In my weekly course session, I discussed a dilemma. Our options for local, community focused radio seem to be either or. Either we have great community programming that no one listens to, for lack of time and money. Or we have crappy commercial radio that everyone listens to, thanks to plenty of time and money being available at a commercial enterprise.
There is however, another option, and I have seen it. I WAS IMPRESSED!
I used to write Business Plans for a living. If someone wanted a small business loan, they would hire me to write their plan for them. The plan would be in my customer's head, and my job was to interview him or her and document their business strategy, as part of documenting the loan.
Which brings me to community radio. I was hired once by an immigrant who was relatively new to the states. His primary business was a retail store that catered to the local population from his country of origin. His side business, however, was to operate an unlicensed radio station. The local broadcast was very popular with the local population. He provided them important information that no one else would consider relevant, for free. It was commercial in the sense that advertisers paid him (well below market rates), and that was how he funded the site.
This is, of course, completely illegal. The FCC routinely caught up with him and shut him down. But he would simply wait a short time, then set up on a different frequency, and go right back into business.
Common sense dictates this is not a viable solution to community radio broadcasts being made available to low income immigrant communities. If everyone did it, where would we be? But I can't help admiring his entrepreneurial spirit and fearless disregard for FCC jail, or whatever the FCC does to broadcast miscreants.
I do believe it was the legendary economist Milton Freidman who said: America's strength lies in the ability of everyday Americans to ignore the government and break the law... or something to that effect.
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