Recent technological developments have made radio broadcasting even more accessible. Microradio uses low power FM transmitters to broadcast over a limited range, creating a very localized radio audience and opening the door for grassroots alternative radio programming.

Once illegal underground operations, microradio broadcasting stations are now permitted under FCC rules issued in January 2000 and are being used by queer activists nationwide to create new, smaller communications communities.

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Cybercasting has also broadened access to radio production and transmission. With computer broadcasting, virtually any individual with access to the Internet can broadcast a radio program, and queer programming is plentiful.

Cybercast shows range from Gay Hit Parade, offering popular gay music, to Alternative ChristStyle, a gay Christian station. The Internet site www.outletradio.com offers an extensive listing of queer cybercasts.

Satellite Broadcasting

At the other end of the spectrum from microradio is satellite broadcasting, which aims for a large national audience. Currently two companies dominate subscription satellite radio, XM and Sirius, both of which offer a large number of channels, many of them commercial free. These satellite broadcasters feature channels devoted to music, talk, news, and sports.

Sirius Satellite Radio has been in the vanguard of programming specifically for the glbtq community. Launched in April of 2003, with John McMullen at the helm, Sirius OutQ currently provides the only national, 24-hour broadcasting schedule targeting the glbtq community. The OutQ schedule features a number of programs, ranging from a news show presented in collaboration with The Advocate to talk shows hosted by Michelangelo Signorile and McMullen, respectively, to entertainment shows such as the Frank DeCaro Show and Last Call with Jeremy Hovies and Charlie Dyer.

Although glbtq people and issues have been inadequately covered by American television news, there have recently been signs of improvement.

Through his writing, teaching, and public appearances, James Beard became widely recognized as one of the foremost representatives of American gastronomy; he planned to reveal his homosexuality in a memoir, but died before completing the book.

Funnyman Frank DeCaro has found success both in serious journalism as a fashion writer and editor and in comedy as a writer, performer, and radio talk show host.

A lifelong progressive activist and a pioneer in women's music, Alix Dobkin not only helped create a new era of women's music in the 1970s but also paved the way for mainstsream lesbian musicians.

Singer, talk show host, and a creator and producer of television shows, Merv Griffin remained in the closet even as his bisexuality was an open secret within show business communities.

Although playwright, screenwriter, and director Moss Hart achieved great commercial success and popular acclaim, he suffered from severe depression and other emotional problems that were intensified, and possibly caused, by intense anxiety concerning his sexual orientation.

America's only nationally broadcast gay and lesbian newsmagazine, In the Life began in 1992 as a variety show, but has since evolved into an acclaimed public-affairs program.

Political commentator Rachel Maddow became the first out lesbian to host a prime-time television news program when "The Rachel Maddow Show" premiered on MSNBC in September 2008.

Long-distance swimmer and respected sports commentator has in more recent years spoken out on issues of glbtq rights.

Best known for his syndicated sex-advice column, Dan Savage is also the author of books chronicling his and his partner's experiences in adopting a child and dealing with the issue of same-sex marriage

British dramatist Peter Shaffer emerged in the 1960s in the paradoxical guise of the last great twentieth-century poet of the numinous who was also capable of writing commercially successful plays that could be turned into equally successful films.

Michelangelo Signorile is a prolific, and often provocative, writer and activist whose books and articles, radio show, newspaper columns, and website champion the cause of glbtq rights.