[sh-run]

I'm completely unfamiliar with this, but could they not get HAM licenses and operate on amateur radio frequencies? Or simply turn what they are doing into a podcast?

Or is the issue that their target audience only has access to AM/FM radios?

[trothamel]

That, plus Ham radio basically doesn't allow broadcasting. Ham radio communication is (more or less) intended to be between parties that communicate with each other. There are some exceptions, like telemetry, but Ham isn't intended to replace commercial broadcast stations.

[leggomylibro]

One of the funnier HAM licensing questions in the US is when you're allowed to transmit music. The answer?

"When incidental to an authorized retransmission of manned spacecraft communications"

So...not very often.

[whyrlpool]

Playing music on HAM frequencies is against the terms of pretty much every license, and commercial radio receivers that everyone has in their house and car won’t pick up transmissions on HAM frequencies. Assuming a disproportionate amount of pirate radio stations operate in low-income areas, access to equipment is a high barrier to entry for listeners. Internet radio is one solution, but who wants to listen to the radio from their phone when their apartment already has an FM receiver?

[fortran77]

You are restricted from "broadcasting" most things over Ham frequencies.