Place 4th Floor South Elevators, New York. Related works: Troika's Exploded monologues sends your voice on one or more of the four different speakers, each of them located approximately one meter from your mouth; Tomoaki Yanagisawa's Sonic Gun allows you to shoot sounds that you have previously recorded with the gun itself and send them to targets that play these sounds back and The Earworm Assault Devices, by Fur, enable you to distribute your own earworms, a piece of music (preferably irritating) that you hear and you can't forget anymore. Small pieces of sound or music can be recorded onto the devices and fired at single or multiple persons.

From the Federal Communications Commission:

Today, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) adopted a
Report and Order and Order on Reconsideration (Order) that modifies the rules for the Amateur Radio Service by revising the examination requirements for obtaining a General Class or Amateur Extra Class amateur radio operator license and revising the operating privileges for Technician Class licensees. In addition, the Order resolves a petition filed by the American Radio Relay League, Inc. (ARRL) for partial reconsideration of an FCC Order on amateur service rules released on October 10, 2006.

The current amateur service operator license structure contains three classes of amateur radio operator licenses: Technician Class, General Class, and Amateur Extra Class. General Class and Amateur Extra Class licensees are permitted to operate in Amateur bands below 30 MHz, while the introductory Technician Class licensees are only permitted to operate in bands above 30 MHz. Prior to today’s action, the FCC, in accordance with international radio regulations, required applicants for General Class and Amateur Extra Class operator licenses to pass a five words-per-minute Morse code examination. Today’s Order eliminates that
requirement for General and Amateur Extra licensees. This change reflects revisions to international radio regulations made at the International Telecommunication Union’s 2003 World Radio Conference (WRC-03), which authorized each country to determine whether to require that individuals demonstrate Morse code proficiency in order to qualify for an amateur
radio license with transmitting privileges on frequencies below 30 MHz. This change eliminates an unnecessary regulatory burden that may discourage current amateur radio operators from advancing their skills and participating more fully in the benefits of amateur radio.

Today’s Order also revises the operating privileges for Technician Class licensees by
eliminating a disparity in the operating privileges for the Technician Class and Technician Plus Class licensees. Technician Class licensees are authorized operating privileges on all amateur frequencies above 30 MHz. The Technician Plus Class license, which is an operator license class that existed prior the FCC’s simplification of the amateur license structure in 1999 and was grandfathered after that time, authorized operating privileges on all amateur frequencies above 30 MHz, as well as frequency segments in four HF bands (below 30 MHz) after the successful completion of a Morse code examination. With today’s elimination of the Morse code exam requirements, the FCC concluded that the disparity between the operating privileges of Technician Class licensees and Technician Plus Class licensees should not be retained. Therefore, the FCC, in today’s action, afforded Technician and Technician Plus licensees identical operating privileges.

Finally, today’s Order resolved a petition filed by the ARRL for partial reconsideration of an FCC Order released on October 10, 2006 (FCC 06-149). In this Order, the FCC authorized amateur stations to transmit voice communications on additional frequencies in certain amateur service bands, including the 75 meter (m) band, which is authorized only for certain wideband voice and image communications. The ARRL argued that the 75 m band should not have been expanded below 3635 kHz, in order to protect automatically controlled digital stations operating in the 3620-3635 kHz portion of the 80 m band. The FCC concluded that these stations can be protected by providing alternate spectrum in the 3585-3600 kHz frequency segment. Action by the Commission on December 15, 2006, by Report and Order and Order on Reconsideration. Chairman Martin and Commissioners Copps, Adelstein, Tate, and McDowell.

From Jonathan Marks in Broadcast & Podcast Gadgets:

I am currently looking at this piece of software as one possibile solution for a radio station in West Africa. One challenge with the Open-Source project like this is that the developers cannot offer a 24 hour service, like other guys do for Linux. But I have met the people behind this project and know them to be passionate about getting it right.

