The Radio Experience of Seattle Acquired by Broadcast Electronics

Grok Headline matches for The Radio Experience of Seattle Acquired by Broadcast Electronics

XM Satellite Radio to Broadcast on Web

XM Satellite Radio to Broadcast on Web 09/15/2004 06:57 PM
AP via Los Angeles Times Sep 15 2004 11:38PM GMT

XM Satellite Radio to Broadcast on Web
(AP)

XM Satellite Radio to Broadcast on Web
(AP) 09/15/2004 05:16 PM
AP - XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. will soon begin broadcasting some of its stations to subscribers over the Internet, fresh on the heels of the company's discontinuation of a receiver for PCs that some users used to circumvent the music industry's crackdown on illegal file sharing.

A Broadcast Flag For Digital Radio?

A Broadcast Flag For Digital Radio? 05/24/2004 06:59 PM
The RIAA isn't exactly known for understanding concepts like fair use, or that giving consumers what they want generally helps to grow a market, but now they're just wasting everyone's time. Their latest move is to push for a broadcast flag for digital radio, so that you may no longer be able to record what you hear on the radio. In other words, just as the industry is trying to convince people to switch over to digital radio for the better sound quality, they're also going to be taking away the rights people have enjoyed for ages concerning what they can do with the content they hear.

Jordanian net-radio station gets state
OK for FM broadcast

Jordanian net-radio station gets state
OK for FM broadcast 01/03/2005 12:14 PM
Xeni Jardin: Five years ago, Palestinian journalist Daoud Kuttab launched an internet-only radio station in Jordan called Ammannet. The group has finally received approval from the state to request an FM license. With that move, Jordan enters the age of independent radio broadcasting.

The license for AmmanNet doesn't include news reporting, but the stations founder and owner feels that it has enough municipal issues, cultural, social, and economical and sports programming to satisfy the culturally hungry Jordanian public. "Since the new Audio Visual Law was enacted, all the stations that have been licensed have broadcast only music. We are sure that the public is interested in a more holistic approach to broadcasting in the form of a community radio rather than just entertainment radio."

Kuttab expects the new FM station to be operating by the spring. Established in October 2000 under the auspices of UNESCO and the Greater Amman Municipality, AmmanNet has since grown to become a leading liberal voice, exercising a wider degree of freedom than most Jordanian media operations. Among its programs on the Net is a unique monitoring program of the Parliament and the Municipality, eye on the media, school radio, sportsnet, IT in Arabic, book reviews, legal awareness programs (HAQI) and various cultural and artistic programs.

Link to Ammannet home page, and Link to background on the project via UNESCO. Congratulations, Daoud.

RIAA wants a broadcast flag for digital
radio

RIAA wants a broadcast flag for digital
radio 05/24/2004 09:41 PM
Last fall the FCC approved broadcast flags for digital television, marking a big win for broadcasters. It was only a matter of time before the RIAA would request similar treatment of radio.

Developing a URL structure for broadcast
radio sites...

Developing a URL structure for broadcast
radio sites... 06/27/2004 05:38 PM

One of the most common questions I've had about the Radio 3 redesign work that we've been doing has been about the URL structures that we have used to identify individual episodes of individual programmes. I'm really keen to address these questions with a full and maniacally over-detailed post because I think the issue of how we map broadcast programming to web URLs is a really interesting one, and because I think we've done some good work here that other people might find useful or interesting. Drew McLellan writes:

I see URLs like /radio3/showname/pip/randomcode which, as I understand it, would require a user to locate a particular show through the site's navigational system. It looks like there's no way of guessing a URL. Is that right? What's 'pip'? That makes no sense to me. My preference for date-based material is a path with the date in it - like /radio3/showname/2004/06/27/ Is there a reason why a URL format similar to this wasn't chosen?

So the first thing to explain is that Radio 3's new site is particularly interesting and ground-breaking because it doesn't just have a page for every broadcast, it has a page for every episode. This is way cooler than having a page for every broadcast, but the full implications of it aren't immediately easy to digest. Basically it means that there would only be one page for any documentary no matter how many times that documentary is repeated. That one specific page then becomes the definitive home for that episode of that documentary on the BBC and all subsequent information or supplementary material that is relevant to that episode can be stuck onto that page at any point in time. Imagine it as being a bit like having an entry in IMDB for that particular radio episode. It's like creating the basis for an ever growing encyclopaedia of Radio 3 programming, and it should make it really easy to search for information about a programme without getting overwhelmed by dozens of versions of the same page, each containing little odds and sods of information, none of which are aware that they're all talking about the same thing.

