I assume that I am not the only Radio Survivorist who follows the podcast Welcome to Night Vale. The show is so beloved that 8tracks.com playlists of all kinds have proliferated in honor of the series. A short guide to them follows. But first, a description of the program for the uninitiated. Welcome to Night […]
You don’t hear a great deal about Last.fm these days, in large part because it has been eclipsed by a myriad of new streaming music services. But on Wednesday the company announced that it had forged a deal with Spotify to bring the latter’s whole catalogue to Last.fm users. “Whether it be your own profile […]
Paul Riismandel suggested that I take 8tracks.com for a spin. I am enjoying it—a versatile playlist application that interfaces with at least half a dozen other social networking systems, including YouTube, SoundCloud, and Wikipedia. I get an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink feeling with 8tracks, which exemplifies the direction that many social networking music apps are moving towards—maximizing connectivity […]
I teach history courses at a big university in California. Classes started three weeks ago. One of mine takes place in one of the largest lecture halls on campus. I walked into the room, which holds almost 200 people, and there on the corner of a front desk sat two CDs, one by Tom Waits, […]
I am perusing various radio production related Indiegogo campaigns. There are so many that it is hard to keep track of them as they come and go. Some succeed. Others flop. Still others have trouble getting above about 65 percent of their goal. The good news is that Indiegogo lets you keep whatever money you […]
For reasons that remain unclear to me, I bought an Xbox One with Kinect over the holidays. I’m trying to remember how I talked myself into the purchase—something about being able to communicate with my TV via voice. “Xbox! Go to Skype!” I commanded. It worked, except I didn’t have anyone to Skype with at […]
Hallowed New York City classical radio station WQXR’s “Q2” channel is now well over three years old. I am a big fan of the service. It is one of the few places in the classical music radiosphere in the United States where you can consistently listen to a high quality stream of contemporary classical music […]
Shortly after we posted my review of Soundrop, Spotify’s chat room application, Soundrop marketing Vice President Thomas Ford wrote to us. “I think you published just a few weeks too soon,” he observed. “We’re planning to launch the new Spotify app tomorrow [December 17]. I hope it helps solve some of the interaction issues by […]
A new survey by Brandwatch reconfirms earlier findings about United States radio stations and Twitter—the relationship could be a lot more dynamic, particularly for commercial music radio stations. Here is some of the Brandwatch data: Only around 0.06 percent of radio listeners tweet about a US radio station. “This is 10 times less frequently than […]
SoundCloud is five years old as of last month. There are two kinds of radio on the application. You can access established radio networks that archive their shows on SoundCloud. For example, you can listen to BBC World Service Radio, which is a mix of BBC public affairs shows, including my favorite: World Have Your Say. But you […]
