I have…
Well, that’s the first choice anyway….
Fancy choosing your Song of the Decade?
October 19, 2009 By Leave a Comment
Find the best radio stations – online
October 19, 2009 By 1 Comment
Finding the best radio station is obviously a subjective experience. Are you looking for a particular band or genre? Do you want somewhere with variety? And how on earth do you find the station that’s right for you as an individual without going through every stop on the dial and noting down what they play for a whole day or more?
CompareMyRadio.com is the newest project to launch from One Golden Square Labs (Disclosure: One Golden Square Labs is from the team behind Absolute Radio, where I’m Digital Marketing Manager)
And it’s an incredibly simple and effective way to find and compare radio stations (I can say that honestly as it wasn’t my idea, sadly). All you need to do is enter the name of your favourite artist, track or station, and you’ll be presented with which stations play the most of your favourite music, or which music your station plays the most.
It also gives you a guide to how many tracks a station plays over a set period of time, and how much variety there is.
And best of all, the results are completely down to you as an individual – so there can’t be any implied bias. In fact, picking three bands at random from my collection, Metallica, The Lemonheads, and The Charlatans, Absolute Radio wasn’t the top result for the three, although it was in the running every time.
As with the recent launch of a user-controlled radio station, Dabbl, it’s currently in Beta and there are plenty of plans for the future, so give it a go and share your feedback…
Two great new projects launch at Absolute Radio
October 1, 2009 By Leave a Comment
If it seems like I’m blogging less at the moment, you can blame my colleagues at Absolute Radio - not content with a huge live gig on Regent Street and relaunching the One Golden Square blog as part of the celebrations of the first birthday of the station, two really cool projects are launching today.
Dabbl is our experiment in user-controlled radio. You can vote for your favourite tracks, and then from 7pm every evening, hear them online or on DAB. It’s currently themed around great live tracks, so check it out and get voting:
Dabbl: User-controlled radio - click to start dabbling
And if that wasn’t enough, the launch of Dabbl is also tied into the launch of the new One Golden Square Labs which is where we can unveil and test our new and experimental projects.
One Golden Square Labs
Not a bad week, and it’s not even Friday yet.
Has Pure just launched the future of radio hardware?
September 17, 2009 By Leave a Comment
The new Pure Sensia launched to the press and radio industry today, and as an internet-connected radio with a 5.7″ touchscreen, it’s hard not to be a bit impressed by the technology. But what’s more interesting is what it allows radio and audio providers to do in the future.
I need to disclose that I’ve been discussing the Sensia for a while as part of Absolute Radio’s Pure Sensia promotion. (Obligatory plug: You can win 4 Sensia’s every Thursday for the next 3 weeks by listening to Absolute Radio or visiting the website).
What’s really interesing is that it’s internet-connected, but doesn’t have a browser or any ability to play video. And both of these are conscious decisions by Pure, in order to ensure that the Sensia is a radio that does lots more, rather than a TV or PC that happens to have a radio built-in. And I think that’s a vitally important definition when the long awaited convergence of devices in the home has really kicked in.
The new Pure Sensia internet-connected DAB Radio
So you get access to FM, DAB, Internet Radio and Podcasts. But it also allows an audio provider to display slideshow images and now playing information alongside the broadcast, for example. And in the future there are lots of ways that this can allow more utiility and interaction.
Plus it also has the facility for internet applications, which are limited for launch to news, weather, Twitter and Facebook, but will soon be opened-up. Suddenly there are a number of possibilities which also tie into the existing plans most people have for mobile devices and internet projects.
For me it’s all about looking at how we can increase enjoyment and interaction, and minimise annoyance. What things generally bug people when they’re listening to a tradional radio at home, and what things would they love to do if they could? Can we streamline the interaction with an on-air presenter, or create new ways for people to get involved? Can we make commercial messages more of a service to people? And how does this compliment mobile phone listening and interaction,or PC (or Mac) based listening and interaction?
Combine this with radio in the iPod Nano, and HD radio in the Zune, and the complimentary nature of radio seems to be leading to a bit of a wave of incorporating what is a great complimentary medium into technology. Now it’s just about making the most of those opportunities to better serve listeners.
