What do you think?

[South]

A friend of mine who I've worked in radio with for years has an idea. He wants to put on a locally targeted internet only radio station based on a format we had success with about 10 years ago.

The music is 30 - 40 something targeted which holds well for office listening. The revenue would be generated by selling local advertising (audio on the stream and graphics on the site) with long term plans of having small purpose-specific units built to lease an in-store, localized alternative to muzak.

The site will have the usual contests, polls, ect. you would see on a traditional radio station site. I've already started on it

www.statesborolive.com

All local radio has gone to satellite programming leaving the area with no local source, so his thinking is people will appreciate the idea and support it.

What do you think of the idea of an internet broadcast targeted specifically at a local area? I'm really curious to hear your input as I'm wrestling now on just how involved I want to get, just paid to handle the site and streaming, or to partner up with him.

All equipment, software, and music has already been purchased, so the only overhead is a very small office to run it from (literally one room) at $150 per month, about $600 per month to stream, and licensing fees for BMI and ASCAP, totalling less than $300 per year.

[theJack]

I've just been turned on to podcasting. Basically, it's kind of like audio blogging ( I hate the name podcasting....makes it sound to Mac-specific). My computer downloads feeds overnight and I listen to them during the next work day. Only a few of the feeds have ads, and they are short and well done, so i don't even think about skipping them. Personally, I much prefer this over streaming.

I really like the idea of radio/journalism that is not influenced by following the ratings.

Your idea sounds good. You might be a few years ahead of the curve though...not sure if advertisers will really understand how important this is going to be,.