Having said all that, lots of programmes don't ever get repeated on Radio 3. Let us take as an example, "Morning on 3". This is basically the equivalent of the DJ-led shows that we're all familiar with and which are common to radio networks the world over. These things are just broadcast live. That's the whole point! It wouldn't make any sense for it to be repeated. Some of the music on it will clearly be repeated - just like any popular music radio show, but the programme itself will not. For programmes like "Morning on 3" Drew's URL structure (which is familiar to all of us who run weblogs) would work perfectly. You can imagine very easily getting to today's episode of Morning on 3 via the URL bbc.co.uk/radio3/morningon3/2004/06/27/. That would be the perfect weblog-like kind of programme, where every individual entry/episode could only be connected to one moment in time.

But if wouldn't work if they programme ever got repeated. By definition a programme that gets repeated has been broadcast on multiple occasions in time. Imagine a programme that was originally broadcast on June 27th 1985 and which is then repeated the following evening and then again nineteen years later (tonight). What would be the date-based URL for a programme like that? Well one approach would be to go for the date on which it was first broadcast. But what's the experience of that for a user? They've gone to a schedule page for today (say) and they've clicked on the link to a programme that's on this evening and found themselves with a URL from 1985. A plausible reaction would be to think that you'd got lost somewhere along the line and were on the wrong page. How did I end up here?. This situation gets worse when you consider that since we started capturing programmes on the 4th of June, any programme that was originally broadcast before that date would be assigned a URL based on a fairly meaningless broadcast date...

So, a date-based URL structure would work fine for programmes that never get repeated, but wouldn't work very well for any programme that did get repeated. Immediately, we've got a problem then, because even though 99.9% of the time we know that "Morning on 3" won't get repeated, we can't exactly guarantee it. Just recently on the BBC we've had an unedited re-broadcasting of the live coverage of the 1979 General Election and the daily re-broadcasting in real-time of the Home Service's commentary on the D-Day landings. So even those topical programmes we've talked about could quite easily be repeated.

But let's pretend for a moment that isn't too much of a problem. Let's also pretend that we can easily distinguish between those programmes that almost certainly won't get repeated on the one hand (and say they might work with a date-based URL structure) and those that very easily could or will get repeated on the other (say anything that's pre-recorded before it goes out on air). What kind of URL structure should we use for the latter?

One obvious and simple answer is that we should use episode numbers. The Radio 3 show Composer of the Week is broadcast each weekday around lunchtime and then is repeated the following week at midnight. This means that there are two episodes broadcast on each day (another place where date-based URLs might get confusing or seem broken). If we used episode numbers, however, that wouldn't be so much of a problem. So you can imagine the URL being something more like bbc.co.uk/radio3/cotw/episode/2345. This would allow you to predict sequence and order and would make the URL structure nice and hackable by users. Except then you have to think about what you should base that episode number on. Should you base it on the definitive numbers for that episode - ie. the ones that the makers of Composer of the Week use? How should you source that number? Do you trust that numbering scheme to be consistent and reliable? On the other hand should you start with an arbitrary number? And what happens if your system for determining repeats isn't fool-proof and you accidentally assign the wrong number to an episode at some point? The worst eventuality would be that you end up with episode numbering schemes that start to wander out of sync with one another because someone pulls and episode or a schedule changes. And then you get gaps in your URL structure, or programmes out of order. Imagine a circumstance where after six months of perfect running you accidentally pick something up as being a repeat when it isn't... Suddenly that episode has to be reinserted into the scheme somewhere by hand, or you have to change the URLs for any episodes that have been made into pages before you realised. The URLs break or what they point to change, and that whole part of the site stops being human hackable or readable and starts becoming institutionally and forever broken.

