CBS Digital Radio Network: They Have Nailed It

Yesterday I attended a launch event that really impressed me. As I watched it, I sent this twitter message:

Watching a killer presentation on the cbs digital radio network. These guys have nailed it

I got a bunch of replies asking for more, but I've been offline for most of the past 24 hours and couldn't get around to posting about it.

Paid Content has a post on the event that does a good job of "play by play". But it really doesn't capture what went down.

Ad Age did a slightly better job with their coverage, but also missed the big point.

And that point is this. CBS has launched a single flash player that showcases all of their terrestrial stations' internet streams, all of their internet radio streams (like the new WNEW), all of AOL's internet stations (which CBS now operates for AOL), and best of all allows the listener to create their own custom radio stations that are also available on the player.

And that flash player can be launched whenever you visit a CBS radio station's website, whenever you play an AOL radio station, and whenever you play a custom station you or your friends create using the new CBS digital radio network.

Think about this. They have rolled out the entire spectrum of what radio might be on one single player. You want to listen to WFAN? You can do it on the player. You want to listen to AOL's indie rock stream? You can do it on the player. You want to create and listen your own station? You can do that on the player. I suspect it won't be long before you can listen to any last.fm stream on that player too.

And here's what really got me. When all of this audio content is being delivered in a single network, CBS can move you around the network when it makes sense. If you are listening to the AOL indie rock stream and Wilco is playing in the WXRT studio, the CBS digital radio network can alert you in the AOL stream and give you one click access to the Wilco live performance.

As my friend David Goodman explained, when the next Eliot Spitzer moment happens, you can go from the wonderful WNEW stream to 1010 WINS to get the news and then go back, all in a single state of the art flash player.

As I said in my twitter, these guys have nailed it.

Comments

[LiquidSoapDispenser]

I hope it somehow equates to more income for them -- most of my work has come from CBS Radio for the past 13 years, and things certainly have gotten tighter in the industry since the 90s.

[bluesmoke]

As a former dj and syndicated radio show producer, most of us have watched terrestrial radio go down the tubes for years. (I'm speaking now of music stations). Between the major label iron grip, the lobbyists trying to destroy the competition, satellite radio, Clear Channel and its ridiculous cronies, itunes and other digital distribution models, the programming "experts" who listen with their mouths, and the rest of the dog & pony show, it has been a slow-moving train wreck.

For all its "new frontier" questions and hurdles, CBS has done what no one thought possible - developed a business model to capture this new technology. Last Fm is brilliant. It learns your style and introduces new ones. I am speaking from experience on this one. With absolutely zero promotion, I posted 4 of my own albums back in July of '07. I now have a steady listening audience of 100+ listeners that I can network with and sell songs to. And I am a nobody.

But do you think any music oriented terrestrial radio station would have given me the time of day?

With results like that, who needs radio at all?