How Volunteer-Run Argus Radio Broadcast Ferguson Protests Live To the World

On the night of Aug 13, 2014, about half a million people watched online as a militarized police force in in Ferguson, Missouri, squared off with largely peaceful crowds protesting the killing of unarmed teenager Michael Brown.

Mustafa Hussein, a constitutional law student who volunteers at the small, urban music station based in nearby Maplewood, said that Argus Radio, which launched online in 2013 and is run by five volunteers, recently purchased video equipment so it could livestream concerts. But the station decided to use the equipment for the first time to cover the interaction between police and protesters.

As many as half a million people simultaneously watched the livestream, and about 1.2 million people in total watched it, Hussein said.