11

Live365 returns, one year after going silent

live365-logo-bladn-and-white


Last week we revealed that the year-ago demise of Live365, the pioneering internet radio platform for small webcasters, provided the top articles on RAIN News in 2016 — in fact, the top two articles. The sad fate of Live365 emblemized the disruption caused by new webcaster royalty rates for recorded music, which took effect on January 1, 2016.

“We are elated to announce that Live365 has been rescued.” –Live365 website, January 2, 2017

Now, almost exactly one year after Live365 went dark, sending thousands of small webcasters scrambling for new platforms or giving up their stations, Live365 is back. Details are scarce, but the new owners promise RAIN News information soon. In the meantime, this is what we know now:

The website is live. It’s only a container at this point, without stations, but its framework gives clues to what’s coming. Programmers will be given “easy to learn 24/7 cloud automation. Live support will also be a 24-hour service, evidently. On the front end, players will can carry the station brand, can be embedded in websites, and will permit social sharing an a yet-unspecified way.

On the legal front, Live365 will cover webcast royalty payments (SoundExchange, ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC). While Live365 covers legal payments for music, it offers ad insertion and revenue sharing. The system will involve “easy ad insertion triggers,” which might mean that the station owner determines ad load and placement.

Prices range from $59/month to $199/month in three plans which vary by amount of music cloud storage, and total listening hours (TLH) per month. All other features currently appear to be equal across the three levels — unlimited listeners, unlimited bandwidth, 192Kbps bandwidth (high quality for earbud streaming, though not technically hi-rez audio), and something called Go Live.

We look forward to learning more about Go Live, which sounds as if it could be a live-DJ’ing feature.

“A renewed passion for small webcasters, and fierce dedication to come back stronger.” –Live365 website

The damage to done by last year’s Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) ruling, and the simultaneous expiration of a law which protected small webcasters, cannot be totally undone. The online music sphere was disappointingly thinned and we lost many wonderful stations. Some surviving stations limited their hours or geo-blocked their streams, to reduce the cost burden of serving American listeners. A couple of large platforms likewise revised their operations to protect their businesses, in ways that limited listening or made it less convenient.

For many small webcasters, the thought of Live365 rising from the ashes could stimulate the first really good news for the field in 12 months. Step by step, we’ll soon learn more about what this means, and how it might affect the internet radio landscape.

Brad Hill

11 Comments

  1. I had left them for the “free” service of Radionomy after the shutdown. Radionomy was good until they shutdown my station for not meeting listing hour requirements. I am currently not broadcasting because I yet to find anything like the old Live 365.

    Hope the new version is as good or better. As a small webcaster targeting a small unique radio mark Live 365 was perfect for me.

  2. The interesting part is the new Live365 will cover US-based listener royalties. I assume this means that we’re on our own when it comes to licensing for the rest of the world or we have to geo-fence them out. That’s not clear from their website. Jury is still out until they’re actually up and running and have some time under their belt.

    Former Live365-er and current Radionomy station.

  3. I was really excited until I saw how much they are charging per listener hours. We hung on to Live365 until the very last day when it went silent. Then we moved to Stream Licensing and ShoutCheap. I wanted this Live365 reboot to be amazing but I can’t go from paying 60.00-80.00 per month (depending on listener hours) which is what we are paying now to 299.00 just to be back with Live365. I am extremely disappointed by this.

  4. Ed, you are covered anywhere outside the US as long as you don’t have an office there.

  5. The news is actually better even than that. Other countries have reciprocity agreements with the U.S. and SoundExchange. You are covered for foreign play, and you don’t have to worry about it.

  6. Was on live365 almost ten years.was happy with set up graffic design. Hope it will remain similar. I havent found any other platform to offer the same.

  7. Was on.live365 for almost ten years . Hope it will somewhat be the same .i havent found any other platform to compare with live365

  8. SPACE LOUNGE!!!
    It saved my life! What happened?
    Where can I find it??
    TURN ME ON DEAD MAN!! ??

Comments are closed.