TuneIn has created an interesting arrangement with Bing, the Microsoft search engine. Searches for “online radio” return a panel of Bing’s most searched-for radio webcasts, a mix of terrestrial and pureplay stations. (Mostly terrestrial. And at least one podcast that we encountered.) Clicking any one of them results in a TuneIn-branded embedded player for that station, with information about that station in most cases. The embedded player pops out into its own smallish window when you click the Play button.
The feature works with the “online radio” search, and no other phrase that we could dream up. “Internet radio,” “webcasts,” “streaming radio” — no good.
We counted 55 stations in the sideways scrolling, carousel-style display presented by Bing. Microsoft promises to add to that number, mentioning 10,000 as a possible number — that would be a display challenge.