Sunday, April 27th marks the anniversary of one of the most notorious moments in satellite history. For those with a C-Band satellite dish (one of the 10 footers) back in the day, it was the beginning of the end of clear skies. When HBO began scrambling its signal - first only for a few hours, then for all 24 of them - viewers who had been watching the American pay service for free got angry.

Most just looked for something else to watch, but one guy - a Florida man who worked at a satellite uplink centre - wasn't having any of it. That's when John R. MacDougall, using the same "Captain Midnight," aimed his own dish at the HBO satellite, interrupted the signal and sent HBO a message, which you can see below. It was 1986.

It became a cause celebre among dish owners, and a serious threat to uplinkers - and did not go unnoticed by the FCC. MacDougall interrupted the movie "The Falcon and the Snowman" for almost four minutes, with the entire east coast seeing the mystery message. It didn't work, of course, and the scrambling soon went on almost everything up there. 

Authorities eventually traced the signal back to the culprit, who was given a $5,000 fine and a one-year suspension of his amateur radio licence, along with probation. In my mind, he got off easy. Since then, laws have been passed to make interference with a satellite signal a major crime. But back then, it was a first - and mostly last - of its kind. I believe I saw it that night and had no idea what was going on.

But it certainly sent a message.