Internet Radio.. viable for the future?

Hey Guys,

I never really thought of this today but since we have some real world radio jocks here I figure I'd ask; Are internet radio streams viable income streams for the owners? I listen to internet radio all the time mainly ShoutCast or Free XM through Winamp. Do you think as technology allows more people to be connected 24/7 that internet radio will over take terrestrial radio?

I can see it happening if the owners followed copyright/broadcast regulations, and internet connectivity was truely seamless between car, home, work, etc.. Currently there isn't much advertising other than self promotion on most streams (stations). Just think with the internet a lot more demographic information can be compiled on listeners therefore better targeting for advertisers... just something to ponder.

There is still a lot of ground to be covered before it will truly be viable. I can tell you this, 99% of all agency produced radio commercials CANNOT be streamed on the internet due to various clearance issues not negotiated for internet.

The stations I work for have to individually code each commercial so the streaming software will not play it.

The biggest issue of internet radio is mobility, right now it's very difficult to take it with you.

I figured I'd chime in on this as a terrestrial radio vet and a recent internet radio station owner.

You may remember it was about a year ago that "Mobile Beat Radio" went on-the-air 24/7 with full music show rotation and early evening live "call-in" talk shows 3-days a week. It was very exciting to start up and at first everything was very positive. We had paid all the fees, purchase all the studio equipment, streaming servers, production library, voiceover talent and software. I applied all of my experience in terrestrial radio toward this project, did everything the right way and we officially kicked everything off at MBLV07. Heck, we even invited the big wigs to a posh South Point steakhouse, all expenses paid dinner to introduce Mobile Beat Radio and have a Q&A session to invite their input on how to best advertise their products on our radio station. We walked away with some great relationships and good ideas on effectively advertising their products and great promotions/giveaways ideas.

A big section of Mobile Beat Radio were our recording podcasts, by far the most successful in terms of numbers of listeners. It worked out great for those who couldn't hear the shows live, but still wanted to get the dirt on any aspect of the industry. We had some big names hosting and a few on the radar for hosting their own show, names that really attract listeners.

In March of 2007, SoundExchange did quite a number to the internet broadcasting industry and severly crippled legit companies with outrageous music licensing rates. For Mobile Beat Radio it would have cost us upwards of $50K per year to play music 24/7 around our 1-2 hour live talk shows as we had been doing, we closed down pretty quick after that.

If the rates were even 1/2 of what was put in place, we would still be online and growing strong. The fact that internet radio advertising, just like terrestrial radio, is about the only revenue stream causes problems with the rates you tend to pay. The more you make, the more you pay to play copyrighted music...not a good formula.

I think in the future the recording industry and their artists are going to have a solid, positive understanding of internet radio. There will be a ton of benefits that terrestrial radio currently reaps, but there needs to be time for artists to feel comfortable about it. Once that time comes there will be more rules, actual benefits of playing music, and a real chance for internet radio to be an income business. Personally I don't feel that time will come until the internet is as common to listen to as terrestrial radio, where people listen to it in the car and on a regular radio. THEN they will know this is for real and proven to work as a method of THEM making more money and promotion for their music.

Our station does mainly syndicated talk radio, meaning that a lot of the programs cannot be streamed. Sports like UNC Tarheels, Duke, and the Atlanta Braves cannot be streamed either.

In order to mitigate this, we have to run everything to potentially be streamed through another RDS unit, which decides to either let it through to the stream server or block it based on a time schedule. In circumstances where we broadcast something streamable, but the time schedule at the time is rejecting, we have a switch on the board to control it. On Air locks the RDS to let everything through to the stream. TRN locks it on Talk Radio Network. Finally, Sched makes the RDS go back to it's normal time schedule.

No tailoring of commericals, just simple routing. Only problem is several of us live out of range of the station (1000W AM) but like to listen to sports that get blocked on the Internet. So we have a "monitor" stream that we can use. :p

Our station does mainly syndicated talk radio, meaning that a lot of the programs cannot be streamed. Sports like UNC Tarheels, Duke, and the Atlanta Braves cannot be streamed either.

In order to mitigate this, we have to run everything to potentially be streamed through another RDS unit, which decides to either let it through to the stream server or block it based on a time schedule. In circumstances where we broadcast something streamable, but the time schedule at the time is rejecting, we have a switch on the board to control it. On Air locks the RDS to let everything through to the stream. TRN locks it on Talk Radio Network. Finally, Sched makes the RDS go back to it's normal time schedule.

No tailoring of commericals, just simple routing. Only problem is several of us live out of range of the station (1000W AM) but like to listen to sports that get blocked on the Internet. So we have a "monitor" stream that we can use. :p

Sunsparc where in the Carolina's are you?

I know that there are several electronics companies (the big car stereo manufacturers Sony, Pioneer, Alpine etc) trying to develop technology for wimax if wimax ever gets up and running to the advertised speeds, thus along an internet radio head unit thus making it easier for the end-user to listen however as described in most of the other posts it is difficult if at all possible for small start ups to start an internet radio station, your better off spending your money at an auction for a terrestial signal when all is said and done.

On other related notes even the early adopters havent fully caught on to the HD radio concept.

IBOC (the next thing to sweep AM) is still in it's earliest stages

and regardless of what they report a few million customers of XM & Sirius Combined barely covers the total possible cume of Los Angeles and New York much less the rest of the country.

I worked at XM in the early stages and getting the phone to ring was harder than when I worked in Myrtle Beach in the off-season.

Ive always been a strong advocate of the genuine human 1:1 interaction that traditional local radio can offer.

Kyle

I like Sirius .....