The internet radio that never happened

[Tom Wells]

I was recently reminded of the early days of the internet, and what I thought internet radio would be when I first heard of it.
I imagined that there would be a directory page, where one could select radio tuners in diverse locations, then tune them to whatever was desired in that area. It wouldn't matter whether a station had any desire to stream or not.
It would allow people to listen to any little podunk signal anywhere!
Now anyone could dial up a coastal location and hear transcontinentals, check out how propogation was throughout the country,
hear the local side of stories. It would let people have access to signals if their location had bad interference.
It would permit the FCC to witness interference and noises in order to effect corrections and repairs.
Seemed like such a natural idea that I wondered why it hadn't happened sooner, and I was ready to jump on.
Naturally, the model that evolved did not come from someone like myself who thinks in radio tech, but from computer technology.

Internet "radio" is enjoyable, but even the streams from real stations have the commercials stripped out, so it's no longer the same product.
When no RF is involved anywhere I have a hard time calling it radio.

 

[vsa]

I was recently reminded of the early days of the internet, and what  I thought internet radio would be when I first heard of it.
I imagined that there would be a directory page, where one could select radio tuners in diverse locations, then tune them to whatever was desired in that area.  It wouldn't matter whether a station had any desire to stream or not.
It would allow people to listen to any little podunk signal anywhere!
Now anyone could dial up a coastal location and hear transcontinentals, check out how propogation was throughout the country,
hear the local side of stories.  It would let people have access to signals if their location had bad interference.
It would permit the FCC to witness interference and noises in order to effect corrections and repairs.
Seemed like such a natural idea that I wondered why it hadn't happened sooner, and I was ready to jump on.
Naturally, the model that evolved did not come from someone like myself who thinks in radio tech, but from computer technology.

Internet "radio" is  enjoyable, but even the streams from real stations have the commercials stripped out, so it's no longer the same product.
When no RF is involved anywhere I have a hard time calling it radio.

Tom,

One reason why your vision never really materialized to any great extent is that any such service would probably be responsible for paying SoundExchange performance royalties and ASCAP, BMI and SESAC publishing royalties. Another reason is that such a service would only appeal to radio geeks like you and I.

Normal people just want to get a good, clear "signal" - everywhere. That's one of the greatest strengths of Internet radio. New entrants have also been able to get in the game without the need to have a huge source of funding. These are good things for the future of "radio".

 

[Tom Wells]

From the perspective of a "content geek", I was eager for this so I could listen to stations I had enjoyed traveling, and figured the largest group of people who would use it would be those who had relocated but wished to listen to radio from "back home".
The ability to tap into unique content makes sense, as long as there is some unique content.
The more everything becomes the same everywhere, the less reason there is to look far away for unique content.

From the perspective of a radio geek, it didn't suprise me that it didn't work out this way, but it seems this model
would have supported radio, rather the current model, which further dilutes traditional radio.
I would have been happy to pay a subscription fee to such a service.

I know there are some "remote tuner" sites out there, but these aren't really designed for streaming audio.

 

[vsa]

I look at it this way. Instead of each station relying on some 3rd party to include their signal on some tuner, each station is able to be a master of their own ship. They operate their own transmitters. Why not their own streams?

 

[Keoll]

In one aspect, I completely understand where your coming from Tom.....I'd love to be able to tune into one of the rock stations I used to listen to growing up in New England....But only for the local news from the area....Musically speaking, I'm more into the versatility that internet radio offers.....If I'm in the mood for classic rock, I need to hear more than "Wish You Were Here", "Money", and "Another Brick in the Wall" by Pink Floyd.....I need more than "Barracuda" and "Magic Man" by Heart...It seems that every commercial station in the U.S. just rehashes the same 2 to 3 tracks from any artist and rarely strays deeper into a musician's catalog.....Internet radio allows the listener the opportunity to hear those "non-radio" tracks from artists who put out incredible music during their careers.....I'm sick of being bombarded with commercials 15 times a day so I don't miss that aspect of radio one iota.

Every once in a while, though, I'll still fire up the old shortwave radio just to hear something substantial from other countries.

 

[RadioMan203]

In one aspect, I completely understand where your coming from Tom.....I'd love to be able to tune into one of the rock stations I used to listen to growing up in New England....But only for the local news from the area....Musically speaking, I'm more into the versatility that internet radio offers.....If I'm in the mood for classic rock, I need to hear more than "Wish You Were Here", "Money", and "Another Brick in the Wall" by Pink Floyd.....I need more than "Barracuda" and "Magic Man" by Heart...It seems that every commercial station in the U.S. just rehashes the same 2 to 3 tracks from any artist and rarely strays deeper into a musician's catalog.....Internet radio allows the listener the opportunity to hear those "non-radio" tracks from artists who put out incredible music during their careers.....I'm sick of being bombarded with commercials 15 times a day so I don't miss that aspect of radio one iota.

That's the sheer beauty of Internet radio. There are so many creative folks out there with niche formats that fill most anything you can think of (which is one reason I have my wide 'n' deep format oldies stream). I'm not even talking about the corporate streams, I'm talking about the little folk on Shoutcast, Live365, etc.

Every once in a while, though, I'll still fire up the old shortwave radio just to hear something substantial from other countries.

Now that I finally have a place with a yard I need to pull my rig out of storage and give that ol' big knob a twirl too.