RadioDNS was presented to the Spanish radio industry at Radio 2.0 in Madrid, Spain this week – in a talk entitled “How can technological innovation increase consumption of radio, and effectively connect with brands?” (Nick Piggott)

RadioDNS will also be part of a speech at the EGTA “Radio Thematic Day” at the end of next week in Instanbul, Turkey. EGTA is the association of radio and television sales houses. (James Cridland)

And, later this month, the RadioDNS Project will be taking part in ON2 Test Signals in Berlin, Germany – in both the workshops (Nick Piggott and some of the RadioDNS development team) and in the conference (James Cridland).

We’re grateful for the chance to spread the word about RadioDNS.

Nick Piggott, Chair, writes the following:

Hello,

We send these RadioDNS updates out periodically, to keep you up to
date with progress on the project. If you or a colleague
might enjoy getting these updates, join http://groups.google.com/group/radiodns-announce

RADIODNS AT IBC

IBC is one of the world’s biggest broadcast technology exhibitions,
and RadioDNS was represented as part of the EBU’s “Hybrid Digital
Radio” presentation, on Stand 10.D12. The EBU have constructed an
entire digital transmission chain, and RadioDNS forms an integral part
of that.

Interest in the Hybrid Radio concept is high. At the EBU Press
Conference on Friday 10th September, which covered topics including 3D
HDTV, TV Loudness and Hybrid Radio, more than half the questions were
about Hybrid Radio. There was a steady flow of visitors to the stand,
wanting to know more about the opportunities that RadioDNS enables.

I’d like to thank the EBU for their kind invitation to present on
their stand. It’s a great example of how our Members and Supporters
can support RadioDNS in practical ways.

RADIODNS ON MORE DEVICES

There doesn’t seem to be any limit to the devices that people can use
for Hybrid Radio.

The EBU have implemented RadioDNS on the CHUMBY ONE, which is a small
desktop media device, which retails for around $100. Not only is a
great demo of how radio should work on a media device, it’s also been
enthusiastically received by the Chumby developers, who want to make
RadioDNS an integral part of the product. Follow the discussion here.

RADIODNS IN WASHINGTON, DC.

RadioDNS will make a presentation to the NRSC (National Radio
Standards Committee) on 29th September, to update the members on our
progress.

I’m going to be in Washington on 28th and 29th September, and can meet
any US broadcasters, manufacturers or service providers who would like
to know more about RadioDNS. If you (or a colleague) are attending the
NAB show, then do get in contact (nick.piggott@radiodns.org) and we’ll
find a time to meet up.

Thanks to the NAB (another of our Members) for organising this
opportunity.

RADIODNS OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE

RadioDNS encourages the development of open-source solutions. I’m
pleased to tell you about more open source code that is available to
developers, and could help you get RadioDNS services for your radio
station(s) faster and more cheaply.

There are two implementations of RadioVIS servers now available:
• The EBU has released its RadioVIS tool and server, written in Java,
supporting both STOMP and COMET.
• Global Radio has released a simple RadioVIS publishing tool and
server, running under Node (server side Javascript).

EBU will be shortly releasing more code, including the Chumby One
code, and Global will be releasing code relating to the mobile
clients. More on that soon.

SENSIA TO GET RADIOVIS WITH FM

The Sensia has been an iconic device for hybrid radio, and PURE will
be releasing a firmware update by Christmas that will enable RadioVIS
when you’re listening to FM Radio. This opens up the opportunities for
many more radio stations to start visualising their output.

NEW MEMBER JOINS RADIODNS

I’m really pleased to welcome Cox Media as a member of RadioDNS. Cox
are a prominent radio operator in the US, and it’s great to even more
of our US colleagues join the group.

PROMOTING RADIODNS

If you would like to include RadioDNS in your presentations, then get
in contact and we will try and provide you with things like Powerpoint
Slides and images you can use. We’ll try and make this a part of the
website, but in the meantime just e-mail feedback@radiodns.org

Of course, you can take full credit for introducing your audience to
the concept of Hybrid Radio.
—–

That’s all for this update. If you signed up after visiting us at IBC,
then thanks for taking the time to come to the stand and find out
about RadioDNS. As people join the list every day, I’ll just remind
you that RadioDNS is an open project, run by its members, and you can
find out about how to be a Member, Supporter or User.

If you have anything you’d like included in the new update, just send
it to feedback@radiodns.org. And of course, you can follow us on
Twitter as @RadioDNS.

Thank you for your support and interest in RadioDNS,

Nick Piggott
Chairperson
RadioDNS

Ben Poor, Lead of the RadioVIS developer workgroup, says in a post today…

I’d like to take a short moment to encourage all of you who are involved in
the broadcast of RadioVIS feeds to expand the range of platforms that you
support. I know that the majority of you are broadcasting RadioVIS topics
covering the DAB platforms, and some also the existing version of the IP
platform from the specification.

