How Internet Radio Works

Internet radio has been around since the late 1990s. Traditional radio broadcasters have used
the Internet to simulcast their programming. But, Internet radio is undergoing a revolution that
will expand its reach from your desktop computer to access broadcasts anywhere, anytime, and
expand its programming from traditional broadcasters to individuals, organizations and
government.

Freedom of the Airwaves

Radio broadcasting began in the early ‘20s, but it wasn’t until the introduction of the transistor
radio in 1954 that radio became available in mobile situations. Internet radio is in much the
same place. Until the 21st century, the only way to obtain radio broadcasts over the Internet
was through your PC. That will soon change, as wireless connectivity will feed Internet
broadcasts to car radios, PDAs and cell phones. The next generation of wireless devices will
greatly expand the reach and convenience of Internet radio.

Uses and Advantages

Traditional radio station broadcasts are limited by two factors:
 The power of the station’s transmitter (typically 100 miles)
 The available broadcast spectrum (you might get a couple of dozen radio stations
locally)

Internet radio has no geographic limitations, so a broadcaster in Kuala Lumpur can be heard in
Kansas on the Internet. The potential for Internet radio is as vast as cyberspace itself (for
example, Live365 offers more than 30,000 Internet radio broadcasts).

In comparison to traditional radio, Internet radio is not limited to audio. An Internet radio
broadcast can be accompanied by photos or graphics, text and links, as well as interactivity,
such as message boards and chat rooms. This advancement allows a listener to do more than
listen. In the example at the beginning of this article, a listener who hears an ad for a computer
printer ordered that printer through a link on the Internet radio broadcast Web site. The
relationship between advertisers and consumers becomes more interactive and intimate on
Internet radio broadcasts. This expanded media capability could also be used in other ways. For
example, with Internet radio, you could conduct training or education and provide links to
documents and payment options. You could also have interactivity with the trainer or educator
and other information on the Internet radio broadcast site.
Internet radio programming offers a wide spectrum of broadcast genres, particularly in music.
Broadcast radio is increasingly controlled by smaller numbers of media conglomerates (such as
Cox, Jefferson-Pilot and Bonneville). In some ways, this has led to more mainstreaming of the
programming on broadcast radio, as stations often try to reach the largest possible audience in
order to charge the highest possible rates to advertisers. Internet radio, on the other hand,
offers the opportunity to expand the types of available programming. The cost of getting “on
the air” is less for an Internet broadcaster (see the next section, "Creating an Internet Radio
Station"), and Internet radio can appeal to “micro-communities” of listeners focused on
special music or interests.

Creating an Internet Radio Station

What do you need to set up an Internet radio station?
 CD player
 Ripper software (copies audio tracks from a CD onto a computer’s hard drive)
 Assorted recording and editing software
 Microphones
 Audio mixer
 Outboard audio gear (equalizer, compressor, etc.)
 Digital audio card
 Dedicated computer with encoder software
 Streaming media server

Getting the Programmes live on internet:

1. The audio enters the Internet broadcaster’s encoding computer through a sound card.
2. The encoder system translates the audio from the sound card into streaming format.
The encoder samples the incoming audio and compresses the information so it can be
sent over the Internet.
3. The compressed audio is sent to the server, which has a high bandwidth connection to
the Internet.
4. The server sends the audio data stream over the Internet to the player software or plug-
in on the listener’s computer. The plug-in translates the audio data stream from the
server and translates it into the sound heard by the listener.

There are two ways to deliver audio over the Internet: downloads or streaming media. In
downloads, an audio file is stored on the user’s computer. Compressed formats like MP3 are
the most popular form of audio downloads, but any type of audio file can be delivered through
a Web or FTP site. Streaming audio is not stored, but only played. It is a continuous broadcast
that works through three software packages: the encoder, the server and the player. The
encoder converts audio content into a streaming format, the server makes it available over the
Internet and the player retrieves the content. For a live broadcast, the encoder and streamer
work together in real-time. An audio feed runs to the sound card of a computer running the
encoder software at the broadcast location and the stream is uploaded to the streaming server.
Since that requires a large amount of computing resources, the streaming server must be a
dedicated server.
General Background History
Internet radio
Internet radio (also known as web radio, net radio, streaming radio and e-radio) is an audio
service transmitted via the Internet. Music streaming on the Internet is usually referred to as
webcasting since it is not transmitted broadly through wireless means.

Internet radio involves streaming media, presenting listeners with a continuous stream of audio
that cannot be paused or replayed, much like traditional broadcast media; in this respect, it is
distinct from on-demand file serving. Internet radio is also distinct from podcasting, which
involves downloading rather than streaming. Many Internet radio services are associated with a
corresponding traditional (terrestrial) radio station or radio network. Internet-only radio
stations are independent of such associations.