Or you could do it by subject for some of the URLs. Again - Composer of the Week is broken into five part weekly chunks. You could have a URL structure for programmes like this which highlighted those divisions: bbc.co.uk/radio3/mozart/part/4 or bbc.co.uk/radio3/mozart/4. Here the problems are potential URL length and namespace issues. And while they might remain human-readable, they're not machine predictable in any way. So even this kind of URL structure has its problems.

I want to make something clear at this point - each one of these URL schemes could have worked very nicely for that particular kind of programming. But in the end that's not enough. Because fundamentally as soon as you've decided to use different URL structures for different kinds of programming you're immediately in trouble - because radio programming isn't a static thing, it changes and evolves - an individual programme brand (say Choral Evensong) might change format, change frequency or be cancelled. Another programme might be created with the same name ten years later. And each week there will be a number of specials and one-offs and schedule fillers (this week on Radio 3 there were around seven one-offs, including tonights zeroPoints ) as well as regular short-series or new brands. Suddenly there's a time-consuming and fairly-skilled job that has to be undertaken every day - which URL structure should this new programme use... And you're never going to be one hundred percent correct. And so pages are going to be moved and URLs break and all hell will break loose...

Which brings us to the URL structure that we went with in the end and the rationale for it. Our first principle was that in order to stop URLs breaking and to stop the possibilities of human error in assigning URL structures to brands incorrectly (and to deal with the possibility of random repeats et al) the URLs should all follow exactly the same structure. Fundamentally, this meant that date-based URLs had to go out of the window straight away because they weren't suitable for every episode of every brand. The only URL structure that we could identify that didn't actually break in any circumstances is one that's based on an episode number or identifier of some kind. After careful consideration we decided that we didn't want to give the impression of human readability or order or structure where that structure was inevitably likely to be broken or flawed or mismatched with other identifiers. And we decided that whatever additions to the URL that we made had to be short - it had to be able to be appended onto the end of a brand name without sprawling out of control. More importantly still, we decided that it shouldn't break any naming conventions already used around the site or make the site harder to maintain.

Which is where 'pip' comes in. We'd already decided that we didn't want to have the episodes sitting in the top directory of the brand. We're in this for the long-term, and we wanted to make sure that we could guarantee that whatever future changes were made to the content management of the site, however many new things or features were added to it, we'd never have collisions between these features and the episode pages. We decided to place all episode pages into a subdirectory, and after much discussion of what that should be called (episodes - too long, not always an obvious term for a news programme / eps - too likely to already be used and too close to the name of a file format for us to be sure that it wouldn't overwrite anything at any time in the future etc) we eventually decided to stake our claim on the directory name /pip/ meaning (if you really want to know) nothing more than 'programme information page'. [PS. In a few weeks time, this directory should contain a list of all the episodes for each brand, meaning that you can hack back the directories and keep going up a level in the site heirarchy from individual episode to all episodes to brand to network to broadcaster.]

With the final part of the URL - the episode number itself - having taken into account all the problems that we might have with sourcing and guaranteeing the integrity of the 'definitive' numbers for any given series of programmes, and having considered the problems associated with any and all possible bugs that might emerge (what if two random programmes started to be considered as repeats of each other and had to be broken apart - what URLs to give them? What if the programmes were broadcast out of sequence oor we started running the site halfway through the broadcasting of a run and had to move around the episode numbers later etc) we came to the conclusion that the actual episode number should be a non-human readable short code. After much deliberation we came to the conclusion that a five-character alphanumeric hash would be short enough to not break URLs in e-mail and long enough to give us up to 60 million different identifiers. And of course we've kept it as a directory level URL to future proof the URLs against changes in the technology that we've used to build the site. (You'll notice some index.shtml's around the place, but we're going to clear that up).

The alphanumeric short code that we've got now also opens up a whole range of new possibilities. Because these identifiers are unique across all of Radio 3, we suddenly have a way to point to (and potentially manipulate) every episode that's broadcast on the network. We're still looking into the various affordances that this identifier might provide us with and we'll let you know what we come up with.

So - in summary - we have a URL structure that is eminently suitable for dealing with the breadth and wealth of programming that could come out of a radio network - a URL that will shortly be totally hackable to the extent that each and every level of the directory structure will contain content appropriate to its place in the site's structural heirarchy ( broadcaster / network / programme brand / episode list / individual episode), and which is human readable as far down its length as is practical. Drew's quite right - in order to guess the URL for an entry you do need to use the site's inbuilt navigational systems. However, it's almost impossible to be able to build URLs for radio programming that are completely human guessable and as reliable and stable as we're determined to make them.