Community radio stations in Sierra Leone and in other emerging democracies will be powered by the latest release of the free and open source Campcaster software, which was released on December 7th 2006. Campcaster is free and open source software that turns a PC running the free Linux operating system into an essential tool for radio broadcasting. In a user-friendly way, it enables both automated broadcast at preset dates and times, as well as allowing “live” playout from the studio. At the same time, it also enables the exchange of radio program material both online and off-line, and provides a stable, secure, extensible archive server for storing, searching and retrieving program content.

Campcaster 1.1, code-named “Freetown,” was built with conditions in difficult environments such as Sierra Leone in mind. It provides very stable playout, and because it runs on Linux, there are fewer problems with viruses, spyware and malware.

Campcaster's relevance is not limited to the developing world: stations in the developed world are starting to adapt the system to their own needs. For example, Vienna, Austria's Radio Orange is adapting Campcaster's playout system to work with its existing digital archive, while in Hungary, a network of independent radio stations is integrating Campcaster's storage server into its IKRA project, a generic public website engine for radio stations.

Because all of the Campcaster software is free and open source, stations are free to adapt it to their individual needs, but are strongly encouraged to share their efforts with others.

“Campcaster provides features that used to be only available in extremely expensive commercial radio systems,” says Sava Tatić, Managing Director of the Media Development Loan Fund's Center for Advanced Media, Prague (CAMP), which coordinates the Campware Initiative. “We believe there is a strong north-south aspect to using and extending Campcaster,” Tatić added. “Every time a station in North America or Europe adapts and extends Campcaster, stations in places like Sierra Leone benefit.”

An international team of software developers, user interface designers, media activists and radio professionals have worked for more than 12 months on the 1.1 “Freetown” release. Campware representatives have coordinated their work with the Cornet community radio network on the software, and members of the development team will travel to Freetown, Sierra Leone later this month to provide training to partners implementing and servicing Campcaster locally.

Campcaster 1.1 “Freetown” is the latest release from the Media Development Loan Fund's Campware Initiative, which creates free and open source tools for independent media in emerging democracies. Initial funding for Campcaster has been provided by a grant from the Open Society Institute. The tools are all free and available for download at the Campware website at www.campware.org. Developers and technically-minded users can visit the developers' page at http://code.campware.org/projects/campcaster.

Douglas Arellanes Head of Research and Development on the project tells me that he and programmer Ferenc Gerlits are now in Freetown, Sierra Leone to install Campcaster at the Cornet network of community radio stations. They already have confirmation that a number of other stations have already begun installing and extending Campcaster, and they will regularly update the Campware site as we hear about new implementations.

Next on their release program (in addition to bugfix releases) is Campcaster 1.2, which is code-named "Kotor" because they are planning to implement it at Skala Radio in Kotor, Montenegro. The main feature will be integration with Campsite, which will allow stations to create and manage news broadcasts in an effective and user-friendly manner.

From AsiaMedia via Angelica Oung in Taipei Times:

Members of the Taiwan Defense Alliance demonstrate outside the office of the National Communications Commission yesterday, demanding that commission members resign because the group had been declared unconstitutional. Scores of pirate radio station operators protested vociferously against the National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday in a continuation of clashes that have simmered since June. Held back by rows of police in riot gear, angry protesters spat at pictures of commission members and burnt copies of the Constitution over what they said was the NCC's lack of legitimacy.

"The threshold that the NCC has set for licensed stations is NT$50 million [US$1.5 million] in assets and capital, which puts licensing totally out of reach of independent operators," said Tsai Chi-feng, a pirate radio station owner. "Local and non-mainstream Taiwanese voices are being silenced," Tsai said, adding that the crackdown was part of the NCC's "secret scheme to let the pro-China media monopolize the media market" in the country.

The commission has been cracking down hard on pirate stations, which are generally considered more sympathetic toward Taiwan independence. So far this year, the commission has shut down more than 500 such outfits, according to Hsu Ming-tse, the news liaison for the protesters. The commission itself was declared unconstitutional by the Council of Grand Justices in July because of the party-based nomination method for its members. However, the current members will serve until the end of their term in January 2008.

