Make Your Own Internet Radio Station: ubroadcast
Duncan Riley
34 comments »
ubroadcast provides a platform that gives users the ability to create and broadcast their own internet radio station.
ubroadcast’s Station Manager software allows users to host a live internet talk radio or music show complete with play list support, inline CD ripping, MP3 uploading, commercials and other pre-recorded content.
User generated internet radio stations are far from being new. Live365 and Shoutcast have provided similar functionality for years. Where ubroadcast differs is the simplicity and cost: setting up and running a ubroadcast station is free and the learning curve is close to zero. It’s more internet radio creation for the mass market.
Setup takes no more than 5 minutes. The client is quick to download and registration options are built in. Users can immediately broadcast live content, upload music from MP3’s, or select from music uploaded by other ubroadcast members. There is a lack of depth in the existing ubroadcast playlist; this isn’t a Last.fm or similar site with an extensive music library, it’s strictly user uploaded content and I’d imagine that this will become less of an issue as the service grows.
The only real negative I could find with the service is the need for listeners to download the ubroadcast player to listen to stations. ubroadcast’s John Castiglione told me that “some of the features are unlike anything Internet Radio has seen before, and this level of interaction between the broadcaster and listeners can only be accomplished with our own Player”. The service is free so perhaps asking for Real or Windows Media streaming options is too much.
Professional internet radio station operators will stick with Shoutcast and Live365, but for casual users, ubroadcast is a strong alternative to the more complicated and expensive existing players in this space.
For those looking to test the player, Channel 677 on ubroadcast is currently the “TechCrunch Test Channel” and is playing non-stop music from the Dave Brubeck Quartet.
Not a bad program, considering its free, i’ll be creating one tonight hopefully.
Might be a good platform for wanna be shock jocks to broadcast unsenored.
I agree sensorship or the lack thereof could turn out to be a boon for this new concept.
http://www.whatshottoday.com
Duncan,
I think with the technologies available today (Flash, Apollo, Silverlight, Ajax) that building a client for a solution like this might not bring the most value.
Operator11.com has a similar model but for videocasting and they use an all flash client that works well for video, I don’t see a reason why these technologies would not work for audio.
Windows only??? Booo! A standalone Flash or Apollo app would have prob worked cross platform….
Why would someone release a stand alone player that only works on one platform? Do they think that the future is moving off the web?
“Interesting, cool article, made me chuckle.”
http://www.xmasdownload.net
Umm, so who pays royalties to the labels/musicians for the music streamed on the service?
Nerds, Macho man, Greeks, Freaks, Goth, shemale, clowns, jackass, animal house, big guy with female brain, sheeps, idiot, Klingons, etc…
What are we anyways?
I love the look and features of this site and their product. Great domain name too.
I wonder if they force users to use their player to listen to the content they host so they can help control what type of content is being broadcast. Obviously you would not want random .m3u streams out there with illegal content etc? I am still trying to figure this one out. You would think that by creating general .wma or 128Kbps mp3 streams you would get a broader audience with more player compatibility? But then again how would you be able to monitor how many listeners you have on each station if they are all using different players? Definately over my head
From a general consumer standpoint, I would think that integration with iTunes or WMP would be where the appeal is.
I predict that by the end of the year, the TV will be in the DEAD POOL!
It would be great if there is no download required. A pure web-based platform.
WARNING!!!!!!!!!!!
I use Avira Antivir virus protection program, when i downloaded the setuptools.exe (Station Manager). It came up with a trojan warning, the trojan horse ‘TR/Dldr.Age.66267.C’, is this something to be worried about
There are already a few services that allow users to create video channels and it looks like video is considered to be bigger because we definitely see a smaller number of radio broadcasting websites (this one as an example). But what I think could actually help them is let the users monetize their radio channels (via ads or paid subscriptions even). It could create a whole marketplace here and bring the young musicians to broadcast their music here.
Damn it. I’ve had an idea to do something almost exactly like this, just without the standalone player, so all web-based. But, I think this standalone client is that much of a dealbreaker, that this may not stop me from doing it anyway.
radio is so past, make your own live TVstation http://www.gaspanik.tv, sorry french only
11)
- more likely AppleTV than reg TV
-RB
What are they going to do about those Sound Exchange royalty hikes?
I think this sounds really neat, and it could do for internet radio what YouTube did for uploading stupid webcam clips, but I really don’t know that they can make enough money to pay the obscene royalties. Still, nice to see that there are still startups in the space - maybe they haven’t killed internet radio yet.
No,Thanks
I don’t want to give my credit card information for a free account.
You forgot to mention the most important thing- the broadcast software does not currently support OSX.
why a credit card needed This is java based so is Http://www.pirateradio.com you buy the program 5 mins you on air sort out your own copyright check it out.
Without OS X support - they have cut themselves off from 50% of the Audio Podcasting Community. Shame - look good otherwise.
Oh Well.
Hang on a minute, haven’t we forgotten a little thing called the United States Copyright Royalty Board ??
Haven’t they decreed crippling royalty rates payable by anyone daring to broadcast music on the web?
http://www.savenetradio.org/
Those of you that would like to host an online talkshow without the need of a download should look at BlogTalkRadio.com. Since our launch on Techcrunch in August 2006, BlogTalkRadio has broadcast close to 14,000 episodes. With over 5000 hosts signed up since our launch, the ease of use with the platform allows the host to sign up, and stream live within minutes. No downloads are required to host, listen or call into a live broadcast. We air more than 125 live shows a day which become archived podcasts
i can do that in operator11 with live video and without the need to download anything..!!!! they should have done the client in apollo!!
I’ve tried it for a couple of days, both the manager and the player. The manager isn’t too bad, though it could be more intuitive. But the real weakling is the radio player. If you manage to listen more than 5 minutes music without a crash, you’re lucky. And no way to change channels, it freezes when sync on a channel and no button are responding. U just have to kill it off and start all over again. It is simply not usable (in my humble opinion) the way it is right now.
It’s a neat idea anyway, I’ll check it out in a couple of month to see how the bug fixing is going on…
A few quick answers to some common questions here: “why another player” or “why not just use flash on the web, it does audio.”
1- Flash, and other web technologies, do have audio streaming abilities but they are based on streaming mp3 files. Mp3 sounds good but ubroadcast sounds better! The ubroadcast player is a “next generation” audio system that supports multiple audio codecs with a wide range of quality and ability levels designed to fit a wide range of broadcast types. Our “High Def” is far better than standard Flash streaming, using less bandwidth.
2- ubroadcast is different. It’s never been done this way before so it’s hard to image the interactive features that will make it unique. Many of these features are just not possible within the confines of a web-based player. Try answering a LIVE music or sports survey in real time on Microsoft Media Player
3- Our developers have a long history in the terrestrial radio industry as well as internet broadcast industry. While there is a small obstacle to installing the player for the average user, the overall listen hours is much higher. In fact, the average web based player listens only about 20% of the total amount of time as a stand-alone player.
Thanks for all of your great comments and for supporting ubroadcast!!!!!!
ubroadcast Support Team
PS - Look for some really great new features, updates, and fixes to be out very soon.
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look i found this 1 http://www.radio.awenet.info
you can also listen thru winamp or media player mms://radio.awenet.org/Radio Awenet/ for windows media player
http://radio.awenet.org:8000/listen.pls for winamp
I would love to have a radio show, but with all the stuff going on today I’m not comfortable giving out my credit card information for no reason but to verify ones age. They need to find another way.