A report from a committee of advisers to struggling community radio station KUSP in Santa Cruz, California, offers an updated overview of the signal’s financial situation. “There has been a focus in the public discussions on the NPR cost, with the mistaken assumption that the cost of NPR programs was the primary contributor to the […]
Archive | Community Radio
LPFM Watch: LPFMs up 12% in Q2 of 2015; KZAP Returns as LPFM
No new low-power FM construction permits were issued this past week, which, of course, had a holiday weekend probably slowing down the works. However, the FCC did release its quarterly count of broadcast stations in the US. Not surprisingly–especially if you keep up with LPFM Watch–the radio service with the biggest increase in the second […]
FCC’s Quarterly Station Count: Radio is Still Growing, Particularly LPFM
Today, the FCC released its quarterly list of the total number of licensed broadcast stations. As we’ve seen in recent years, the number of licensed stations continues to grow, with the current grand total at 15,455 licensed full power radio stations as of June 30, 2015. The biggest increase this quarter is in the number […]
“Madroids” take to New Mexico’s airwaves
Low Power FM station Madrid Community Radio is on the air. We posted about the Madrid, New Mexico station some months ago and now it has gotten a write up from the Santa Fe Reporter. Author Benjamin Yeager says he can pick up K96.9 all the way from Santa Fe. It broadcasts from the lower depths of […]
Zambia to community radio: you are on your own
When it comes to funding community radio stations, Zambia’s Minister of Information and Broadcasting Services can only offer some friendly advice: good luck with all that. “Let me make it very clear that it will not be possible for Government to fund community radio stations,” the Zambia Daily Mail quotes Chishimba Kambwili as saying. “Already we […]
Report: London is pirate radio heaven (or hell, depending on your viewpoint)
The United Kingdom is so famous for its pirate radio stations that Hollywood made a movie about one. But as always the government is quite dour about these unlicensed signals, and has shut 400 of them down recently, according to a newspaper report. The London Evening Standard says that a quarter of the crackdowns over […]
LPFM Watch: The Six Segments of LPFM + More Community Radio in Seattle
I just noticed a great piece on REC Networks, “The Six Segments of LPFM,” which outlines the wide array of groups that hold licenses for low power FM (LFPM) radio stations. As we’ve been following the growth of LPFM, particularly after the 2013 application window, I have been interested to learn more about stations in […]
KUSP’s day of decision; Devizes radio is 20; more community radio for SE England
Community radio station KUSP-FM in Santa Cruz, California has posted the date for its next Board of Directors meeting: July 13 at the Aptos Community Foundation building at 6 PM. I presume that it is at that meeting or soon following that the Board will decide what kind of format to adopt for the station. “It […]
Botswana debates whether community radio encourages “tribalism”
An advisory group to the Parliament of Botswana has unanimously endorsed the establishment of community radio stations in that southern African country to “mitigate communication breakdown between Dikgosi and their communities.” Dikgosi is the plural for Kgosi, a Setswana word for tribal chief. The problem, as the advisory board Ntlo ya Dikgosi sees it, is that […]
LPFM Watch: Big Competition in LA Still Unresolved; The 250 Watt Battle
No new construction permits for low-power FM stations were issued this week, as the FCC tackles the remaining 7% of applications left to be processed. Amongst those are several MX groups of applicants competing for a single frequency. Southern California is home to two of these groups, with the one in Los Angeles being particularly […]