h ijacking the airwaves: an introduction to pirate and free radio

1. hijacking the airwaves: an introduction to pirate and free radio

2. there are many kinds of do-it-yourself (d.i.y.) radio. some of the names d.i.y. radio has gone by are: pirate radio, free radio, clandestine radio, micro-radio, micro-power or low-fi broadcasting and amateur radio. sometimes these names are used interchangeably but each has its own connotations and history.

3. one of the aspects common to all forms of d.i.y. radio is a desire for free communication and freedom of speech and information

4. ‘the point the organizers of the popular free radio stations particularly emphasize is that the totality of technical and human means must permit the establishment of a veritable feedback system between the listeners and the broadcast team: whether through direct intervention by phone, through opening studio doors, through interviews or making programs on cassettes by listeners, etc’ - felixguattari ‘popular free radio’

5. ‘guattari stressed the radically different function of free radio from conventional mass media. His notion of 'transmission transversal' suggests that, unlike conventional radio, free radio does not impose programs on a mass audience whose numbers have been forecast, but freely comes across to a 'molecular' public, so that it changes the nature of communication between those who speak and those who listen. The service area should be relatively small, because free radio does not broadcast (scatter) information but communicates (co-unites) messages to a concrete audience. In order to overthrow the passivity of the audience, Hans Magnus Enzensberger has noted that radio receivers could easily be transformed into transmitters. However, the problem is not only with the technology but also with the culture of both receiving and transmitting. Nothing would change if radio receivers were only technologically transformed into new broadcasters. The concept of receiving and transmitting itself must be changed’ - tetsuokogawa‘free radio in japan: the mini fm boom’

8. ‘We have received a telephone call from the Technological Institute: "We have occupied the president's office and we are calling from his phone, listen how he yells... He wanted to impose upon us a vote by a show of hands and then he'd shove it up our ass." It's better that way. The discourse of order's desire for power or the power of desire against the order of discourse. Radio for the participants or radio for the uncanny? In the first case the language is univocal: the announcer's, who announces that the event has happened. They talk about something which means something else and can therefore never be captured because it is over. A mirror. In this sense, attempts at imitation are pathetically ridiculous: dialects and accents are not tolerated. In the second case something continues to flee from language. This is manifest in outbursts of laughter, words in suspension. the word which cannot be found and which refuses to change into another one. stam mering, silence. Well, "let's talk about the uncanny." Well, "let's talk about the uncanny." One cannot pass from one discourse to another (from inside Italian Radio to outside Italian Radio). The subject changes? The new subject is collective and does not speak. Or speaks when it wants to. Silence: a hole. Let's allow holes to grow, let's not fear orifices, let's fall into them and pass on elsewhere. Wonderland. Another direct phone call: "We are workers on strike, we want you to play some music and we want to talk to you about the 35 hour week, it's time they talked about that in contracts." Another direct phone call: "Dirty communists. we're going to make you pay dearly for this radio station, we know who you are. Another direct one: "We are from the anti-fascist committee of the Rizzoli Hospital, don't worry about anything, and call us if something happens, we are here night and day." Break the cycle of the valorization of capital in the process of circulation of the sign-value (no more appropriation of merchandise to interrupt the A-M-A'.cycle, but a savage strike in the circulation of the single sign-value A-A'). Interrupt the language of machines. of the work-ethic, of productivity. An invitation not to get up this morning, to stay in bed with someone, to make musical instruments and war devices for yourself' - collective a/traverso‘radio alice – free radio’

10. ‘i’m calling for every kid to seize the air. steal it, it belongs to you. speak out, they can’t stop you. find your voice and use it. keep this thing going. pick a name, go on the air. it’s your life, take charge of it. do it, try it, try anything. spill your guts out, say ‘shit’ and ‘fuck’ a million times if you want to, but you decide. fill the air, steal it. keep the air alive’ - happy harry hard-on ‘pump up the volume’