Internet radio services are usually accessible from anywhere in the world—for example, one
could listen to an Australian station from Europe or America. Some major networks like Clear
Channel and CBS Radio in the US, and Chrysalis in the UK restrict listening to in country because
of music licensing and advertising concerns. Internet radio remains popular among expatriates
and listeners with interests that are often not adequately served by local radio stations (such as
eurodance, progressive rock, ambient music, folk music, classical music, and stand-up comedy).
Internet radio services offer news, sports, talk, and various genres of music—every format that
is available on traditional radio stations.

Internet radio technology

Streaming
Streaming technology is used to distribute Internet radio, typically using a lossy audio codec.
Streaming audio formats include "MP3, Ogg Vorbis, Windows Media Audio, RealAudio, and HE-
AAC (or aacPlus)". Audio data is continuously transmitted serially ("streamed") over the local
network or internet in TCP or UDP packets, then reassembled at the receiver and played a
second or two later. The delay is called lag, and is introduced at several stages of digital audio
broadcasting.

Simulation
A local turner simulation program includes all the online radios that can also be heard in the air
in the city.

History
A November 1994 Rolling Stones concert was the "first major cyberspace multicast concert."
Mick Jagger opened the concert by saying, "I wanna say a special welcome to everyone that's,
uh, climbed into the Internet tonight and, uh, has got into the M-bone. And I hope it doesn't all
collapse."

On November 7, 1994, WXYC (89.3 FM Chapel Hill, NC USA) became the first traditional radio
station to announce broadcasting on the Internet. WXYC used an FM radio connected to a
system at SunSite, later known as Ibiblio, running Cornell's CU-SeeMe software. WXYC had
begun test broadcasts and bandwidth testing as early as August, 1994. WREK (91.1 FM, Atlanta,
GA USA) started streaming on the same day using their own custom software called
CyberRadio1. However, unlike WXYC, this was WREK's beta launch and the stream was not
advertised until a later date.

In 1995, Progressive Networks released RealAudio as a free download. Time magazine said that
RealAudio took "advantage of the latest advances in digital compression" and delivered "AM
radio-quality sound in so-called real time." Eventually, companies such as Nullsoft and
Microsoft released streaming audio players as free downloads. As the software audio players
became available, "many Web-based radio stations began springing up."

In March 1996, Virgin Radio - London, became the first European radio station to broadcast its
full program live on the internet. It broadcast its FM signal, live from the source, simultaneously
on the Internet 24 hours a day.

Internet radio attracted significant media and investor attention in the late 1990s. In 1998, the
initial public stock offering for Broadcast.com set a record at the time for the largest jump in
price in stock offerings in the United States. The offering price was US$18 and the company's
shares opened at US$68 on the first day of trading. The company was losing money at the time
and indicated in a prospectus filed with the Securities Exchange Commission that they expected
the losses to continue indefinitely Yahoo! purchased Broadcast.com on July 20, 1999 for US$5.7
billion.

US royalty controversy
In October 1998, the US Congress passed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). One
result of the DMCA is that performance royalties are to be paid for satellite radio and Internet
radio broadcasts in addition to publishing royalties. In contrast, traditional radio broadcasters
pay only publishing royalties and no performance royalties.

A rancorous dispute ensued over how performance royalties should be assessed for Internet
broadcasters. Some observers said that royalty rates that were being proposed were overly
burdensome and intended to disadvantage independent Internet-only stations—that "while
Internet giants like AOL may be able to afford the new rates, many smaller Internet radio
stations will have to shut down." The Digital Media Association (DiMA) said that even large
companies, like Yahoo! Music, might fail due to the proposed rates. Some observers said that
some U.S.-based Internet broadcasts might be moved to foreign jurisdictions where US
royalties do not apply.

Many of these critics organized SaveNetRadio.org, "a coalition of listeners, artists, labels and
webcasters" that opposed the proposed royalty rates. To focus attention on the consequences
of the impending rate hike, many US Internet broadcasters participated in a "Day of Silence" on
June 26, 2007. On that day, they shut off their audio streams or streamed ambient sound,
sometimes interspersed with brief public service announcements. Notable participants included
Rhapsody, Live365, MTV, Pandora, and SHOUTcast. Some others that did not participate, like
Last.fm, having just been purchased for 280 million dollars by CBS Music Group,, stated that
they did not want to punish their listeners.

SoundExchange, representing supporters of the increase in royalty rates, pointed out the fact
that the rates were flat from 1998 through 2005 (see above), without even being increased to
reflect cost-of-living increases. They also declared that if internet radio is to build businesses
from the product of recordings, the performers and owners of those recordings should receive
fair compensation. Opponents argued that the purchase price paid for Last.FM reflected that it
was primarily a social network service that included a radio service.

