Radioactive! v.6 (December 27, 2007)
Note: if AVG antivirus is telling you kblauncher.exe that downloaded with Radioactive is a virus, it isn't, it's a false positive. More info here.
Radioactive is a Windows program that tries to take the clutter out of listening to college and freeform radio over the web. Personally I hate the interface iTunes gives to Shoutcasts, and Shoutcast.com is just atrocious. So this is supposed to look like a classic jukebox. That's the idea, anyway. (And here's a version that plots all the stations on a map...)
Support is available in the forum or via email, but try to use the forum first.
Snazzbo features:
- Updates it's list of stations from the mothership when it launches. The list is pretty well chosen, all true non-commercial, freeform radio with high quality internet feeds.
- Users can give a "thumbs up" to a station, and a little "thumbs up" icon shows up next to that station for everyone. Since college radio changes so quickly the rating only lasts 30 minutes.
- Users can "flag" a station if it goes down or some info needs updating, which goes to a webpage where they can let me know what needs updating. So maybe just maybe the database will stay up to date.
- Shows the studio phone number, DJ schedule, homepage, local FM frequency, college affiliation, email, etc., for the station you're listening to.
- Random station! Click the button at the top left and it takes all the agonizing decision making away from you.
- Coolio classic jukebox interface, here's a screenshot (click it for fullsize):
- RECORD! In theory it can record the streams, although this feature needs some work. But if it works, look in c:\program files\radioactive\assets\recordings.
- Has a purdy installer and uninstaller, and doesn't install anything outside it's program directory so is very low impact on your puter.
Download it, install wherever you want (the default is c:\radioactive, might as well go with that), then run c:\radioactive\Radioactive.exe and click any button and you'll be awash in college and freeform radio.
Major issues:
- It has a built-it player, but it's super buggy. So consider it a necessity to install Winamp. It'll prompt you if it's not installed and guide you to the page with the light installation, meaning no icons on your desktop, bloated video support, etc.
- When using Winamp as the player, sometimes there's a lag between when you click a station/button and it starts playing. Don't go crazy clicking or you'll launch multiple instances of Winamp and be doomed. For now be gentle on the poor interface when using Winamp.
- The program window isn't resizable yet, so it looks great on a 1024x768 pixel screen, absolutely shitty on anything else.
- The jukebox graphic is pretty low-rez, I pulled it off google images, hoping to scan a real one soon.