Some of you may be aware that there are a number of devices coming very soon
which will make use of FM RDS information to locate a RadioVIS feed, and it
would be most advantageous to Broadcasters and the RadioVIS ecosystem to
have your feed available at launch.

A number of different Stomp servers provide facilities to ‘symbolic link’
topics, meaning that there is not a great deal of extra work to be done. I’m
sure that any questions on the exact implementation of this would be
gratefully received on the discussion group.

http://groups.google.com/group/radiovis-developers/

We’re delighted to announce that RadioDNS will be demonstrated and discussed at Le Radio, France’s premier radio conference, in Paris in October.

Nick Piggott, Chair, will be at the event, discussing the future of hybrid radio.

More information

At the recent IBC conference in Amsterdam, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) demonstrated a number of hybrid radio devices using open source radio production and transmission tools.

Above is a video of RadioVIS/FM running on a Chumby One: demonstrating FM audio being accompanied by visuals from the internet connection, using RadioDNS.

Notably, this service displays live pictures from traffic cameras, and the production tools also built by the EBU allow broadcasters to immediately slot live pictures into the broadcast.

The stand also displayed RadioVIS/DAB on a PURE Sensia and two implementations of RadioVIS/FM on two mobile phone platforms; as well as other digital transmissions. The entire platform, including the software-defined radio system for DAB transmission, cost less than €5,000.

The team behind the software suite – both the production suite and the Chumby software – plan to release the code in open source.

Further information related to this project:

• The EBU’s open-source RadioVIS server source, hosted at Google Code
• Photographs and more information about the open-source digital transmission chain at IBC

We’re pleased to announce that RadioDNS will be at the UK’s Radio Festival 2010 in Salford Quays, England.

At TechCon, the pre-conference technical gathering, the RadioDNS team will be presenting the technical details behind RadioDNS.

At the Radio Festival itself, chair Nick Piggott and secretary James Cridland will be presenting what RadioDNS means for people in radio programming and sales: including some demonstrations of RadioDNS-enabled receivers.

Tickets for the Radio Festival, the UK’s foremost radio gathering, are available now.

We’re pleased to announce that RadioDNS will be demonstrated at IBC in the EBU Village – booth 10.D21

The EBU, one of RadioDNS’s founder Members, have created a “digital radio area” and will be displaying various technologies including a working demonstration of RadioDNS.

The IBC is the leading international forum for the electronics industry, and the exhibition is open between 10-14 September 2010 at the RAI in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Periodically we send out a short summary of all the recent activity in the RadioDNS project. If you’d like to receive it by e-mail, join our (low-traffic) announcements group at http://groups.google.com/group/radiodns-announce

—–
Talking about RadioDNS

As RadioDNS grows in size and visibility, more people are talking about the opportunities that hybrid radio provides the industry, and how RadioDNS can play a role in that development. Here’s a selection of interesting reads (and listens) that help put what we’re doing into context.

Industry discusses RadioDNS (podcast):
In a tumultuous period for UK Radio, RadioDNS’ Secretary Elect James Cridland explains why hybrid radio is a bright innovation for the industry. If you’re interested in the saga of the consolidation, de-regulation and “de-localisation” of UK radio, then enjoy this podcast from the beginning, but the RadioDNS specific discussion starts at 36’50″.
http://www.radioacademypodcast.co.uk/podcast/iframe.phtml/?podcast_id=81

BBC works on RadioDNS:
The BBC are members of RadioDNS, and their Research and Development team has been working on RadioDNS for some time. George Wright, the head of the team, gives some insight into their work generally, and what they’re working on with RadioDNS, in a blog update.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/researchanddevelopment/2010/07/prototyping-weeknotes-22-09071.shtml

RadioDNS in the US:
The last RadioDNS update came directly after a significant event for RadioDNS – our first every live presentation of RadioDNS in action on a mobile handset at the TechINK conference in Santa Monica, CA. Here’s how RadioINK covered the event.
http://www.radioink.com/Article.asp?id=1828297&spid=24698

Hybrid Radio is “Better” Radio:
Hybrid Radio is about making better radio, and who better to judge that than listeners and non-technology colleagues. James Stodd (a UK Radio producer), gives his review of 95.8 Capital FM (London’s) “Summertime Ball Event”, and likes what his RadioDNS enabled radio can do for him and other listeners.
http://jamesstodd.wordpress.com/2010/06/07/summertime-ball-mixes-it-up/

Hybrid Radio is more profitable radio:
Hybrid Radio should also be more profitable radio, and I’m pleased to see more stations and their clients realising the added value it can deliver. Global Radio (UK) have been commercialising visualised radio for some time, and now Absolute Radio (UK) are writing new revenues streams from it too.
http://onegoldensquare.com/2010/07/universal-mccann-book-a-microsoft-office-campaign-that-includes-radio-dns-visuals-by-paul-brown/

Hybrid Radio in the car:
Roger Lancot is an Analyst for Strategy Analytics, and he’s been looking at the challenges of getting digital radio a standard item in vehicles worldwide. He talks about how a hybrid approach, as enabled by RadioDNS, could be the ideal scenario for manufacturers.
http://blogs.strategyanalytics.com/auto/?p=125

—–
Team Updates

All three Technical Teams agreed by the Steering Board meeting are now up and running, and working on solutions for their respective challenges. Any member can join a team, and supporters can ask the Team Leader if they’d like to join too.

