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Announcement :: Media |
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KBFR silenced at last by FCC |
Current rating: 0 |
by uh-nawn
(No verified email address) |
03 Feb 2005
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Facing a government keelhaul, the voices behind Boulder's pirate radio station have signed off β for good, this time. |
Operators: KBFR, Boulder's pirate station, 'gone for good'
By Matt Sebastian, Camera Music Writer
February 3, 2005
Facing a government keelhaul, the voices behind Boulder's pirate radio station have signed off β for good, this time.
Operators of KBFR (95.3 FM) silenced their illegal frequency last month after Federal Communications Commission agents conducted another raid on the station, which had been beaming out tunes from a mobile broadcast studio since early 2001.
The bust wasn't the first for KBFR's anonymous DJs, who've killed their broadcasts temporarily following past run-ins with the FCC, and even conducted a full-blown housecleaning last summer after receiving too many complaints about on-air profanity.
This time, though, the static emanating from 95.3 is permanent.
"We're gone for good," Monk, the station's pseudonymous director, said in an e-mail Wednesday. "When the government decides they want to'get' you at all costs, there's little you can do to win. ... Welcome to fascist America."
Neither Monk nor others associated with the station β dubbed "Boulder Free Radio" β would discuss the January raid.
Similarly, Denver-based FCC field agent Jon Sprague declined to comment on his investigation of KBFR.
"We don't have anything to say because it's an open issue," said Janice Wise, FCC spokeswoman.
Monk launched the free-form FM station four years ago, and has been pursued by the FCC ever since. Federal agents located KBFR's fixed antenna β which amplified the signal beamed from its broadcast van β several different times over the past few years, while volunteers working with the station have been threatened with thousands of dollars in fines and a year in prison.
"We've even had the FCC guys walk in here and say, 'We know you know the guys at 'BFR," said Elaine Erb, music director at Boulder's KGNU (88.5 FM). "It's kind of a weird position for us to be in, because we're such strong believers in the idea that having more voices on the air is a good thing. But, still, I don't know who's behind it β and I don't want to know."
Now all that's left is KBFR's Web site, www.kbfr.org, adorned with a tombstone that carries this epitaph: "Here lies KBFR. RIP."
http://www.dailycamera.com/bdc/county_news/article/0,1713,BDC_2423_3519443,00.html |
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