Radio Free Kimberly
Radio Free Kimberly was a clandestine radio station in Great Scorria, known for its odd selection of music, controversies with the regulatory body and contribution to the Great Scorrian music scene, at a time when Great Scorria was considered to be "a nanny state" according to its founder.
Radio was controlled by Radio Great Scorria during the entirety of its history, at the time it also had a commercial division (privatized in 1990) as part of its corporate structure until the liberalization of the market.
History[edit | edit source]
Background[edit | edit source]
Until 1980, the Great Scorria Broadcasting Corporation was the only nationwide radio network, operating the National, Local and newly-founded Concert services on its nationwide network of transmitters. The only other alternatives were foreign radio stations operating on shortwave and were sometimes blocked by the Park Labor government of the time.
In February 1979, the GSBC's structure was flawed. An extensive survey was conducted to an estimated 200.000 listeners. Most of them were satisfied with the structure, others called for more variety. Especially the "progressive" demographic, largely ostracized until the campaign leading up to the 1986 presidential elections, who demanded the playing of tracks that the GSBC didn't even allow. When the results of the survey came, just a few hundred people did manage to demand for the improvement of its structure. Unfortunately, the GSBC and its later replacement, Radio Great Scorria, said that playing "progressive tracks" was considered to be "decadent music" and was legally banned from being broadcast on any media. An egregious example was a Nashlandian band called Sex Pistols - according to radio presenters, playing an entire track from the band and saying its name were both considered "taboo" in the media industry of the time, especially because of the word "sex".
On March 1, 1980, the division of the GSBC into two corporations, Radio Great Scorria and Television Great Scorria, went official. Days later, what eventually became the founder of RFK, Kieran Chapman (father of the singer of The X) decided to buy some equipment and built a radio transmitter. In May, the radio station was publicly announced. It was going to be named Radio Free Kimberly due to its nature as being "against the tyranny of the flawed monopoly" (by "flawed", RGS's monopoly was technically divided into two entities, the state entity for Radio National and Radio Concert and the commercial entity for the local services and the two new national FM networks). In July, RFK was first advertised on underground magazine Swarm. The advert said "July 25 on 101.2" and nothing else.
First months on air[edit | edit source]
The well-anticipated July 25 led to the innauguration of Radio Free Kimberly at precisely 8pm. The frequency formerly occupied by static gave way to a recording of the last twenty seconds of the Sex Pistols song "No Feelings", at the time banned from RGS stations. It was selected by RFK's limited staff as the signal to start and end its daily operations. Following a speech from its founder, the Pink Floyd song Another Brick in the Wall followed. This was a clear reference to the fact that Radio Free Kimberly was fighting hard for its legalization, as the first clandestine radio station in the country, and desperately waited for future presidential elections to see if the pretended demographic needed to have their voice on the radio.
At 8:32, RFK shut down for the night. There were limitations in its first weeks of operation, as there were primary problems: a limited music catalog (about forty tracks) and lack of listeners. A report said that "about forty people" tuned in, possibly due to two reasons: RFK had a limited catchment area and other radio users were either on legal stations or watching TVGS. On the next evening, the broadcast ran for one hour.
Although he really liked the job, he stated that "RFK won't broadcast every day", and that days without its broadcast were "for the sake of his own sanity". He also used these periods to buy more tracks for the station, frequently obtained in music collections from friends he had in Northulia.
Jump into television[edit | edit source]
Just a few months after the successful launch of the radio station, Kieran bought some equipment and made experiments over television, on channel 9 (later occupied by TV3).
Initially due to the lack of content from abroad, the channel tried to simulcast RFK's inner workings. The content consisted largely of Kieran's interactions with listeners. The station's name was Television Free Kimberly.