We're thinking five to twenty-five years in advance here, making sure that the URLs of pages about radio programmes on Radio 3 could conceivably last as long as the web does. We're in this for the long-haul...

Read the comments

Use an iPod Mini to Broadcast Pirate
Radio

Use an iPod Mini to Broadcast Pirate
Radio 07/02/2004 04:20 PM

Ascentis Announces First Annual HROffice
User Conference: Invites HROffice
Customers and Partners to “Experience”
Seattle in September

Ascentis Announces First Annual HROffice
User Conference: Invites HROffice
Customers and Partners to “Experience”
Seattle in September 03/31/2005 03:44 AM
Ascentis Corporation today announced the opening of attendee registration for its first annual HROffice User Conference being held Sept. 21-23 at the Experience Music Project in Seattle, Washington. [PRWEB Mar 31, 2005]

Iowa Schools Create Internet Radio
Network For Sports Broadcasts and
Activities Info Using Meridix Broadcast
Producer

Iowa Schools Create Internet Radio
Network For Sports Broadcasts and
Activities Info Using Meridix Broadcast
Producer 09/03/2004 02:24 AM
Meridix Creative, Inc. and SchoolWebRadio have partnered to create a school webcast and information network throughout southwest Iowa. The network will enable live mobile webcast, event dissemination, news publishing, and announcement technology in the region's high schools. [PRWEB Sep 3, 2004]

Good Experience - Budgeting for
Advertising and Customer Experience

Good Experience - Budgeting for
Advertising and Customer Experience 07/30/2004 08:59 PM
What if companies spent their money on improving customer experience rather than on marketing? .. Budgeting for Advertising and Customer Experience

goodexperience.com/blog/archives/000036.php
track this site | 4 links

Radio GaGa: Radio streaming from
Internet Solutions powers major radio
stations in SA

Radio GaGa: Radio streaming from
Internet Solutions powers major radio
stations in SA 09/02/2004 09:41 PM
Sunday Times South Africa Sep 3 2004 2:22AM GMT

Top February electronics sites:
BestBuy.com, eBay Electronics,

Top February electronics sites:
BestBuy.com, eBay Electronics, 03/31/2005 11:25 PM
ZDNet Apr 1 2005 3:39AM GMT

Electronics for Bargain -
http://electronics-for-bargain.com/
announced new product catalog version
“A”.

Electronics for Bargain -
http://electronics-for-bargain.com/
announced new product catalog version
“A”. 05/31/2004 02:07 PM
[PRWEB May 29, 2004]

Should The Web Experience Be More Like
The Desktop Experience?

Should The Web Experience Be More Like
The Desktop Experience? 05/28/2004 12:41 PM
There have been many people who haven't been thrilled with the state of the user experience within the browser. After all, as simple as it is, it also has quite a few limitations - especially compared to the typical "windows" (lower case) interface that people are used to on the desktop. Still, this article at IT-Analysis seems positive ly stunned that some company has worked out a way to build a windows-like interface in the browser. They even point to a (somewhat buggy) demo shopping site, that basically shows how a company could create a shopping site that feels more like a traditional client-server application using windows and the ability to drag and drop products into a shopping cart. It's an interesting interface, but all it really does is move that traditional interface into the browser. Plenty of other companies, like Macromedia and Laszlo Systems, have been working on other interactive interfaces within the browser as well - so this specific offering doesn't seem all that new or different. Others have recreated traditional applications (such as office suites) within the browser as well - so the idea of "drag and drop" within the browser isn't really that new or exciting. Some web traditionalists have problems with many of these systems because they "break the web." There are benefits to having things like standard URLs that you can send to other people and a traditional hyperlink system. More advanced interfaces are sometimes nice, but, so far, many of them seem to cause more problems than they solve. For example, the sample shopping site above had some confusing buttons at the bottom, and once I clicked on one, the whole window closed and now the page refuses to reload. Not the most user-friendly shopping experience.

mp3.com Acquired by CNet

mp3.com Acquired by CNet 11/14/2003 09:09 AM

blo.gs acquired by Yahoo!

blo.gs acquired by Yahoo! 06/17/2005 07:22 PM
Jim Winstead tells the sale of blo.gs has been completed, and i'm proud to announce that yahoo! has acquired the service. as of right now, give or take a few minutes, yahoo! is running blo.gs. this is the sort of good home that i was looking for — yahoo! obviously has the resources to run and improve blo.gs in pace with the incredible growth of blogs (and syndication in general), and in talking with them it was also clear that...

