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MARCH MADNESS STREAMING WORTH $21MM TO CBS CBS has built a revenue success story with its NCAA March Madness partnership, and streaming has become a big part of it. In 1999, when the deal began, the revenue from Internet coverage was negligible. But the company revealed that ad revenue will be at least $21 million this year from online, more than double what it earned in 2007’s tournment ($10 million), and more than five times 2006’s $4 million. In 2005, the last year CBS offered a subscription model, revenue was about $250,000.

ACCURADIO DEVELOPER EXAMINES CURRENT MOBILE NET RADIO LIMITATIONS Webcasters are antsy to clear that last hurdle that represents their greatest disadvantage to broadcasting: portability. Most are looking to mobile device platforms for a solution. And though several webcasters are now offering content on various devices, no solutions yet match the quality, interactivity, performance, and breadth of programming of their web-based products. Following Apple’s recent release of a “software developer kit (SDK)” for the iPhone, AccuRadio’s Ralph Sledge assesses the situation (full article here).

SOME PROS BUT MORE CONS FOR SONY PLAYER Sony’s VGF WA1Wireless Digital Music Streamer doesn’t win any awards in the product name department, and according to a review in Business Week Online, setting the device up is just as hard to make sense of. Still, the review says that the WiFi music player streams Internet radio clearly over its likeable built-in speakers. Another drawback: “the mere hundred or so stations Sony has made available through… Live365 “ which the reviewer says pale in comparison to the “seemingly limitless Internet radio options afforded by the Squeezebox.” Read the whole review here.

WOULD AN “ALL-YOU-CAN-EAT” iPOD KILL RADIO’S “BUFFET?” At least two bloggers are suggesting Apple’s rumored plans for an “all you can eat” or “comes with music”-type iPod/iPhone (RAIN coverage here) would pose a serious threat to music radio. “This idea, if it happens, could effectively nail the coffin shut on radio. If more manufacturers put plugs in cars to attach iPods, all music radio could be obsolete within a decade,” writes blogger and radio pro Buzz Bishop (here). Mark Ramsey, on Hear 2.0 (here), writes, “And as anyone who has ever visited a buffet knows, when it’s one price for ‘all you can eat,’ you always eat more. And from what medium do you think that listening is going to come?“

Comment

1. The development of the hardware and complimentary software mentioned in the top two stories in Friday’s RAIN get exactly to the crux of why all of us have to move from “radio broadcasters” to “content developers” using radio as we know it as one platform, and developing content that is desirable and usable withing every viable emerging platform.

   — Pete Booker · Mar 21, 02:02 PM · #

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