RadioVIS is led by Ben Poor and is specifying the presentation of visuals to accompany radio
RadioEPG is led by Ben Matthew and is specifying the provision of EPG and other Service Related Data
RadioTAG is led by Andy Buckingham and is specifying a simple interaction framework for connected radios

You can follow all their discussions in our Developers’ discussions at http://groups.google.com/group/radiodns-developers

—–
Trials

More stations are trialling RadioDNS, including our first temporary event-based station. The number of countries in the database continues to grow, and we’re more than happy to help stations who want to trial RadioDNS. We’re expecting the members and supporters to continue releasing open-source software packages to allow broadcasters and manufacturers to quickly build test and development environments – that information will be circulated on the Developers’ list and added to the website when it happens.

—–
TVDNS?

They say great minds think alike, and we recently made contact with Project Baird, who are looking at how hybrid TV might evolve. It’s relevant as more connected TV manufacturers also look to include an enhanced radio experience. The project is looking at how RadioDNS or a close-variant of it, might become part of their project. We’ll keep you updated their progress, but if you’re technically inclined, you can follow the discussion here.
http://projectbaird.com/discovery/tvdns/

—–
Pure Offer

I’m very pleased to say that PURE, the manufacturers of digital radios, have offered members of RadioDNS a discount on their entire range of radios, including the Sensia which includes RadioDNS technology. If you’d like to take advantage of that offer, please e-mail me (nick dot piggott at radiodns dot org) and I will pass your interest onto PURE.

—–
Coming Up

We expect to be announcing some new members to the project shortly, and demonstrating RadioDNS on more stations and more devices. We’re also hoping that RadioDNS will be present in some form at IBC Amsterdam (September) and the NAB Radio Show (October).

—–
Finally

As ever, RadioDNS thrives on the involvement and engagement of its members and supporters. Supporters can get involved for free, and members (who get voting rights and control the direction of the organisation) pay a membership fee of just CHF2.000,- (about USD1,800, EUR1.200,-) a year.

If you know a station or an individual who’d like to know more or get involved, send them in the direction of http://radiodns.org/membership or get them to email feedback@radiodns.org

Thanks for reading this update,

Nick Piggott
Chairperson
RadioDNS

RadioDNS founder Members Absolute Radio have been creating content using RadioDNS technologies since the launch of the PURE Sensia.

Today, they’ve added a blog post to their corporate website with a headline “Universal McCann book a Microsoft Office campaign that includes RadioDNS visuals“.

The article and video contains no more details about the Microsoft campaign, but does contain a useful overview of the kind of content that’s available on Absolute Radio’s RadioVIS feed.

The capability of RadioDNS technologies, like RadioVIS, to earn additional revenues for broadcasters is an important part of the suite of technologies that the RadioDNS framework allows. We’re delighted that adverting agencies and broadcasters alike are recognising the capability of RadioDNS-enabled technology to reach audiences in a more powerful way.

Andy Buckingham, who is heading up the RadioTAG team, writes:

Following on from Ben’s establishment of the RadioVIS application team
I would now like to announce to the wider RadioDNS development
community the list of members for the RadioTAG Application Team:

James Cridland – Not At All Bad Ltd
André Fatton
Mark Glanville – BBC
Chris Gould – All In Media
Sebastian Kett – Südwestrundfunk (SWR)
David Madelin
Jason Malaure – All In Media
Chris Needham – BBC

As the current documentation for tag is an initial draft specification
the primary focus of the team is to publish a final V1.0 specification
for the RadioTAG application. This will then allow those interested
parties to implement the application from both a client and server
perspective.

Key areas that need the attention of the team include, but are not limited to:

* Finalising a suitable authentication methodology between client and server
* Finalising the data exchange between client and server

I would also like to host discussions on the potential for different
service providers to share information on tagged events so users can
view tags from one particular service provider on another service
providers platform.

Beyond finalising the specification it would be fantastic to see
members and the wider community develop a shared knowledge on how to
implement the protocol and potentially see some open source libraries
emerge within the RadioDNS ecosystem at large.

As with Ben and the RadioVIS team, I will be leading the discussion
and presenting my own thoughts on the above points but also acting as
a collator of the team’s thoughts. If you would still like to join in
and have your say on RadioTAG then please do get in touch with some
details on why you are interested in taking part and I will do my best
to accommodate you.

This e-mail will be followed with an introduction to the RadioTAG
developers list which is independent of this list. You are free to
observe the work of the team over at
http://groups.google.com/group/radiotag-developers/

Finally a very special thank you to those new members who have agreed
to dedicate time to this project. I hope we can present back to the
wider RadioDNS developer community a well thought out and innovative
final specification for RadioTAG in a timely fashion.