Live Radio Streaming!

Wow!

Thats all I could muster after learning about online radio streaming.

For the past two state of origin games, i've been listening to the Continous Call Team of the 2GB radio station online. The team of Darryl 'Big Marn' Brohman, Steve 'Blocker' Roach and Ray Hedley have been calling the game for a long time and often transmitted on FM 100 in PNG. But this time, i got to listen to them online here in Perth. The live radio is streamed online at around 20kbps so its actually easier to download even if you dont have broadband.

I looked at other radio stations that were online for listenership in Perth, i looked at the website http://www.lookatwa.com/ and saw that there are 28 radio stations that braodcast programs specifically and broadly on sports, news, commentary, classic music etc. For most, i believe, is a competition to produce better programs and increase listernership. So one way to increase listenership is to go online.

But i kind of wondered like who would want to listen to radio stations online when you could listen to it on the radio? I think one of the best advantage of this use is listening in from other countries overseas like you have Australian soldiers in Indonesia or Iraq who listen to games like the State of Origin. But others who are here, especially those who live in rural australia that are not in the radio coverage area, can listen to it online. The sound online is relatively clear as it is digital! Another positive is that you can record programs or songs on your computer if you have recording programs.

I also checked the radio stations in Perth for online streaming. On some of the radio websites, i found it hard to navigate around the website to find the streaming icon and had problems opening them such as 927 AM Curtin, 87.6FM, 87.8 Magic FM and Perth Tourist Radio among others.

However, there were others like FM92.9, 6PR 88.2 FM and ABC National Radio are easy to locate and actually easy on the ears. Some even have the radio playlist on you computer so you know what songs are playing or have been played. Others had programs you could listen to when you wanted at your own time. I so desparately wanted to hear the tok pisin service on ABC's Radio Australia service but couldnt do so as the links to their live streaming were difficult to access. They, like most other radio stations also have podcasts available so you can download it onto your computer or mp3 and listen whenever, which i think is clever for those on the move. I guess the thing about live radio streaming is interaction. Being able to listen to an event or news and then call up or send a text message straight to the station no matter the time difference or location is way better than trying to do so with televison.

Most radio streaming require you to download Windows Player or Real Player to be able to access the live streaming but most computers already have Windows Media Player so its ok. The only disadvantage about radio streaming is that you have to be online to access it.

Anyway, i think for a country like Australia, the technology and infrastructure is good enough to have such things like these. But i long for the day when these things such as live radio streaming can become a reality for many developing countries including PNG. Man it would be oh so nice if a Papua New Guinean living in the US or Britain or Japan could go online and listen to FM100's Roger Hauofa doing a live interview with the PM in Port Moresby or Hagen or even having a panel discussion on agriculture...oh, that will be the day, my friends!