Are there ever any west coast pirates?

[Robot Matrix]

Move this to the appropriate thread if need be... but it seems I never hear pirates after a certain time of night. While it's 11:30pm here,  it's 9:30pm in CA and all the pacific time zone. Seems pretty rare to hear pirates after a certain time of night,  which leads me to belive most of them are in the eastern time zone. Am I wrong? It's not like they tell you where they are,  understandably. Just curious. Thoughts?

[Treehouse SWL]

B-Side Radio seems to be somewhere closer to out West here, as he comes in directly very well to my location near Seattle. X-FM also comes in often when it's on the air a few times a year, and the weird religious pirate YHWH broadcasts out of the desert somewhere in California and can be heard up here much of the time. There are a handful of other West Coast pirates on occasion.

That said, even those pirates don't usually go beyond 8 or 9 p.m. PST most of the time. Maybe pirates just aren't night owls?

[Zoidberg]

Yup, I can think of two or three who were active more than a decade ago. I received a QSL from one.

No idea whether they're still active.

[ChrisSmolinski]

B Side Radio and Boat Anchor Radio both have a west coast "feel" to their reception.  It's not just their signal strength, which is of course generally low here in Maryland, but also propagation effects (fading, etc.) overall that just give stations from the west coast a certain sound overall. Difficult for me to describe.

There's definitely an east coast bias to shortwave pirate radio activity. As a famous pirate radio blogger once said, you can draw a 500 mile radius circle around Pittsburgh and enclose most US shortwave pirates.

I suspect the relative lack of west coast activity vs out east is a negative feedback loop of sorts. Fewer pirates means fewer listeners which means fewer pirates...

[Charlie_Dont_Surf]

There's definitely an east coast bias to shortwave pirate radio activity. As a famous pirate radio blogger once said, you can draw a 500 mile radius circle around Pittsburgh and enclose most US shortwave pirates.

Those of us out this way are keenly aware of that, hence there is some SDR usage.

I suspect the relative lack of west coast activity vs out east is a negative feedback loop of sorts. Fewer pirates means fewer listeners which means fewer pirates...

I've thought the same thing for a long time. I think that has been the status quo ever since I got involved in radio decades ago.

I remember a station calling itself "KCFR California Free Radio" in the early 80s. I have no idea if they were actually in California but I remember that they were on the air very late night/early morning east-coast time.

[Ct Yankee]

From 2012-2022, I went out to see my son in the SF Bay Area, at least annually, for 2-10 weeks at a time - always bringing a very good portable with me.  I totaled 9 months in the Bay during the decade (there every month of the year but November and December).  I was only able to pick up 2 pirates direct in all that time, Wolverine Radio and X-FM (non-relay).

I always pondered whether being in Silicon Valley encouraged broadcasters to be more frequent users of the web - over air in the east, streaming in the west. 🤷

[ThaDood]

SW and AM seem more of an East Coast thang, where as FM pirating seemed to be all the rage on the West Coast. (Berkeley Liberation Radio and Free Radio Santa Cruz being two of the more famous examples.) I've also heard of various stories of AM Band pirates in the 1950's and 60's out there as well. Shortwave pirating??? Not so much of a clique out there. Just my $0.02 worth, while we still have pennies.

[Charlie_Dont_Surf]

Wolverine and X-FM have relatively good coverage so if you were going to hear something, it might very well be them.

I always pondered whether being in Silicon Valley encouraged broadcasters to be more frequent users of the web - over air in the east, streaming in the west. 🤷

It's ironic but a running joke in Silicon Valley is that home internet service can be quite poor compared to other areas of the US. I've only experienced this a little myself but the number of times that I have been on a Zoom, Microsoft Teams or Skype meeting where someone (or several people) in SV had connection issues is notable.

[Charlie_Dont_Surf]

SW and AM seem more of an East Coast thang, where as FM pirating seemed to be all the rage on the West Coast. (Berkeley Liberation Radio and Free Radio Santa Cruz being two of the more famous examples.) I've also heard of various stories of AM Band pirates in the 1950's and 60's out there as well. Shortwave pirating??? Not so much of a clique out there.

Yeah, I think that's fair.

It's interesting to me that the FCC action against FM pirates focus on Boston, NYC and Miami, primarily. To be fair, those areas are where the legal station owners get all up in arms about pirates so there is that pressure and if I were the FCC I would focus there too, but I'm certain there must be some FM pirating going on in LA and surroundings. (There certainly is in the Bay Area.) The density of pirate activity is likely not what there is in NYC but not zero either.

[radioartisan]

It's interesting to me that the FCC action against FM pirates focus on Boston, NYC and Miami, primarily

I think it's a case of picking the low-hanging fruit.  As you mentioned, licensed station owners are the most up in arms in these markets, but they're also congested markets and the busts seem to be mostly neighborhood Latino stations.  Arguably the pirate operations are answering some sort of community need as these stations often operate everyday for hours, have websites, and are rather open with their operations.  The PIRATE act was mostly for the FCC to look tough and look like some sort of profit center with revenue from fines, a subterfuge while screwing over Americans in other areas like net neutrality and cow-towing to commercial interests.  I don't expect this to slow down during this administration unless DOGE accidentally fires all of the enforcement employees before someone clues them in about the Latino station pirate busts, which actually is quite ideologically compatible with the anti-diversity, equity, and inclusion mission of Chairman Carr.

[Charlie_Dont_Surf]

I think it's a case of picking the low-hanging fruit. 

It certainly is. That's where most of them are and where most of the complaints are so, it's logical.

They exist in those cities because there is a feeling that their communities are under served.  It will be interesting to see what happens over the coming months.

[Ct Yankee]

I think it's a case of picking the low-hanging fruit.  As you mentioned, licensed station owners are the most up in arms in these markets, but they're also congested markets and the busts seem to be mostly neighborhood Latino stations.  Arguably the pirate operations are answering some sort of community need as these stations often operate everyday for hours, have websites, and are rather open with their operations.  The PIRATE act was mostly for the FCC to look tough and look like some sort of profit center with revenue from fines......

I fully agree plus the PIRATE Act only applies to FM and the standard AM broadcast band frequencies, 43 metres is not a concern of said law:

"(h) Definition of pirate radio broadcasting
In this section, the term 'pirate radio broadcasting' means the transmission of communications on spectrum frequencies between 535 and 1705 kilohertz, inclusive, or 87.7 and 108 megahertz, inclusive, without a license issued by the Commission, but does not include unlicensed operations in compliance with part 15 of title 47, Code of Federal Regulations."

[shadypyro]

Not I know of, but when conditions are good I would get two dog radio and YHWH here in B.C Canada.