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| Thursday, June 15, 2000 |
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The one-button volcano
What happens to broadcasting when listeners and viewers start talking back, and real conversations start up between 'casters and 'sumers?
No, it doesn't change from broad to narrow. That's the supply-side view. "Narrowcasting" is how the broadcasting industry sees streaming on the Net.
No, it changes from 'casting to talking. Let's call it broadtalking. Take any guy playing music he likes over a Real server. Without conversation, he's just jerking off his record collection. With conversaton, he's a connoisseur sharing his record collection. Big difference. Think what that does for the record industry (and what a real improvement it provides over the all-catalog likes of Napster)
That change is nicely equipped by the Kerbango radio. This funky little unit sees all the streams 'cast over the Net, and serves them us as a radio dial, in a real radio. Aside from all the features you would hope to have, it comes with something that cracks a San Andreas-grade fault in the world of Broadcasting as Usual: a Positive Feedback feature.
In most ways using the Kerbango Internet Radio is very much like using the AM/FM radios you are used to. In one very important way it is different. Radio over the Internet is by nature two-way. Need more information on the song you are listening to? Just ask for it. Want to buy concert tickets for the artist that's on now? Just press the information button to find out how. Can't remember the phone number of the company whose ad you just heard? It's just a click away. The Kerbango Internet Radio makes it easy to get the information you want when you want it.
And there you see it: your own volcano. More accurately, the volcano that belongs to you and the sites that hear from you, welcome the conversation, and begin doing away with the one-to-mass broadcasting business that is busy trying to protect itself by funding the likes of TiVo and ReplayTV, then strong-arming them into dumbing down their products.
By the way, Kerbango's top folks include three veterans of fine work at Apple and the much-loved (and missed) Mac cloner, Power Computing.
Penguin inside
A nice bonus: the Kebango radio is a good example of embedded Linux at work. So are the TiVo boxes, by the way. If you know any other embedded Linux cases, write and tell me about them. I'm writing a story on the subject right now.
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