RadioWeave

Facebook and RadioWeave are now friends.

2010-06-04T08:29:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the latest RadioWeave feature, Facebook Integration, here's what happened:

I'm walking my dog, listening to RadioWeave, and I hear my wife's Facebook update "Surprising Brent with a feta-spinach-egg-substitute-omelet. Aren't I a good little wifey!" I'm now quite happy for at least two reasons 1) Our new feature worked: I can now hear Facebook on my radio, and 2) I've got an omelet waiting for me at home (my only concern now is how to act surprised).

Facebook/RadioWeave integration means you can now:

log in to RadioWeave with your Facebook id
hear your latest News Feed updates read to you
share recordings you create (and any track you like) with your friends, playable directly in their Facebook News Feed

Detailed information about listening and speaking to Facebook Radio is available on our help site here.

Being a new feature, we're hoping we got this right but expecting that it's not perfect, and so we're looking forward to your feedback on our help forum, or via email.

How blend your own music files into RadioWeave

2010-04-14T10:43:00.000-07:00

I own lots of music. I love that music. Just because I'm listening to podcasts and weather and tweets and friends does not mean I don't also want to listen to my music.

So I configure RadioWeave to play a song from my own music library every few tracks.

Two Methods for adding your music into your radio weave:

weave-your-music method 1)
add iPod music directly from the iPhone/iTouch/iPad

The latest RadioWeave iPhone app (available at the store here) contains this option to blend your on-device music library into the RadioWeave experience.

Instructions for using the "Add iPod music" feature are available here.

weave-your-music method 2)
upload your music into the cloud with RadioWeaveMyMusic

The second method for adding your music library is with a helper tool we're working on called RadioWeaveMyMusic (RWMM). This is an application for Windows or Macintosh that will keep a rotating portion of your local music cached on the RadioWeave servers. RWMM doesn't manage artwork or ratings yet, and isn't very pretty, so we don't consider it complete. But even in this form it is quite useful so we're making it available for feedback.

The RWMM AIR application may be downloaded here . (If you don't have Adobe AIR installed, see here.)

When you run RWMM on your computer you'll get a screen like this:

Notes:

A - size : This is how many of your music files will be kept on the server at any one time.
B - tbd : This is feature is not enabled.
C - choose restricted channel : To protect musician's rights, RWMM will only upload to your own personal channel (but restricted for only you to hear) or to a restricted channel you own.
D - list of your music folders : Add all folders containing music files to hear on RadioWeave.
E - folders to ignore : Add folders within "include folders" that should not be cached to the server.
F - status window : Activity and error messages.

If you run RWMM on your local computer every few days you'll hear a fresh sampling of the music you own mixed in with the rest of your radio content.

If you have questions or suggestions for RadioWeaveMyMusic, please email feedback@radioweave.com.

New iPhone Release: Declaring an end to streaming smartphone radio silence

2010-04-03T14:16:00.000-07:00

RadioWeave iPhone/iPod version 1.2 is now available in the app store here. With this version we have achieved a significant milestone in the mobile streaming experience… or should I say a 272-milestone: the final QA test before submitting this version was a taxing 272 mile drive through cell-coverage hell using a first-generation iPhone.

The San Francisco Bay Area’s AT&T cell network is notoriously bad. Last weekend I drove from home to a relative’s Oakland apartment across the bay, then down 101 to Monterey, then up the coast back to Oakland through SF and another bridge, with a couple of passes through the Alameda tunnel for good measure. RadioWeave played for me, uninterrupted, the entire time. At no time was there a 3G connection, sometimes there was an Edge connection, sometimes GPRS, and quite often no connection at all (especially through the mountains and along the coast). Long periods averaged close to 20 kbps, and too often it was zero, but RadioWeave just kept playing and playing.

Immediately after the trip I called Dale, our iPhone programming genius, and said “Ship It!”

There have been other important real-world milestones in the development of RadioWeave. One of my favorite milestones was the first time I could jog for over an hour without realizing I’d been running for so long because our server algorithm delivered just the right mix of talk and tunes that made me forget how long I’d been exercising. (Should I call that a 7-milestone?)

The importance of this 1.2 release, as exemplified by last weekend’s 272-mile test drive, is that this is the first time that RadioWeave could prove itself more reliable than any terrestrial radio option, or any other iPhone option for that matter (except for Pandora - kudos to the developers at Pandora for holding up to the strain against similar tests I’ve performed).