On May 1, 2007, SoundExchange came to an agreement with certain large webcasters

regarding the minimum fees that were modified by the determination of the Copyright Royalty
Board. While the CRB decision imposed a $500 per station or channel minimum fee for all
webcasters, certain webcasters represented through DiMA negotiated a $50,000 "cap" on
those fees with SoundExchange. However, DiMA and SoundExchange continue to negotiate
over the per song, per listener fees.
SoundExchange has also offered alternative rates and terms to certain eligible small
webcasters, that allows them to calculate their royalties as a percentage of their revenue or
expenses, instead of at a per performance rate. To be eligible, a webcaster had to have
revenues of less than $1.25 million dollars a year and stream less than 5 million "listener hours"
a month (or an average of 6830 concurrent listeners). These restrictions would disqualify
independent webcasters like AccuRadio, DI.FM, Club977 and others from participating in the
offer, and therefore many small commercial webcasters continue to negotiate a settlement
with SoundExchange.

An August 16, 2008 Washington Post article reported that although Pandora was "one of the
nation's most popular Web radio services, with about 1 million listeners daily...the burgeoning
company may be on the verge of collapse" due to the structuring of performance royalty
payment for webcasters. "Traditional radio, by contrast, pays no such fee. Satellite radio pays a
fee but at a less onerous rate, at least by some measures." The article indicated that "other
Web radio outfits" may be "doom[ed]" for the same reasons.

On September 30, 2008, the United States Congress passed "a bill that would put into effect
any changes to the royalty rate to which [record labels and web casters] agree while lawmakers
are out of session." Although royalty rates are expected to decrease, many webcasters
nevertheless predict difficulties generating sufficient revenue to cover their royalty payments.

In January 2009, the US Copyright Royalty Board announced that "it will apply royalties to
streaming net services based on revenue."

Popularity
In 2003, revenue from online streaming music radio was US$49 million. By 2006, that figure
rose to US$500 million.

A February 21, 2007 "survey of 3,000 Americans released by consultancy Bridge Ratings &
Research" found that "as much as 19% of U.S. consumers 12 and older listen to Web-based
radio stations." In other words, there were "some 57 million weekly listeners of Internet radio
programs. More people listen to online radio than to satellite radio, high-definition [sic] radio,
podcasts, or cell-phone-based radio combined."
An April 2008 Arbitron survey showed that, in the US, more than one in seven persons aged 25–
54 years old listen to online radio each week. In 2008, 13 percent of the American population
listened to the radio online, compared with 11 percent in 2007.

Internet radio functionality is also built into many dedicated Internet radio devices, which give
an FM like receiver user experience.
General
The following tables compare general and technical information for a number of streaming media systems both audio and video.

FIRST
PUBLIC LATEST STABLE
NAME CREATOR RELEASE VERSION COST (USD) LICENSE MEDIA MEDIA PLAYER
(YYYY-MM- (RELEASE DATE)
DD)

PeerCast Giles ? 0.1217 Free GPL Audio/Video {?}

Macromedia/Adobe proprietar
Flash Media Server 2002-07-9 3.5 (2009-01-13) $4,500 Video Flash Player
Systems y

Any with appropriate protocol

support, including Flash players,
Free Developer Silverlight players, QuickTime
license, $995 players, VLC players, Safari
2.1.2 (2010-07- proprietar Audio/Video/Dat
Wowza Media Server Wowza Media Systems 2007-02-17 Perpetual, (HTML5), iPhone/iPad/iPod
20) y a
$65/mo touch, 3GPP (Android, Blackberry,
Subscription Symbian, etc.), IPTV set-top
boxes, game consoles (Wii, PS3
and other).

5.5.5 (2007-05- Any with appropriate protocol

Darwin Streaming Server Apple Inc. 1999-03-16 Free APSL Audio/Video
10) support.

0.6.1 (2009-09- Any with appropriate protocol

Flumotion Streaming Server Flumotion 2004-11-30 Free GPL Audio/Video
09) support.
 0.2.4.1 (2007- Any with appropriate protocol
Firefly Ron Pedde Free GPL Audio
10-21) support.

FreeCast Alban Peignier 2004-09-14 2006-06-29 Free GPL Audio/Video FreeCast client

11.1 (2006-06- Any with appropriate protocol

Helix DNA Server RealNetworks 2003-01-22 Free RCSL/RPSL Audio/Video
10) support.

Free for 12
14.0 (2010-04- months (Basic) proprietar Any with appropriate protocol
Helix Universal Server RealNetworks 1994-01-01 Audio/Video
14) and $1,000- y support (PC & Mobile devices).
$10,000

proprietar
Windows Media Services Microsoft Free Video Windows Media Player
y

Free (Personal),
proprietar Any with appropriate protocol
Broadwave NCH Software 2006-07-21 1.01 $136 Audio
y support.
(Commercial)

2.3.2 (2008-06- Any with appropriate protocol

Icecast Xiph.Org Foundation 1998-12 Free GPL Audio/Video
02) support.