Guangzhou 3G Acquired

Guangzhou 3G Acquired 03/30/2005 09:24 PM
3G Mar 30 2005 11:22PM GMT

CNET acquired MP3.com

CNET acquired MP3.com 11/14/2003 08:05 AM

3G Network Player Acquired

3G Network Player Acquired 06/29/2004 04:24 AM
3G Jun 29 2004 8:09AM GMT

Furl acquired by Looksmart

Furl acquired by Looksmart 09/23/2004 07:20 AM
Furl acquired by LookSmart .

Ask Jeeves to be acquired for US$1.9
billion

Ask Jeeves to be acquired for US$1.9
billion 03/22/2005 03:15 PM
Once again, who really cares? With the heat coming in from Yahoo, MSN and Google, is Ask Jeeves even an issue any longer? Not for me people. I am am using either Google or Yahoo. Anyway, Ars is reporting that Ask Jeeves has been acquired by IAC/InterActiveCorp for almost 2 billion. Are they seeing something here that I am not?…

Direct and Related Links for 'Ask Jeeves to be acquired for US$1.9 billion'

LookSmart Has Acquired Grub Inc

LookSmart Has Acquired Grub Inc 03/15/2003 07:12 AM
A minor snippet in the LookSmart Annual Report: "...acquired substantially all of the assets of Grub, Inc., a developer of distributed computing software..."

myITforum Acquired by TechTarget

myITforum Acquired by TechTarget 04/29/2004 05:53 PM

Marketleap Acquired By DigitalImpact

Marketleap Acquired By DigitalImpact 07/12/2004 03:58 PM
"Digital Impact, Inc. (NASDAQ: DIGI), a leading provider of integrated digital marketing solutions for Global 2000 enterprises, today announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Marketleap, a San Francisco-based Internet marketing firm specializing in search engine marketing services"

Public Domain Acquired

Public Domain Acquired 04/09/2004 03:54 PM
Breaking news: "In a move shocking to all, Duke University, of Durham, North Carolina, purchased the entirety of the public domain late last evening for a fee of 2.2 trillion dollars . . ." (Full story)

GoToast Acquired by aQuantive Inc.

GoToast Acquired by aQuantive Inc. 12/15/2003 11:42 AM
GoToast - one the largest SEM services providers on the net...

FlexLink AB Acquired by ABN AMRO Capital

FlexLink AB Acquired by ABN AMRO Capital 06/05/2005 11:53 PM
FlexLink AB, a global leader in factory automation systems for the fast moving consumer goods, pharmaceutical, automotive, electronics and telecom sectors, announces its acquisition by ABN AMRO Capital, one of Europe's leading private equity providers. [PRWEB May 6, 2005]

Consolidation Comes to Euro SEO as
Notabene.net Is Acquired

Consolidation Comes to Euro SEO as
Notabene.net Is Acquired 03/14/2005 05:18 PM
"... becoming Scandinavia’s biggest player on the rapidly growing market. Notabene.net taken over by the successful Danish media house, Danmark Online A/S, with a view to carrying on Notabene.net as the common name and framework of its European objectives."

Spam, an Acquired Taste
(washingtonpost.com)

Spam, an Acquired Taste
(washingtonpost.com) 04/11/2005 03:29 PM
washingtonpost.com - Americans are learning how to digest spam.

Austrian Wi-Fi Operator Acquired by
T-Mobile

Austrian Wi-Fi Operator Acquired by
T-Mobile 12/02/2003 12:34 AM
T-Mobile Austria is acquiring the 300-hot-spot strong Metronet.at (press release is in German): T-Mobile is continuing to expand its international presence through acquisition of Metronet. T-Mobile has partnered with Metronet on roaming since 2002. Metronet is the fourth-largest European WISP, according to their press release. "This deal is therefore bringing us a large step closer to the international objective of providing W-LAN around the entire globe," explains Dr. Georg Pölzl, Managing Director of T-Mobile Austria. T-Mobile Austria charges €7.95 per hour, €15.95 for three hours, or €24.95 for 24 hours. This is enormously higher than the same rates charged by T-Mobile USA. T-Mobile customers can pay via SMS at €1.99 per 15-minute unit, but the service is currently free to subscribers....