"They have no authority to shut us down when they have constitutional problems themselves," Hsu said. "We will be willing to work with the next group of commissioners, elected constitutionally, but not the current NCC," Hsu said.

The commission did not respond to the protest. An administrator who declined to be named told the Taipei Times that the commission did not meet with the protesters because the protesters did not submit their complaints in the proper manner. Despite the fact that stations are continually being shut down and their equipment confiscated, Tsai said station owners continue to play cat and mouse with the commission. "We will keep fighting ... we are regrouping and rebroadcasting as soon as soon as they shut us down," Tsai said. 12.15.06.

From Chicago Tribune via Media Network Weblog:

“After 20 years and more than $530 million, the Office of Cuba Broadcasting operates a radio station that by the U.S. government’s own estimates has suffered a precipitous drop in listenership and a television station that may never have been seen by anyone in Cuba for more than a few minutes at a time.” So writes Andrew Zajac, national correspondent for the Chicago Tribune.

Zajac continues “Cubans who manage to tune in to Radio or TV Martí hear or see programming that is sprinkled with vulgarity, presents one-sided programming as news, and omits stories critical of the Bush administration and Miami’s Cuban exile community, all in apparent violation of federal broadcast standards, according to recent U.S. government quality-control reviews of OCB offerings.”

In a Special Report (registration required), one of the longest and most detailed articles we have seen about Radio and TV Martí in the popular press, all aspects of the operation are looked at, and a fair amount of space is given to those defending the operation.

The Federal Communications Commission sent four warning letters about unlicensed use of radio transmission equipment to northern New Jersey microcasters in the past four weeks. Someone, apparently, called in two Jersey pirates on Nov. 4, and another on Nov. 8. On Nov. 29 the FCC sent a "Notice of Unlicensed Operation" to "Jain and Jain, Inc." operating on 102.3-FM from 214 Glenwood St. in East Orange. That same day they sent a nearly identical letter (except it says they learned about his operation on Nov. 8) to Perkin A. Diaz, who they contend was operating a station at 90.5-FM from 439 E. 32nd St. in Paterson. Then on Dec. 7, the FCC notified Manuel Carbajal (99.9-FM at 256 Clifton Ave., 2nd fl, in Newark) and Wayne Phillip (also on 102.3-FM at the same address in East Orange of "Jain and Jain, Inc."). So three stations in four weeks have been reported, observed, and sent letters from the FCC's New York City office.

Sri Lanka Community Radio Organization will begin a web site (100years0fradio.org) on "100 Years of Radio" from Dec. 24, 2006 through Dec. 23, 2007 with the theme "Free Air Waves." They are looking for articles and programs. Send before Dec. 20, 2006 to: Niranjan udumalagala, General Secretary, Sri Lanka Community Radio Organization, sl community radio movement srilankacomradio@yahoo.com

The Fourth Annual NYC Grassroots Media Conference is coming Saturday, February 24th, 2007. We’re now accepting workshop proposals, artwork and films, advertisements, table exhibition reservations and more.

To submit a workshop proposal visit: www.nycgrassrootsmedia.org/proposal
To submit your artwork or film visit: www.nycgrassrootsmedia.org/art
To reserve an ad in the conference program visit: www.nycgrassrootsmedia.org/ads
To reserve a table to promote your organization in the exhibition area visit: www.nycgrassrootsmedia.org/table

This year, the NYC Grassroots Media Conference seeks to ask: What are the common threads inherent in our global struggles for social change and how does media contribute to our understanding of the root causes of injustice faced by world communities? From educating ourselves and our government leaders to spreading our messages and recruiting broader and more diverse constituencies into our campaigns, media is central to the struggle for social justice. Therefore, the fight for better access to and representation in the media is essential for advancing peace and justice both at home and abroad.

Join us for the 4th annual NYC Grassroots Media Conference as we explore these connections and strategies, and come together to demand a media system that will link our diverse communities, connect local and international struggles, and fight for social justice across boundaries and beyond borders. In addition to a full day of workshops and networking sessions there will be a political art installation and full day film festival and an exhibition room featuring displays by local organizations.

