Prometheus Radio Project

""I just always thought that the barnraising was a beautiful metaphor for all the things that people don''t do anymore. There is a weird tension between technology and community. For all the great things that technology can allow us to do, the way the technology has developed in the current corporate context, it tends to empower individuals. Whereas it used to be that you needed about 20 people working together to put out a newspaper, now you can publish it yourself on your computer and a Xerox copy on your desk, so you didn''t have to mediate your views with anybody else. So it is making people more individualistic, which is in some cases interesting and quirky but in other ways it makes us forget how to work together. And what I think is most important about community radio is not so much the radio . . . but what''s important is the creation of the institution, where people work together to do something they couldn''t do by themselves. With barnraisings, the idea is that no one guy used to be able to build his barn by himself."
Pete Tridish, in an Aug. 8, 2005, interview at Northampton, Mass. "

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SLIDESHOW: Of the WXOJ barnraising, Aug. 2005

Listen to a 17-minute audio interview with Pete Tridish taped Aug. 5, 2005 in Northampton, Mass., and read a story about a radio "barnraising" which took place then.

Below is a short bio on Pete Tridish from the Prometheus Radio website (http://www.prometheusradio.org/staff.shtml):

Pete triDish was a member of the founding collective of Radio Mutiny, 91.3 FM in Philadelphia In 1996, He was an organizer for the station''s demonstrations at Benjamin Franklin''s Printing Press and the Liberty Bell; on both occasions the station broadcast in open defiance of the FCCs'' unfair rules that prohibit low power community broadcasting. He was the organizer and speaker for the Radio Mutiny tour of 25 cities from January to March of 1998, and undertook another 20-city tour in February 1999 with the Prometheus Radio Project. He also worked on the first two microradio conferences on the East Coast --and organized radio barnraisings in five communities around the United States. He actively participated in the rulemaking that led up to the adoption of LPFM. He sat on the committee that sponsored the crucial Broadcast Signal Labs study, which proved to the FCC that LPFM would not cause interference. Tridish has helped to build a number of low power radio stations, and provided advice to hundreds. He has done radio trainings in Guatemala, Colombia, Nepal and other countries.He has spoken at colleges, coffee shops, living rooms, and even the CATO Institute. He has been interviewed for several segments on NPR, a number of college, public and pirate radio stations, CNN, for Maximum Rock and Roll, Radio Ink, Radio and Records, Philadelphia City Paper, Baltimore City Paper, Albany Times Union, Philadelphia Inquirer, Freedom Forum, Chicago Tribune, LA Times, the Nation, Talkers Magazine, Washington Post, Broadcasting and Cable, Radio World, Hollywood Reporter, Z Magazine, Paper Tiger TV and other news outlets. He holds a BA in Appropriate Technology from Antioch College.

The Prometheus Radio mission from http://www.prometheusradio.org/about.shtml:

To serve as a microradio resource center offering legal, technical, and organizational support for the non-commercial community broadcasters

To research and develop technical resources in anticipation of legalized micro-radio. Upon legalization, we will offer technical services to non-commercial micro-stations- equipment testing, frequency searching, submitting FCC applications, studio advice and so on

To sponsor and produce educational tours, conferences, events and literature on microradio and democratic media issues.

To serve as a public interest advocate on microradio issues, and to help facilitate public participation in the FCC rulemaking and legislative process.

To help start a regional micropower association, which could eventually serve as a self-regulating association for low power fm analagous to the ARRL for HAM radio. Until this is formed, we will perform some of its future functions, primarily performing a coordinating and secretarial role to facilitate communications among existing stations.

AUDIO SOURCE (link above): Media Matters, with John McChesney, Feb. 19, 2006:
Guests were Pete Tridish of the Prometheus Radio Project, and Erin McCarley. They had returned from the World Social Forum in Venezuela and will be discussing that event with us. Pete Tridish has helped to build a number of low power radio stations, and provided advice to hundreds. He has done radio trainings in Guatemala, Colombia, Nepal, Tanzania, and other countries. He holds a BA in Appropriate Technology from Antioch College.

http://prometheusradio.org
Erin McCarley, a masters student at the University of Texas in photojournalism, worked for Free Speech television to cover the World Social Forum. http://erinmccarley.net/

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