BTW, if you’re a developer of a streaming mobile application, and you want it to run robustly under real world cellular network conditions, I'd recommend doing what we did. First develop a cell-network simulator that mimics slow networks, faulty networks, networks that deliver wrong data, and networks that frequently drop connections at any random point during communication. Second, test your code against that simulated-awful network. Third, put the code into a smartphone and test against the real network but frequently enclose that smartphone in a cast-iron pot for minutes at a time. If that all works, then, finally, take a 272-mile drive with a first-generation iPhone on the Bay Area AT&T cell network.

There are other important improvements in this iPhone release, such bug fixes and new ways to find content based on other listeners, but for me this release is all about that 272-mile drive. If you want personalized streaming social radio on your iPhone, and you aren’t always fortunate enough to be close to an unobstructed 3G cell tower, then RadioWeave 1.2 is the version for you. Get it now, before the app store runs out of copies :-)

- Brent Noorda
Founder, CEO, & QA Motorist, RadioWeave

Tune in to SXSW: How to experience SXSW 2010 via an internet radio stream

2010-03-12T15:22:00.000-08:00

I’m not at SXSW this year. Again.

But I almost feel like I'm there in Austin, eating 'Q and walking down 6th Street, because I'm tuned in to the "SXSW-List" channel on RadioWeave. I hear people reporting the goings on, tweets from attendees, and coverage of the products to be released and the bands that will play.

HOW TO LISTEN TO SXSW-LIST

To preview the SXSW-List radio channel, go to

http://radioweave.com/c9/8qm

you don't need to be a member to preview that channel. You can also hear that channel from our iPhone app (available here) by adding that channel to your weave.

WHAT YOU CAN HEAR IN SXSW-LIST

These are the channels in "SXSW-List" so far:

tag:sxsw - This channels holds any RadioWeave tracks that have been tagged with "sxsw". These may have been contributed from the RadioWeave website, or using our RadioWeave or Soundbiter iPhone apps.
twitter:#sxsw - This is a Twitter channel. It contains tweets hash-tagged with '#sxsw' and converted to speech via TTS. (If you care to add more related twitter channels, see RadioWeave twitter instructions)
sxsw AudioBoos - Boos tagged 'sxsw' and posted to http://audioboo.fm/ from their website or iPhone app (BTW, AudioBoo launched their audio-blogging application one year ago at SXSW; Congratulations AudioBoo!)
sxsw:Huffduffer - This channel streams all items entered through the http://huffduffer.com/ podcast-aggre-creator and tagged there with 'sxsw'
podcast:Scobelizer - Robert Scoble is at SXSW and using the Cinch audio-blogger to upload podcasts directly from an iPhone.
sxsw etc... - If I catch any SXSW-related information coming in that miss the above channels (e.g. uploads that weren't labeled, band recordings) I’ll also put them in this channel

If you have more suggestions for SXSW material that should get into the SXSW-List channel, let me know by emailing support@radioweave.com.

HOW TO BE CONTRIBUTE AUDIO TO SXSW-LIST

RadioWeave content is all community created. You an add audio to the SXSW-List through any of these methods:

To give direct audio feedback to anything you hear on RadioWeave, press the microphone icon and reply directly with your computer microphone or your iPhone/iTouch. That audio will be available for all to hear in a few seconds.
Any content created on RadioWeave (e.g. microphone, URL, uploaded…) may be tagged with 'sxsw'
With our Soundbiter iPhone application, you can capture sounds, live music, & comments directly at the show. With Soundbiter you can immediately edit, tag (with 'sxsw') and upload directly into the radio.
Record with the AudioBoo iPhone app, tag ‘sxsw’ and upload to AudioBoo.
Import any audio to huffduffer, and tag ‘sxsw’
tweet with #sxsw and it might appear on RadioWeave. I say ‘might’ because there are approximately a gazillion tweets about sxsw this week. There’s no way to listen to them all so we only take a reasonable portion.
Create other channels or tags related to sxsw, and let me know about them

WANT MORE? (IF YOU GET TIRED OF SXSW-LIST)

Instead of listening only to SXSW-List I suggest you add SXSW-List to your weave, so you can hear about SXSW along with many other informative and entertaining channels.

For more information about how to use RadioWeave, see http://radioweave.com/about/

What was that SXSW-List URL again?

http://radioweave.com/c9/8qm

Enjoy.

Keep Austin weird.

