After the crackle, pop - Miranda Sawyer

Sunday April 15th 2007 The Guardian

A few years ago, every wireless would be equipped with FM, LW, MW and SW bands. The SW frequency was always the most interesting, as you could come across some fantastically "exotic" music which could be broadcasted from as far away as North Africa and Latvia!

However, the onward march of digital broadcasting would seem to kill such accidental wireless joy. Certain radio stations are very "unique" and not at all hard to find. Stations such as "Mouseworld Radio" (The Disney Vacation Station) and "Sirens Of Song" (music made by women) can be found. Such websites as Live365.com enable users to scroll through a dial of these websites.
http://www.live365.com/index.live

Internet radio falls into 2 categories, the online versions of real radio stations, and the specialist, internet-only stations.

The station PandoraFM accounts for 1.5% of all internet traffic. It provides a written description of the music you choose. It also allows the user to type in their preference of song or band, and then proceeds to search for other types of music similar to the users preference.

Other stations which allow the user to have a wide range of special features to choose from include:

• Radio Paradise
• Resonance 104.4fm
• East Village Radio
• Last.fm
• SomaFM
• Wefunk
• Radioio
• Dead
• Woxy.com
• LittleRadio.com

It is possible to create your own station as well which is not so popular in the UK or the US because people are too busy listening to mainstream popular artists and music.