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General Radio Discussion / Six Things Broadcasters Should Know about the PIRATE act

« on: February 26, 2019, 2141 UTC »

https://www.radioworld.com/news-and-business/business-and-law/six-things-broadcasters-should-know-about-the-pirate-act

For the second time, the PIRATE Act (H. R. 583) has unanimously passed the U.S. House of Representatives on Monday, Feb. 25.

Although this time it was brought forward early in the first session of the 116th Congress, only time will tell if the Senate will next take up the bipartisan legislation or if it will die in committee, as it did during its first go-around on Capitol Hill.

New York State Broadcasters Association President David Donovan and NAB President/CEO Gordon Smith have been vocal in their support of the PIRATE Act and issued statements that praised the House and urged the Senate to take the steps necessary to make the bill into a law.

WHAT’S IN THE PIRATE ACT, ANYWAY?

In case you need a refresher, the PIRATE Act takes the following steps to combat illegal broadcasting and interference:

• It creates a maximum penalty for illegal broadcasts to $2,000,000 — but also ups the fine allowable to $100,000 per day.
• The FCC will have to prove it’s working hard to combat piracy and support enforcement by reporting its progress to Congress annually.
• Biannual “enforcement sweeps” will also be instituted in the top five radio markets, during which personnel will work to on “identifying, locating, and taking enforcement actions designed to terminate such operations.” However, this doesn’t mean the FCC is discouraged from taking enforcement actions throughout the year.
• It eliminates the notice of unlicensed operation and allows personnel to cut to the chase and issue a notice of apparent liability to alleged violators, unless there is a good reason.
• The commission will create a new Pirate Radio Broadcasting Database within three months of the legislation’s passage, and it will be updated semiannually. It will contain the stations licensed in the AM and FM bands, including assigned frequency, channel number or call letters. Additionally, the database will identify “entities that have received a notice of unlicensed operation, notice of apparent liability, or forfeiture order issued by the commission.”
• The PIRATE Act also defines pirate broadcasts as “ the transmission of communications on spectrum frequencies between 535 and 1705 kHz, inclusive, or 87.7 and 108 MHz,” meaning compliant Part 15 operators are clearly excluded.

So, basically what they're saying in the bill is that these stricter measures only apply to AM and FM pirates? I always liked HF better anyway...

2

Bacon, BBQ, Beef, And More / Hong Shao Rou (Chinese Red Braised Pork Belly)

« on: April 20, 2017, 2148 UTC »

This is a dish famous for being Mao Zedong's favorite. My wife is also from Xiangtan, Hunan, Mao's hometown, and thus my mother in law makes a mean hongshao rou herself. This is how she makes it.

Ingredients:

1-2 lbs. pork belly (with or without skin. She leaves the skin on and it's amazing, so if you ask my preference, that's it.)

2 tbsp. peanut oil

2 tbsp. white sugar

Shaoxing wine (this can be found in any Asian market - it's a type of rice wine for cooking)

A thumb sized piece of ginger, sliced up.

1 star anise

Dried red chili peppers (I usually use 3, but you can add as many as you like. Hunanese folks are like Chinese Cajuns and they love hot stuff)

A stick of cinnamon

Soy sauce

Green onions /spring onions


Ok, here goes:

Boil some water in a big pot. Put the pork belly in and let it do it's thing for 4 minutes or so.

Take it out and let it drain and cool down. You can then slice it up into bite size pieces, but remember to slice it to where there is a nice proportion of meat, fat, and skin on each piece.

Take a large pot (I use a cast iron dutch oven, which is perfect for this) and heat the peanut oil and the sugar. Stir it and let the sugar caramelize. Don't let it burn. Burnt sugar taste will ruin your meal big time.

Once it's brown though, add a couple generous splashes of shaoxing wine and stir a couple times.

Throw in the pork, star anise, cinnamon, ginger, and chile peppers. Add enough water to just cover the pork. Turn the heat up and let it boil. Once it boils, bring the heat back down to low and cover it and let it simmer for 45 minutes or so.

Check it occasionally. You don't want the water to run out.

After about 45 minutes you can check and adjust the taste with soy sauce and sugar. Turn the heat up to reduce the liquid further. You want it to almost be like a sticky bbq sauce, but just a little runny.

At that point it's done and you can cut up some of the green onions to sprinkle on top.

If I can find the time, I will translate more of her recipes. She left us a huge stack of handwritten cards on one of her visits.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G891A using Tapatalk

3

Bacon, BBQ, Beef, And More / Cantonese Siu Yuk (Crispy Pork Belly)

« on: April 20, 2017, 1713 UTC »

I used to eat this all the time when I lived in Guangdong Province, China. I still make it occasionally when I get enough time to do so, and it turns out really well.

Ingredients:

• Large slab of pork belly, with skin.
• Lemon Juice
• Chinese Five Spice Powder
• Kosher Salt

Preparation:

Wash and pat dry the pork belly.

Take a knife or a spiked meat tenderizer and poke little holes all over the skin side of the pork belly. Be careful not to pierce all the way through the fat and meat below. This is just to prepare the skin and make it less tough and more crispy.

Flip the pork belly over.

Lay the pork belly skin side down, and using a sharp knife, cut across the pork belly, about ¾ of the way through, being careful not to cut all the way through to the skin. Make these cuts in parallel lines across the pork belly every inch or so.

Take the Chinese Five Spice powder and rub it all over the meat side (NOT the skin side!), being sure to rub it into the cuts you just made.

Place the pork belly in a foil lined pan, skin side up. Wrap the foil tightly around the edges of the meat, leaving only the skin side exposed.

