iHeart (Clear Channel) Jumps Into The Streams

+48V

+48V

hi-fi or die
"the all-in-one streaming music and live digital radio service – announced today that it is reinventing live radio with the launch of its two new subscription services -- iHeartRadio Plus and iHeartRadio All Access -- set to debut in January 2017. While research shows that more than 90 percent of listeners say they listen to both FM radio and music collections, but at different times, for different reasons, this marks the first time ever that on demand functionality will be used to improve the radio experience, unlike current services which can only approach on demand through a music collection offering."

Two tiers. $5 & $10 just like the coming Pandora foray. Heh...I'm now officially ©alling this the five and dime approach. They spawn as quick as they die--regardless of how many pots they have to piss in.

What a strange mass of amoebas this revolution/evolution is producing.


:banana:............................:idea:

Here's The Announcement.
 
Beavis and Butthead said it best:

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^^^ Yeah. Not and never was a fan of mega corp CC/iHeart.

There’s no denying the crappy effect their hoover-phonic greed and lazy programming had spiraling terrestrial FM radio into a cesspool of sameness. That said, if it hadn’t been CC, then surely it’d been some other hungry behemoth thanks to handy provisions included in the 1996 Telcom Act.

Obviously those ships have long sailed and are well over the horizon on that gooey point, so let’s leave that ragged debate for another thread.

As for Clear Channel’s venture into the streaming world, they sunk their toes in the water with simulcasts of their terrestrial network in 2008; iheartmusic.com. I checked them out briefly back when and every now & then. But since I had been streaming many other much better streamed independent terrestrial and internet only radio stations since 2002 via the RadioTime (now Tune-In) directory, I honestly had no interest whatsoever in CC’s parroted terra based schlock.

Going forward from ‘08, “Clear Channel” has since offered up several additional non-interactive internet only genre based radio stations that were/are supposedly more meticulously curated. And so goes the rebranding and birth of Clear Channel to iHeart Radio/Media.

Personally, since I’m not a current and active iHeart Radio consumer, I can’t really speak much for or against their genre based internet only radio offerings. But I hear things critically. And they range from “not bad at all” to “great”. {emphasis on quote marks} So I imagine and expect they’re par for the course.

iHeart Radio’s exponential growth, popularity, and impact to date (thanks mainly to a mega-millon dollar advertising push just around the time most people were discovering the power and convenience of their internet connections) against a gob of analogous competition, has obviously struck a notable chord.

So now, as they strum away along with looming bankruptcy, iHeart Media is diving into the on-demand streaming pool. Who knows.

To the expectations of polished turds and fraudcasting. Trust me, I get it. But since this new expedition of theirs is a roll your own/on-demand deal, CC/iHeart’s sorrid and sour history with FM really shouldn’t/can’t have any bearing on the music selection & substance. So poo-poo projections out of the gate may well prove to be overly-anticipated left over knee-jerk bias.

All I do know is the more players and competition in the on-demand streaming music circle the better.
 
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