More than 200 local organizations and over 3,000 people have already participated in NYC Grassroots Media Coalition events. The conference offers anideal opportunity for presenting organizations and activists to reach out and gain visibility among the many conference attendees and the slew of participating organizations, and to network, make connections and form the basis for future partnerships. Information about how to submit proposals, art and film, purchase ads, reserve tables and register for the conference is available at www.nycgrassrootsmedia.org.

Call for Papers (submission deadline: Jan. 5, 2007)

Our understanding of the technical and social processes by which culture is made and reproduced is being challenged and enlarged by digital technologies. An emerging generation of media producers is sampling and remixing existing materials as core ingredients in their own work. Networked culture is enabling both small and large collaborations among artists who may never encounter each other face to face. Readers are actively reshaping media content as they personalize it for their own use or customize it for the needs of grassroots and online communities. Bloggers are appropriating and recontextualizing news stories; fans are rewriting stories from popular culture; and rappers and techno artists are sampling and remixing sounds.

These and related cultural practices have generated heated contention and debate. What constitutes fair use of another's intellectual property? What ethical issues are posed when sounds, images, and stories move from one culture or subculture to another? Or when materials created by a community or religious or ethnic tradition are appropriated by technologically powerful outsiders? What constitutes creativity and originality in expressive formats based on sampling and remixing? What obligations do artists owe to those who have inspired and informed their work and how much creative freedom should they exercise over their borrowed or shared materials?

One source of answers to such questions lies in the past – in the ways in which traditional printed texts – and films and TV shows as well – invoke, allude to and define themselves against their rivals and ancestors; and – perhaps even more saliently – in the ways in which folk and popular cultures may nourish and reward not originality in our modern sense, but familiarity, repetition, borrowing, collaboration.

This fifth Media in Transition conference, then, aims to generate a conversation that compares historical forms of cultural expression with contemporary media practices. We hope this event will appeal widely across disciplines and scholarly and professional boundaries. For example, we hope this conference will bring together such figures as:
• anthropologists of oral and folk cultures
• historians of the book and reading publics
• political scientists and legal scholars interested in alternative approaches to intellectual property
• media educators who aim to help students think about their ethical responsibilities in this new participatory culture
• artists ready to discuss appropriation and collaboration in their own work
• economists and business leaders interested in the new relationships that are emerging between media producers and consumers
• activists and netizens interested in the ways new technologies democratize who has the right to be an author

Among topics the conference might explore:
• history of authorship and copyright
• folk practices in traditional and contemporary society
• appropriating materials from other cultures: political and ethical dilemmas
• poetics and politics of fan culture
• blogging, podcasting, and collective intelligence
• media literacy and the ethics of participatory culture
• artistic collaboration and cultural production, past and present
• fair use and intellectual property
• sampling and remixing in popular music
• cultural production in traditional and developing societies
• Web 2.0 and the "architecture of participation"
• creative industries and user-generated content
• parody, spoofs, and mash-ups as critical commentary
• game mods and machinima
• the workings of genre in different media systems
• law and technological change

Short abstracts of no more than 200 words for papers or panels should be sent via email to Brad Seawell at seawell@mit.edu no later than January 5, 2007 . Brad can be reached by phone at 617-253-3521. Email submissions are preferred, but abstracts can be mailed to:
Brad Seawell
14N-430
MIT
Cambridge , MA 02139
Please include a short (75 words or less) biographical statement.
This will be our fifth media in transition conference. The previous conferences were the inaugural Media in Transiton conference, MiT2: globalization and convergence , MiT3: television and MiT4: the work of stories.

