Over the years, regular broadcast radio has become a touch authoratative. The system worked back before popular music was designed to be popular, but today we’re all pretty much presented with the same sugary garbage and expected to pick our favorites. Audiophiles seperate themselves from the pack by seeking out the most obscure sounds they can find, but for the regular person who still loves radio but wants to take back the airwaves, there’s Jelli. You don’t create your own customizable station, nor do you assemble a playlist yourself. Jelli is a musical democracy, with one playlist that’s decided by user voting. This idea brings back the influence of listeners on what’s actually popular. Take that major labels.

Why do we like Brooklyn Radio? Probably because it’s not actually a radio station, which is good because we don’t listen to the radio anymore. On their newly relaunched website, you won’t find call letters or frequency numbers. Instead of through the airwaves, you can listen to Brooklyn Radio from its website via podcast and streaming audio. You can choose which of the shows (each are updated regularly) you want to listen to, and you can listen at your leisure — free to skip ahead or to pause, if you like.

The new site is an attractive blog format, with a menu of the station’s programming down the left side of the page. Under the “columns” tab there is even some purely editorial content. Overall, the tone of the site (and the columns) is pleasingly informal and comedic. Some of the shows available for a listen include The Rub, which ran a best-of Ghostface show this week, and The Dope Spot, which kicked off its most recent show with a funktastic Bob Marley remix. The Dope Spot’s DJ, Dan Martino, sums up the Brooklyn Radio project best himself. “Good evening, good afternoon, good morning, whenever it is you’re listening,” he says, “this is not real world time; this is internet time.” Yes, it is.

When Pandora came out, I was instantaneously addicted and I’m not afraid to admit it. I loved that I could type in a certain artist or song name, and it would analyze my choice and spit closely-fitted music back at me. Musicovery is like Pandora in the way that you are ultimately at the mercy of their algorithm or whatever their music choosing method is, but it allows you more discretion than Pandora. You can choose music by genre, era, popularity, dance beat, and by mood (by selecting a point on a four axis matrix blending dark, positive, energetic, and calm moods). Once you make your set your criteria, your playlist is displayed in an animated spider web-esque trail on your screen. I have been experimenting with Musicovery all morning, and it has definitely thrown me some great picks (more eclectic and international than I expected).

When the FCC granted a request by Chicago Public Radio to boost their wattage by 7 times, the team led by president Tony Malatia decided that they would use the new broader reach to tap into a demographic that is not traditionally known to listen to CPR – young, non-whites. Though this is not a unusual goal, it is a lofty one and Malatia and his group of talented producers, DJ’s, and program managers have come up with an interesting approach. They are hoping that the viral marketing that has brought success to YouTube and MySpace can bring them some luck as well. No set playlists or pre-programmed elements. Instead, hosts will be given two hour long blocks which they can direct as they please. Listeners will be able to upload their own music and other content to the website, affording millions of garage musicians a chance for some radio playtime. Chicago Public Radio and their tongue-in-cheek SecretRadioProject (password: newcitizenband) could very well change the landscape of radio.

Via Time Out Chicago, thanks Kedar!

Want to hear a quite possibly very entertaining interview with yours truly on the radio? I did an interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that’s airing this Saturday on the ‘Definitely Not The Opera‘ show with radio host Sook-Yin Lee between 1 and 2pm EST. There are several ways to listen to it– if you have Sirius Satellite Radio tune into channel 137– if you’re in the frozen land of Canada check out this massive map to find out what frequency it will be broadcasted on– and of course if you’re online you can stream it through Windows Media Player or Ogg Vorbis– just select something in the ‘East’ time zone and you should be all set. If you miss it don’t worry, I’ll get a copy to share.

Update: Well, I don’t remember my repsonses being in that specific order, minus a few wrong ‘facts’ in their intro (Nike a client?), and cutting it down to only a few minutes, it turned out all right! If you missed it you can check out my 5 minutes of fame here: Listen to the MP3

I don’t listen to the radio much at all unless I forget my nano and I’m forced to scan the static abyss in search of a song while I’m in my car. The whole idea of having a desktop radio seems hopelessly romantic to me because I use my computer for just about everything now– but I love these Scandinavian made Asono DAB1 radios. It’s really an intuitive piece of electronics– it can be rotated and the display orientates itself automatically. There’s also an additional wireless speaker, a mini-USB plug, SD card slot, alarm, and MP3 player capabilities. If you haven’t seen Asono’s ‘Mica‘ MP3 player– check that out too.