0.9.0 (2010-01-
Red5  ?  ? Free LGPL Audio/Video  ?
27)

1.9.8 (2007-02- proprietar Any with appropriate protocol

SHOUTcast Nullsoft 1998-12 Free Audio
28) y support.

Unreal Streaming Free, proprietar Flash, Windows Media, UMedia

Unreal Media Server 2003-10 7.0 (2010-03-22) Audio/Video
Technologies Commercial y players

CasparCG http://www.casparcg.com/  ?  ? Free  ? Audio/Video Flash

Mammoth Server http://mammothserver.org/  ? Audio/Video Free  ? Flash

Operating system support

Name Windows Mac OS X Linux BSD Unix Solaris Other Unix

PeerCast Yes Yes Yes ? ? ?

Firefly Yes ? Yes Yes ? ?

Flash Media Server Yes No Yes No No No

Wowza Media Server Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Darwin Streaming Server Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Flumotion Streaming Server Yes Yes Yes ? ? ?

FreeCast Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes

Helix DNA Server Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ?

Helix Universal Server Yes No Yes No Yes No

Windows Media Services Yes No No No No No

Broadwave Yes No Yes No No No

Icecast Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes

SHOUTcast Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Unreal Media Server Yes No No No No No

Name Windows Mac OS X Linux BSD Unix Solaris Other Unix

Container format support
Name AVI ASF QuickTime Ogg OGM Matroska MP4 MPEG transport stream FLV

PeerCast ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ?

Firefly No ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ?

Flash Media Server ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes No Yes

Wowza Media Server No No Yes No No No Yes Yes Yes

Darwin Streaming Server ? ? Yes ? ? ? Yes ? No

Flumotion Streaming Server ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes

FreeCast ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ?

Helix DNA Server ? ? ? ? ? ? No ? ?

Helix Universal Server No Yes Yes Yes No No Yes Yes Yes

Windows Media Services ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? No

Broadwave ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

Icecast Yes ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? No

SHOUTcast Yes ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? No

Unreal Media Server Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ?
Protocol support
MPEG- Real Data
Name HTTP RTSP MMS RTP RTCP UDP TCP RTMP
TS Transport

PeerCast Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

Firefly ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

Flash Media
No No No No No ? ? Yes No ?
Server

Yes Yes
Wowza Media (Apple HLS, Silverlight Smooth (RTMP, RTMPE,
Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No
Server Streaming, Adobe Dynamic RTMPTE, RTMPT,
Streaming) RTMPS)

Darwin Streaming
No Yes No Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ?
Server

Flumotion
Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Streaming Server

FreeCast Yes No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

Helix DNA Server Yes Yes No Yes No Yes Yes ? ? Yes

Helix Universal
Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes
Server

Windows Media Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes ? ? No

Services (WM-HTTP, plain download&play (WM- (WM- (MMSU, MMS- (MMST, WM-
HTTP via IIS) RTSP) RTSP) MCAST, MSBD and HTTP and HTTP)
 WM-RTSP)

Broadwave Yes No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

Icecast Yes No No No No ? ? ? ? ?

SHOUTcast Yes No No No No ? ? ? ? ?

Unreal Media
Yes No Yes Yes No No Yes Yes ? No
Server

MPEG- Real Data

Name HTTP RTSP MMS RTP RTCP UDP TCP RTMP
TS Transport
Supported website
The design website is a dynamic website that changes or customizes itself frequently and
automatically, based on certain criteria.
The websites can have two types of dynamic activity: Code and Content. Dynamic code is
invisible or behind the scenes and dynamic content is visible or fully displayed, so that the
current propramms and the future programme will be automated.
This type of website displayed in plain view. Variable content is displayed dynamically on
the fly based on certain criteria, usually by retrieving content stored in a database.
A website with dynamic content refers to how its messages, text, images and other
information are displayed on the web page, and more specifically how its content changes
at any given moment. The web page content varies based on certain criteria, either pre-
defined rules or variable user input. For example, a website with a database of news articles
can use a pre-defined rule which tells it to display all news articles for today's date. This type
of dynamic website will automatically show the most current news articles on any given
date. Another example of dynamic content is when a retail website with a database of
media products allows a user to input a search request for the keyword Beatles. In
response, the content of the web page will spontaneously change the way it looked before,
and will then display a list of Beatles products like CD's, DVD's and books.
Purpose of dynamic websites
The main purpose of a dynamic website is automation. A dynamic website can operate
more effectively, be built more efficiently and is easier to maintain, update and expand. It is
much simpler to build a template and a database than to build hundreds or thousands of
individual, static HTML web pages.