From Frederick Joyce in Internet Business Law Services:

Dec. 13, 2006 -- The Federal Communications Commission recently released an order in response to a petition for declaratory ruling filed by Continental Airlines that may be of interest to anyone that owns, leases or rents commercial or residential property. Continental Airlines had asked the FCC to preempt the Massachusetts Port Authority from shutting down Continental's WiFi network in its frequent flier lounge. MassPort had contracted with a vendor for WiFi services throughout the airport, and informed Continental that it was in breach of its airport lease which prohibited private WiFi networks. MassPort raised various arguments in opposition to Continental's petition, including the potential for interference that Continental's WiFi hub could cause to the larger airport network. Perhaps more to the point, MassPort shared revenue with its exclusive vendor arrangement; that arrangement would obviously be at risk if airport tenants opted to install their own WiFi networks.

On virtually all legal and factual points the FCC sided with Continental. The FCC reminded everyone that WiFi is an unlicensed service; hence, in actuality no WiFi operator is entitled to protection against harmful interference from other WiFi operations. And, the FCC cited longstanding rules and statutory authorities that allow tenants, under certain circumstances, to install and operate their own small antennas for certain categories of service. Those rules originally applied to video services (such as satellite TV antennas); by this decision, the FCC for the first time said that WiFi hubs/antennas are also covered under its rules. Consequently, notwithstanding contract terms to the contrary, the FCC has ruled that tenants are allowed to
install their own WiFi networks within their own leased space. By comparison, the FCC's rules would not apply if someone were to install a WiFi booth in the hallways of an airport. Continental's rights derived from the fact that it was a rent-paying tenant, and its WiFi hub was confined within its leased lounge space. The significance of this ruling extends well beyond airlines and airports. The ruling will certainly apply to all public and quasi-public spaces such as convention centers, sporting arena/stadiums, shopping malls, multiple tenant commercial and residential buildings, train and bus stations. Continental presumably didn't pursue this issue for several years only to prove a point; WiFi subscription fees, and the marketing potential of tailored WiFi offerings, can amount to serious dollars for landlords and tenants. In the coming months, landlords and tenants are likely to inspect the fine print in their lease agreements to assess the impact of the FCC's decision to expand tenants' rights with respect to privately installed and maintained WiFi networks.

Several audio sources are available in the past week to hear what's up about the current state of microradio in the U.S. First, Reclaim the Media organized the Northwest Community Radio Summit a few weeks back, with a workshop called "The Case for Free Radio in the 21st Century." Listen to the hour-long discussion here hosted by members of the Free Radio Olympia collective. Then click here to hear John Anderson from DIYmedia.net on mediageek, tracking current FCC enforcement. "The FCC stats look like the commission has been stepping up enforcement on pirate broadcasters, but under the surface it looks like there are even more stations and that enforcement action is not all that it seems," Mediageek reports. There's also "The PiratesWeek Podcast" with reports this week on pirate shortwave stations WHYP, M.A.C. and a UNID, and other illicit broadcasting reports.

free103point9 Dispatch Series subscribers just received copies of The Dust Dive Flash's Tens of Thousands CD. Largely a solo effort, as all songs were written and performed by Laura Ortman (violin, vocals, electric guitar, piano, chord organ, Casio). Ortman got a little help too from producer Martin Bisi (Sonic Youth, John Zorn, Swans, others), and photographer (see cover, above) and fellow Dust Diver Bryan Zimmerman. You can listen to an mp3 of "Gone and Placed to the Land" from Tens of Thousands here, and buy a copy for $8 here.

From Media Network weblog:

The Times reports that the Russians are suspected of involvement in the disruption of the BBC’s Russian Service FM broadcasts in Moscow and St Petersburg, at the height of coverage of the poisoning in London of former Russian security agent Alexander Litvinenko. The FM transmitter that carries the 4-hour daily broadcast in St Petersburg was off the air from 13 November to 1 December. During this period the poison story broke, Litvinenko died and, in a final statement, accused Mr Putin of his murder.

In Moscow the FM broadcasts went off air on 24 November, the day after Litvinenko’s death, and have not resumed since. Sarah Gibson, the head of the BBC Russian Service, told The Times that this was the first time that the FM transmissions had been stopped. She said that the Russians had blamed “technical difficulties” for the suspension. The service is still broadcast on shortwave and mediumwave, but the FM transmission is the most accessible in the Russian capital, where most of the one million Russian Service listeners live.

