Radio Survivor

iPod Nano

I probably don’t have to convince anyone reading Radio Survivor that radio rules. But just in case you need some persuading, I’d like to share a beautifully written love-letter to radio (written by a reviewer at Popular Mechanics of all places).

While checking out the new FM radio feature on the iPod Nano, former college radio DJ Seth Porges rediscovered what he once loved about radio. He writes that his listening habits expanded beyond his self-selected mp3s, broadening to include radio after a 10 year hiatus:

“…my once-rigid playlist of personal standards has suddenly been infiltrated by daily doses of NPR, college radio and the occasional classic rock riff. Yes, Apple has pushed me back into FM radio…

…there’s something inimitable and raw about radio. The way it fades into static as you drive out of a city or go too deep into a subway tunnel. The unyielding perkiness found in over-caffeinated morning-show hosts. The exceedingly obvious playlists compiled by classic rock stations.

The way college radio DJs (of whom I was once one) punctuate every other word with an ‘uhhh’ or ‘you know.’ This nostalgia is only bolstered by the fact that, for many of us, the radio was our first introduction to music.

For others, constructing a crystal radio kit was a DIY rite of passage. Sure, it’s middle-of-the-road stuff, but it’s also a distinct sort of fun that can’t be replicated by self-programmed playlists—or even the niche programming of satellite radio.”

He finishes the piece by postulating that the new Nano may even work to “introduce a new generation—and reintroduce an old one—to FM radio’s unique listening format.” And wouldn’t that be grand? Earlier this year I heard someone describe radio tuners for iPhones as being akin to transistor radios in terms of the way that they will help to transform radio listening. So, I do think he might be on to something here.

Problem solved! See update to this story.

Drat and double drat, I said, following the considerable amount of time it took to put Slacker radio’s app on my Blackberry Curve. It took about 15 minutes for the whole shebang to download and install, and then what? It played a tune for about a minute and crashed the whole darn operating system.

I patiently waited for my Blackberry to reboot, then tried again, thinking maybe that would fix the problem. The thing just bonked out again. Nuts.

It’s slow as poop too. Pandora is so much faster. But I’m trying the app again as I write this. Meanwhile I went over to Blackberry Cool today and it looks like I’m not the only one encountering this problem. Here’s what Ed had to report in his comments:

“Slow? Yes but also bugged up. It crashes my curve often. Still I think its great when it works. I never bothered with radio streams until slacker came out with their caching feature. I have deleted all my mp3 files from my media card to make room for stations.”

Ditto says Martin. “On a Curve the thing is almost unusable. The performance is dog slow and seems to tie up the whole device,” he notes. “I removed it figuring its probably designed for a Bold….”

Alas. But hmmm… When I fire the app up it says, “You’ll need an SD card to cache stations.” I think that might be the problem. More on this when I find out.

Meanwhile, Slacker whacked my system again. Doh!