Internet Radio

While I was out in the US for the wedding, a friend who lives out there introduced me to a very cool website, which had previously passed me by, although I now think I recall having read about the site, its founder Tim Westergren and problems with the US copyright authorities on Doc Searls. Pandora.com is a website that allows you to play a stream of music over the internet, which you can “teach” so that it plays a programme of songs that appeal to your taste. The way it does so is by having laboriously catalogued all of the available tracks according to their characteristics and playing songs which have similar characteristics to songs or artists in relation to which you have expressed approval when “seeding” your “station”. You then have the opportunity to approve, deprecate or remain neutral about each song played by the website, further guiding it in the desired direction. Basically, you end up with an internet radio station where the “DJ” only plays stuff you like.

How gutted was I, therefore, to arrive back in the UK to find that as from January 2008, access to the website has been restricted to those in the United States due to international licensing restrictions. We need this in the UK. Come on, the PRS, etc, give them a licence.

Labels: computers, music