A member of the Russian Service said that the 40 Russian journalists working for the BBC in Moscow were fearful for their safety if the Litvinenko story continued to dominate the headlines.

"The service is still broadcast on short wave and [local] medium wave, although the FM transmission is the most accessible in the Russian capital, where most of the one million Russian Service listeners live. A member of the Russian Service said that staff suspected that the broadcasts were taken off air to stop Muscovites hearing allegations that Russian security services were linked to the Litvinenko killing. The staff member added that the 40 Russian journalists working for the BBC in Moscow were fearful for their safety if the Litvinenko story continued to dominate the headlines." Times Online, 9 December 2006

From CMedford at Red Herring:

Neither television nor the movies could do it, but regulators in the United Kingdom are considering the end of AM and FM radio on the grounds that they have both outlived their usefulness, and digital services could make better use of the spectrum occupied by both bands. Ofcom, the U.K.’s communications regulator, published a statement that said many of the AM and FM licenses are up for renewal and an automatic renewal could tie up very valuable slices of spectrum for 24 years, so the time is right for a long-term decision....By making a decision on the future of analog commercial radio now, the U.K regulator argues, it will have more flexibility in the use of the VHF Band II spectrum currently occupied by FM radio. Ofcom believes that the spectrum would be put to better use if it were allotted to emerging services such as mobile TV and more digital radio and data services.

“FM radio re-uses a limited number of frequencies in a patchwork across the U.K. to deliver around 300 local BBC and commercial services and five UK-wide networks,” said the Ofcom statement. “Any alternative uses for those frequencies would require large chunks of that spectrum to be freed-up simultaneously—something a rolling re-licensing process does not allow for,” the statement continued.

From Boing Boing:

A Platform for RFID Security and Privacy Administration is a paper by Melanie R. Rieback and Georgi N. Gaydadjiev that won the award for Best Paper at the USENIX LISA (Large Installation Systems Administration) conference today. It proposes a "firewall for RFID tags" -- a device that sits on your person and jams the signals from all your personal wireless tags (transit passes, etc), then selectively impersonates them according to rules you set. Your contactless transit card will only send its signal when you authorize it, not when some jerk with an RFID scanner snipes it as you walk down the street. The implementation details are both ingenious and plausible -- it's a remarkable piece of work. Up until now, the standard answer to privacy concerns with RFIDs is to just kill them -- put your new US Passport in a microwave for a few minutes to nuke the chip. But with an RFID firewall, it might be possible to reap the benefits of RFID without the cost. This is a must-read paper for anyone who cares about electronic privacy and who wants to catch a glimpse of the future.

Tag Spoofing Demystified

RFID readers produce an electromagnetic field that powers up RFID tags, and provides them with a reference signal (e.g. 13.56 MHz) that they can use for internal timing purposes. Once an RFID tag decodes a query from an RFID reader (using its internal circuitry), it encodes its response by turning on and off a resistor in synchronization with the reader’s clock signal. This so-called “load modulation” of the carrier signal results in two sidebands, which are tiny peaks of radio energy, just higher and lower than the carrier frequency. Tag response information is transmitted solely in these sidebands2, rather than in the carrier signal. Figure 5 (from the RFID Handbook[6]) illustrates how these sidebands look, in relation to the reader-generated carrier frequency. The comparatively tiny sidebands have approximately 90 decibels less power than the reader-generated carrier signal, and this is the reason why RFID tag responses often have such a limited transmission range.

The secret to creating fake tag responses is to generate the two sideband frequencies, and use them to send back properly-encoded responses, that are synchronized with the RFID reader’s clock signal. The simplest way to generate these sidebands is to imitate an RFID tag, by turning on and off a load resistor with the correct timing. The disadvantage of this approach is that passive modulation of the reader signal will saddle our fake tag response with identical range limitations as real RFID tags (˜10 cm for our test setup).