FM Radio: On the way out?

[Glenn]

My wife and I listen to a lot of Pandora: To and from VT, around the house, outside speakers...ect. It's nice A) Having your station the way you want it B) Not many ads...even with the free version.

Last night, we were listening to FM in the car. The commercials got pretty annoying. Then, they played an ad about how FM radio is local and how much great local info you can get. Seemed like kind of an odd pitch.

But it did get me thinking. Will Pandora...or other Pandora like products be the end of FM radio?

 

[Nick]

Yeah, I've been doing that as well. I've also been using Slacker and sometimes Google Listen for audio podcast streaming.

I still listen to the radio though every once in a while. The interesting thing is you can get so much content now, for free, that is exactly what you want.

The times they are a' changin

 

[bvibert]

My wife and I listen to a lot of Pandora: To and from VT, around the house, outside speakers...ect. It's nice A) Having your station the way you want it B) Not many ads...even with the free version.

Last night, we were listening to FM in the car. The commercials got pretty annoying. Then, they played an ad about how FM radio is local and how much great local info you can get. Seemed like kind of an odd pitch.

But it did get me thinking. Will Pandora...or other Pandora like products be the end of FM radio?

I use Pandora mostly on my phone while at work (since we aren't supposed to stream music over the company internet connection). One of these days I'll hook it up in my car so I can listen there too. For now I listen to FM, aside from crappy reception sometimes I don't find it too annoying. The thing I wonder about is; how much will I use it when Verizon starts capping data usage? Right now I'm unlimited so I don't care. They're supposed to be taking away that option soon. I think that might affect how much I use Pandora.

 

[deadheadskier]

What I really don't understand is how AM radio has survived........

I'm in the car for work 6 hours a day. I listen to a lot of Sports Talk Radio. 98.5 the Sports Hub mainly. Used to listen to a lot of WEEI before Sports Hub came around. WEEI is only available as an AM station in the Boston area. Even though I like some of the hosts on WEEI better, such as Michael Holly, the difference is like watching TV on a 9 inch black and white vs. a 52 inch plasma.

Today is a great day to be listening. Go Bruins!!! :beer:

 

[marcski]

I do listen to Pandora, mostly from my smartphone. I still love FM..... I am a member and listen almost mostly to 2 public radio stations here in the NYC area...WFUV and WNYC. Great music on FUV and awesome interviews and news on WNYC. No commercials....they suck. I will spin the dial to a few other stations but turn them off quickly upon hearing an ad. I hate them.

However, I do think Pandora and internet radio will be the demise of Satellite radio though. I believe cars will have internet radios built in in the near future.

 

[Glenn]

Aside from the car rides, we mostly listen over wifi. vcunning gave me an AirPort express they no longer needed, so we can now stream wirelessly up in VT via the iPad. We can even bring it outside, next to the firepit.

We bought another AP Express for CT so we could stream from the patio. I found it had a bit of signal loss. Turns out the walls and floor the signal from the APE had to travel through to hit the router was a bit much. I had an old CAT 5 run downstairs that we used before wireless..and with some e-mail tech support from a buddy, setup a wireless access point with a $16 wifi router from newegg.com. No more skipping!

Anyways...I think what did it in for radio for us was VT. When you listen to the same station for a good chunk of the day, you hear the same songs and the same ads. And I find radio via computer (pre recorded jocks from some other state) to be kinda cheezy. I will say though; there's a good classic rock station out of Brattleboro (KVT) that plays some good tunes. "The Fox" isn't bad either. Plus, they have a tower on Mt Snow so their signal rips. The top 40 stations in Bratt and Keene are kinda meh.

 

[marcski]

Years ago, there used to be that station right in Dover, which was actually quite good. (I once heard a Gil-Scot Heron tune followed by a rare Zappa song on that station).

You may be able to pull in The River, 93.9/101.5 It is a great station broadcasting out of Northampton and Brattleboro, I believe.

 

[gmcunni]

What I really don't understand is how AM radio has survived........

I'm in the car for work 6 hours a day. I listen to a lot of Sports Talk Radio. 98.5 the Sports Hub mainly. Used to listen to a lot of WEEI before Sports Hub came around. WEEI is only available as an AM station in the Boston area. Even though I like some of the hosts on WEEI better, such as Michael Holly, the difference is like watching TV on a 9 inch black and white vs. a 52 inch plasma.

Today is a great day to be listening. Go Bruins!!! :beer:

if i'm alone in the car it is usually on AM - ESPN 1050 or WFAN 660 out of NYC.

 

[ctenidae]

I only listen to terrestrial radio when I'm in my garage (but usually doing something with power tools do can't hear it anyway) or a rental car, but usually so annoyed with the car I turn off theradio to avoid the additional annoyance of a) commercials and 2) station fade.

While not dead, the FM business model is certianly under a lot of strain and needs to evolve.

 

[ERJ-145CA]

I haven't listened to terrestrial radio since I got my Sirius satellite radio six years ago, except the occasional traffic report on AM.