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Technology Stocks : e.Digital Corporation(EDIG) - Embedded Digital Technology -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Kerry Sakolsky who wrote (12386)	4/23/2000 9:21:00 AM
From: bob	Respond to of 18366

April 20, 2000 REPRINT MARKETING & MEDIA ClickRadio to Start Digital Music Service That Plays From Computer-Disk Drives By DON CLARK Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL A start-up called ClickRadio Inc. (www.clickradio.com) is launching an unusual radio service that plays from computer disk drives, starting with music from one of the biggest record labels. The New York company hopes to differentiate itself from other music ventures with a hybrid technology that avoids the herky-jerky quality of Internet broadcasting, also known as streaming. Instead, ClickRadio plans to distribute software that comes with hundreds of songs by major artists. Professional programmers will organize the music into channels based on musical style, which users can listen to while sitting at their computers. ClickRadio, which has been working in secret on its plans for nearly three years, designed the service to satisfy record labels worried about piracy on the Web. Chairman David Benjamin was an entertainment attorney for 25 years, representing such artists as Bruce Springsteen and Paul Simon, and he worked for CBS Records and General Electric Co.'s NBC unit. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- What Makes ClickRadio Different? It's radio programming for PCs Music is stored on users' hard drives, not broadcast over the Internet Users can shape the programming by indicating songs they like and those they want to skip The sound quality is superior to most Internet formats -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The company is among the first to negotiate a new class of interactive radio licenses. Universal Music Group, a unit of Seagram Co., has agreed to supply music from its large catalog, and the company said it is negotiating with Bertelsmann AG's BMG Entertainment unit as well as other labels. It isn't disclosing details on royalties it expects to pay. Lucent Technologies Inc. is licensing to ClickRadio a technology called ePac, which includes encryption to make it harder to copy songs, as well as data compression with better sound quality than many alternatives on the Internet. ClickRadio's chief executive, Hank Williams, is a former music-industry consultant who helped organize some of the biggest live Webcasts that used streaming technology. Mr. Williams -- who is not related to singer Hank Williams Jr. -- says he became convinced that the Internet would never reliably reach millions of users with such broadcasts because of data-traffic congestion. Another problem with streaming, he noted, is the fact that users have to be connected to the Internet at the time they are listening. ClickRadio, by contrast, eventually expects its service to be played from hand-held devices, modified car radios and home-stereo equipment. "We are not a Web site but a new way to listen to music in whatever venue you happen to choose," Mr. Williams said. The service, set to begin operating on May 11, will include advertising that users hear. Listeners will also have the ability to call up song lyrics and information about artists and advertisers. Consumers also can help shape what songs they hear. While listening to a blues or country station, for example, they could click on a button called "skip" to go to the next selection, or express a stronger "thumbs-up" or "thumbs-down" opinion about songs to shape future selections they hear. There are drawbacks. ClickRadio's software and programming starts with 300 songs that take up a whopping 600 megabytes of hard-disk space. While some consumers with fast Internet connections may want to download that large a file, the company will have to distribute disks to reach many consumers. Additional tracks will be downloaded periodically when the user connects to the Internet. Many music enthusiasts, moreover, already have hard disks full of entire albums, much of it distributed in unauthorized files in the format known as MP3. Mr. Williams argues that, just as most people spend more time listening to the radio than their own collections, consumers will gravitate to a service that has been programmed for them and offers new music. The company's recruiting has been generating a buzz in music circles. Programming operations will be led by Charlie Kendall, a radio-industry veteran and former program director at several prominent stations, with contributors that include jazz musician Herbie Hancock, Scott Shannon, a longtime New York disk jockey, and Max Tolkoff, one of the inventors of alternative radio. "They are a world-class team," said Joyce Eastman, vice president of audio initiatives at Lucent.