75% of Topix Acquired by Media Group

75% of Topix Acquired by Media Group 03/23/2005 01:26 PM
"...Topix.net announced today that Gannett Co., Inc, Knight-Ridder, Inc. and Tribune Company jointly have acquired a 75 percent stake in Topix.net. Ownership is split evenly, with each media company owning 25 percent and the Topix.net founders retaining a 25 percent stake. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed."

FatCow Acquired by Web Host Endurance

FatCow Acquired by Web Host Endurance 04/04/2005 03:09 PM
Web Host Industry Review Apr 4 2005 6:45PM GMT

QRS to be acquired by Inovis; JDA deal
terminated

QRS to be acquired by Inovis; JDA deal
terminated 09/03/2004 04:36 PM
SiliconValley.com Sep 3 2004 6:43PM GMT

Wise Solutions was acquired by Altiris.
So what's new?

Wise Solutions was acquired by Altiris.
So what's new? 09/09/2004 04:13 PM

Olympics Shut Down Online Radio Stream
Of Radio Stations

Olympics Shut Down Online Radio Stream
Of Radio Stations 08/16/2004 02:27 PM
It appears the folks running the Olympics are so focused on controlling (i.e., "selling") the rights to broadcast accounts of the Olympic games that they're forcing some radio stations to shut down their internet streams. The radio stations in question have regular radio broadcast rights for the Olympics, but since they didn't pay up to internet broadcast rights, they need to turn off their internet streams for the duration of the games. Considering the fact that it appears that no one is actually attending these games in person, apparently, the Olympics has decided that they're going to squeeze broadcasters for every last penny. Ah, the spirit of the games.

Reading Machines for the Blind and
Dyslexic...Acquired

Reading Machines for the Blind and
Dyslexic...Acquired 04/08/2005 10:11 AM
Kurzweil Educational Systems, which makes scan-to-speech systems for the blind and dyslexic, has been purchased by Cambium Learning, a company serving "at-risk" students. In 1976, Ray Kurzweil invented a system that would read a page out loud. At that point it cost $100,000 and was the size of a major kitchen appliance. Kurzweil Computer Products became Xerox Imaging Systems in 1980. In 1996, KES was officially launched on its own. In 1998 it was purchased by Lernout & Hauspie. When the founders of L&H were led away in manacles because they were despicable con artists who should rot in hell,...

Lineo / Embedix acquired by Motorola /
Metrowerks

Lineo / Embedix acquired by Motorola /
Metrowerks 12/17/2002 04:48 PM
Press release and Linux Devices coverage. Good news in the long-term, Lineo has been on the ropes for a while....

SunGard is Acquired for Over $11 Billion
by a Consortium of Firms

SunGard is Acquired for Over $11 Billion
by a Consortium of Firms 04/02/2005 06:33 PM
Wall Street and Technology Apr 2 2005 9:47PM GMT

Dave Newhouse, Legendary Sportswriter,
to Appear on Internet Talk Radio Show
“Sports Mavericks” on Voice America
Radio

Dave Newhouse, Legendary Sportswriter,
to Appear on Internet Talk Radio Show
“Sports Mavericks” on Voice America
Radio 09/07/2004 03:03 AM
Tuesday, September 7, 2004 at 5:00pm PST (8:00pm EST) Ida Mourie and Elleanor Stark’s online talk radio show, “Sports Mavericks” on Internet radio station Voice America (http://www.voiceamerica.com), welcome legendary sportswriter Dave Newhouse. [PRWEB Sep 7, 2004]
Grok Description matches for The Radio Experience of Seattle Acquired by Broadcast Electronics
GrokA matches for The Radio Experience of Seattle Acquired by Broadcast Electronics

The Radio Experience of Seattle Acquired by Broadcast Electronics

The following phrases have been identified by the grok system as matching this entry: