Tuesday, July 5, 2011

New York Radio Regulation Pirate Bill Runs Afoul Of FCC Part 15 Rules

John Poet tells us about this ominous threat to unlicensed FCC Part 15 rules.

In all of this, one cannot help but smell the foul odor of big broadcasting companies such as WNBC, ABC, CNN, and others trying to silence everyone but their own interests. FCC rules always have and always will take precedence, even if New York has to learn the hard way about how radio communications laws actually work and who actually has sole authority over radio and TV communications.

Plenty of case law is out here to trump New York in an embarrassing manner. Are there are communications attorneys out here who would like to take a shot at a Federal lawsuit before this bill imprisons innocent people using FRS, CB, and local low power broadcast systems? Radio amateurs with proper licensing are also in the cross hairs of this legislation because none of these radio communications are mentioned in the bill!!! John makes a good point when he states that police and prosecutors have no way of differentiating between pirate radio and FCC allowed FM and AM operations with or without a license.

One mistake Shortwave America can see coming is that properly licensed radio operations can be legally pursued because an amateur radio license does not allow broadcasting and none of the city attorneys, state prosecutors, or police are trained to know the difference between a one way broadcast and a two way radio conversation regardless of whether the station is required to be licensed by the FCC or not.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

They should just leave the guys with eye patches alone. It seems the man is always trying to steal a brother's thunder. Tom, AB9NZ http://radiotelegrapher.posterous.com/