Dylan Wrynn: Pete Tridish

by Bruce Schimmel

Pete Tridish is the Johnny Appleseed of low-power radio -- so instead of sacks of seeds, imagine him schlepping boxes of transistors across the land. And wearing a pirate’s hat.

Born Dylan Wyrnn 33 years ago in Brooklyn, Pete Tridish first made waves in Philadelphia broadcasting in 1996 as a pirate broadcaster. He ran a low-power, illegal community radio station in West Philadelphia -- until the FCC shut him down.

Now, thanks to changes in the law, Pete's pirate's hat can be stashed below deck. The FCC is slated to release thousands of frequencies on the left-hand side of the FM dial that will allow nonprofit groups to set up small community stations.

Typically, these low-power stations have a range of about three miles in any direction. Until now, they've been kept outside of urban areas like Philadelphia.

Some feared that they'd interfere with airplane communications. These tiny nonprofits were also opposed by commercial broadcasters, and, infamously, by National Public Radio.

But Pete, through his organization, Prometheus Radio (www.prometheusradio.org), pushed for an engineering study to dispel those fears. Now he and his merry band of technogeeks are gearing up to do what some call "station raising."

They come into a community, and a week later a new station is on the air. Most of the time they are not paid. Pete says they are "used to sleeping on couches, being our normal cheap selves."

Their first stop this summer is Shutesbury, Mass., for the Sirius Community, which practices a philosophy of self-sufficiency and spirituality. Other station-raising stops include an environmental group in Spokane, Wash., and a workers' rights group in Florida.

The Prometheus Radio Empire, as Pete calls it, is located in the basement of Calvary United Methodist Church in West Philly. He describes his offices as filled with posters from radio stations, props from political demonstrations, bullhorns, bits of electrical wire and hulks of half-built transmitters.

Pete's big political goal is "to build a more democratic media." But with a degree in appropriate technology from Antioch, he admits to simply loving technical gear.

"Yeah, I'm a geek, and I have a lot of geek pride," says Pete. "Every Tuesday night, a bunch of geeks get together to build things that will link computers and the Internet.

"We want to do things better and cheaper, and we're learning to use unlicensed but legal technology in ways no one every thought about."

Hear an extended interview with Pete Tridish at www.schimmel.com/tridish_pete.mp3 .