Monday, December 28, 2009

2PR FM NOW BROADCASTING LIVE - Second Test Broadcast

CURRENT MOOD: Excited

Ah, well, the blood is pumping, I'm awake, and what? Its happening, it's happening. A stream is coming out of LoudCIty, and it seems to be the sound of 2PR warming up for its second test broadcast.

My head is spinning, and my feet feel like they have been sucked down to the mantle of the earth, but it's all been worth it. When that WIMAMP stream was pumping through my computer, and outputting to my Philips D8514 boombox, it was a great reminder that after hours of hard work, the result is worth every bit of it.

3:00 yesterday afternoon, I processed the payment, and within five minutes, my LoudCity account was set up. After a bit of playing around, I finally found how to configure the station page setup, and after an hour or so, it all started taking shape.

The next part was now configuring the radio station software, so that it would communicate to loudCity. This meant the inputting of several config screens. At first, it all seemed quite simple, when it was just a simple copy from LoudCity's webpage, direct into my software. After another two hours, it was obvious that I was doing something wrong, so it was a dash through yahoo, google, and some of the radio forums to find some info why my stream was dead.

After further problem elimination, it was down to LoudCity giving me an incorrect password. They were apologetic about it, and finally at 5:30 this morning, the stream was up and running.

It was now time to get a heap of press-releases out to the newspapers, and some notable websites. Now it is 7:10, and after being up for an odd 23 hours straight, it's time for me to get a few hours nap.

In the end, I'm glad to say that our second test broadcast is up and running. :)

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Major changes for 2PR FM ahead

CURRENT MOOD: Nauseated

2PR FM has been a quite achiever over the last ten odd years, growing and changing through the years, through thick and thin. What started as a two page album review yahoo site in 2000, has now developed into a fully live station.

A lot of stuff has been happening behind the scenes this year, which mainly has been the migration of the radio station from a pre-recorded program website, into a fully live web broadcaster.

This has included encoding several hundred of my CDs, and still several thousand still to be done, the purchase of a new computer, new software, and wait for it... finally the transmitter, or as they say in internet radio...... the full live stream. Yes, it is not too far away, but before that, it's the reality of making sure we broadcast legally, and with that, checking what we can, and what we can't do.

We have finally come across a streaming service that will let 2PR FM legally broadcast. The provider we have in mind, has a rather simple system for copyright per listener payments, and unlike other streaming servers, has an easy to understand page of rules and regulations.

This unfortunately is why this morning is what you could say a rather bitter-sweet experience has happened. With much reluctancy, and almost ten years of programming, I've had to close down 2PR FM's entire "audio on demand" schedual, the low band, broadband, and podcasting sections. Upon deleting all the shows, I felt my stomach drop, like I swallowed a ten pin bowling ball. It was such an empty feeling, but in my true tradition, I never brew on these things, as it is in deed for the better.

I am very glad to say, that this is definitely NOT the end of 2PR, as in 2010 I'm planning a number of test broadcasts.

Stay tuned to this channel for more to come soon.