Modular podcasts (modcasts?)

2010-03-12T11:36:00.000-08:00

Despite spending (what seems like) 100 hours every day working on RadioWeave, I’m not very good at describing the service. So it was nice to come across someone who can make a refreshingly good description of what we’re doing (at least with regard to podcasts), even though, as far as I know, he’s never used RadioWeave.

Andrew Dubber is publishing 30 days of ideas this month. In idea #4, he explains how a better radio can be formed by modularizing and reassembling content that is being made every day, and how it can benefit listeners and publishers.

It’s all about modularization, workflow, and magic!

So skip our own embarrassing attempts to describe the future of radio, and instead read Andrew Dubber - 30 days of ideas - 04

Invite your friends to hear RadioWeave like you hear it with "belike".

2009-12-14T19:24:00.001-08:00

Here's a trick for letting your friends see how you have configured RadioWeave.

You want to introduce your friends to RadioWeave, right, but you know it takes a while to set up the weave. By using a "belike" URL you can let them try RadioWeave anonymously with all the channels that you have set up.

Here's how the URL works: http://radioweave.com/belike/YourUserName/

For example, if your user name is "Sammy" the url is http://radioweave.com/belike/sammy/ or if your user name is "Joe Schmoe" use http://radioweave.com/belike/joe%20schmoe/

Want to hear what I'm usually listening to? Try this: http://radioweave.com/belike/realgoneguy/

RadioWeave UI - take 2 (well, 3 actually)

2009-11-03T22:06:00.000-08:00

Ok, we've ripped up the carpet, refinished the hardwood floors and repainted. Whew! It's not quite a "weave bowl" after all, but we think it's prettier and easier to use. We hope. Please tell us if we didn't succeed.

And here it is:

Weave Bowl - what's a weave bowl?

2009-10-08T12:51:00.000-07:00

Why it's a place where you can mix a bunch of channels together to build your RadioWeave! This is conceptually what it will look like:

The channel (icon) in the bowl with the red border is the one that served up the current traq. Is this better than what we currently have (ok, how can it NOT be?). Please comment or tweet @radioweave.

Get local weather (reports)

2009-10-04T14:52:00.000-07:00

You can now create weather channels for wherever you live (or wherever you'd like to live) in RadioWeave. Here's how:

1. Under the "contribute" tab, select "create" then click on "new channel".
2. Pick "weather", then enter the location to search for (a zip code or city/state works best):

3. Click on "find weather station", then pick one of the available options (we'll let you know if there are no stations near you or we couldn't find the location):

4. Pick a voice.
5. Click on "create this channel"

That's it! We only bug the National Weather Service about once an hour or so, so it may take up to 60 minutes to get your first weather report - but after that you'll always be on top of the latest weather wherever you are!

Coming soon: The ability to automatically get local weather while you're RadioWeaving-on-the-go with our location-enabled iPhone app.

RadioWeave UI - ground under repair

2009-09-26T20:58:00.000-07:00

Ok, ok. We get it. Many of you have been telling us that our website's UI is kinda ugly and a bit convoluted. But we're also glad to hear that you want us to succeed. Thanks for that.

A UX friend recently told us that, charitably, the website looks like it was designed by a couple of engineers. And she's absolutely right. So please bear with us and the website's current utilitarian and slightly geeky design while we work on giving it a facelift (it actually looks a lot better than it used to in the weeks before our public release, if you can believe that).

If anyone has any specific comments about things on radioweave.com or our iPhone app that are especially ugly, hard to use, or just plain don't make sense, let us know. Please.

RadioWeave 1.0 Product Launch at DEMOfall09

2009-09-26T17:17:00.000-07:00

We launched RadioWeave 1.0, both website and iPhone application, this week at DEMOfall09 in San Diego. It was an honor to be accepted into this year's DEMO lineup, and to become part of their "proud 19 year history of launching emerging technologies that disrupt old and define new markets."

At DEMO you're allowed just six minutes on stage to present your new product to the world. Here is what we did for those six minutes:

I'm sure there's at least one Oscar-worthy performance in that presentation.

Thanks to the whole DEMO crew and the other presenting companies and attendees who were all so supportive and fun to hang with, and thanks to the many press outlets who covered our part in the event (and especially to USAToday for recognizing RadioWeave as one of their start-ups to watch).

ready to launch...

2009-09-17T15:56:00.000-07:00

wait for it...

wait for it...

tick... tick...