Rub some lemon juice into the skin, leaving it wet. Next, take the kosher salt and rub it into the skin. The lemon juice and the salt will make a good thick paste. You want to use enough salt to cover up the skin really well.

Leave the pork belly in the refrigerator overnight.

When you get up in the morning, heat your oven to 400 degrees F. Let the meat come to room temperature, or at least get a little warmer, and place the pork belly in the oven for an hour or an hour and a half, depending on how big a piece of meat you’re working with. It’s pork, and it’s wrapped / coated with salt crust on top, so it won’t dry out.

After that time is up, take the pork belly out and put the broiler on HI.

While that’s heating up, take a knife and scrape off the salt crust and remove as much of the salt as you can. Put back in the oven to broil, still skin side up, and watch it carefully. The skin will start to bubble and get crispy. You need to watch it so you don’t burn it.

Once it’s good and bubbly, take it out and let it sit for a while to rest and cool off. From there, you can slice along the cuts you made when preparing the meat, and then slice across those strips to give you nice chunks of meat. Be sure to cut each piece to get a good mixture of meat, fat, and skin on each piece.

Serve on a bed of sliced cucumber, with any sort of sauce you may like. (I just use hoisin sauce with some honey, minced garlic, and sriracha. Just heat it up on the stove a bit, let it bubble and then pour it into a dipping bowl.)

4

General Radio Discussion / Seattle FM Pirate is looping the song "F*** Donald Trump" nonstop

« on: January 30, 2017, 1653 UTC »

http://consequenceofsound.net/2017/01/seattle-pirate-radio-station-is-playing-fuck-donald-trump-on-repeat/

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North American Shortwave Pirate / Wolverine Radio 6950U 5/18/2014 0132Z

« on: May 18, 2014, 0135 UTC »

Very faint here into Houston, lots of local noise, but I'm hearing some big band music. Something with a clarinet and a woman singing.

Lets see how propagation works out.

0145z Sly and the Family Stone: Dance to the Music
0215 Billy Idol: Dancing with Myself
0219 ID
0219 David Bowie: Let's Dance
0225 Men Without Hats: Safety Dance
0245 ID
0245 Genesis: I Can't Dance
0250 Tom Petty: Last Dance with Mary Jane
0258 SSTV too weak to copy here, and off.

Even in less than ideal band conditions here, it was a great show, as always. Thanks, Wolverine Radio!

6

North American Shortwave Pirate / PPVR 6925U 0:57 March 12, 2014

« on: March 12, 2014, 0104 UTC »

Tuned around to hear Sister Christian by Night Ranger.

Heavy QSB here in east Texas.
01:00Z Male announcer at top of hour, but noise level here makes things pretty unintelligible.

01:03Z Talking in your sleep by The Romantics

01:08Z Noise, Fading, and Pescadores are slowly taking over. Faint music in background, about S-2

01:14Z "This is vagina radio" - Seems different than normal PPVR fare I've heard before.

Thanks for the show!

7

General Radio Discussion / Pirate radio stations cause chaos for emergency services

« on: December 30, 2013, 2014 UTC »

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/pirate-radio-stations-cause-chaos-for-emergency-services-29870863.html

28 DECEMBER 2013

PIRATE radio and TV stations were causing chaos in 1983 for communications systems within the Irish emergency and transport services.

Confidential documents, released from the state archives, showed the government was determined to increase fines to clamp down on the soaring number of pirate stations.

One memo, dated April 23, warned: "Illegal radio stations have caused serious interference to authorised services in this country.

"Formal complaints have been received regarding harmful interference caused by unlicensed stations here to authorised broadcasting stations overseas.

Interference has also been caused to airport fire services, taxiing aircraft and aircraft immediately after take-off, to ambulance and garda radio networks and to radio and television reception."

In a separate memo to Posts and Telegraphs Minister Jim Mitchell, a civil servant warned that there were now 50 illegal radio stations operating in Ireland.

Such was the level of interference that emergency services were being impacted.

Of even greater concern, Dublin Airport had reported a total of 22 incidents in 1982 where radio frequency interference was recorded.

Irish Independent

Using 30 year old reports to justify action now? Or just an interesting bit of info from recently released documents?

8

Other / Pescadores 3-25, 1:57z, 6910U

« on: March 24, 2013, 0159 UTC »

Good signal, s5, lots of talk about someone named Luis. Could hear both sides of the conversation, but one side tended to fade out gradually.

9

10/11 meters / 28215 usb 21:30z

« on: February 18, 2013, 0457 UTC »

Got on 10m this afternoon and the band was nice and open. Scanning through the band, i noticed loads of cw signals, but one stood out. It sounded like someone was holding a slide whistle up to an open mic and blowing a cw signal. Nothing i could make out, however. There was about a minute of sending "p" nonstop. This went on for about 15 min. until band conditions and qrm came in and i lost the signal entirely.

10

MW Loggings / UNID 1710AM 0315-0345Z 11/24 SPANISH RELIGIOUS

« on: November 25, 2012, 0411 UTC »

Excellent signal here in Houston. I had this in my car today as I was driving around the city. Lots of Spanish sermons and religious music. The only ID I ever got was:

"Estás escuchando 1710, la frecuencia con propósito", which is "you're listening to 1710, the frequency with purpose". Google isn't helping me here.

This evening, also back in my car, I heard a program from Radio Transmundial being played.  Scans of their website make no reference to that frequency, but does say that they broadcast in Venezuela. That could be a possibility.

Any ideas as to what this one could be?