How do you stream?

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Hello All

I have two or three hosts that I pay for that WordPress sites are hosted on along with some other HTML sites that I have built for people And myself. I must’ve built 70 html and WordPress sites I can bill them for fun.

I used to own a company called UK entertainment and we were a large corporate entertainment company providing lighting audio and equipment I am a qualified sound engineer and could set up equipment for Wembley size events.

I have recently sold this business due to my wife age 44 with three young children developing cancer and spread throughout her body due to the shenanigans of COVID-19 joke and missed misdiagnosis and has only been given the limited time to live. so I was going to set it up so I could have phone-ins and the music to chat about similar things that have happened to other folks in the same or similar situation.

You could have a set up the size of Radio One but whether or not you can get the stream is irrelevant. I don’t want to use a third-party where you have to pay to stream through the service when I have many hosts and basically want to have my music at home so if I wanted to put a CD home or a vinyl record to a laptop running DJ software I could. And there is not one video does it tell you how you stream it live.

So I have bought two Domain names essentialradio.uk and tictokradio.com I think I will probably end up using essential radio though as the other one may implement copyright problems.

So what I’m trying to work out is that no one else seems to explain I want to build a website with various stuff on the local news charts etc ect. And there is literally a button somewhere on there that says listen live. You click on it live radio starts like on every other radio station real heart bbc etc etc.

There must be some type of URL address that you’re streaming to so essentially your use it like line in to a amp or mixing desk. As I said before there is thousands of videos and all the other show you with the equipment well that’s all wonderful.

I could have two articulated lorries full of equipment but how do you get the line or there must be some type of URL you sent to the person listening to it receives it. And nobody can hear you.

And as everyone else explains on the thousands of videos about the equipment mixing desks laptops mics ect ect online. And everybody explains what microphone they’ve got to what mixing desk then something magical happens. You could have 150 mixing desks 150 microphones 610 pairs of headphones 45 pairs of monitor speakers 25 laptops 15 pc computers but that’s all irrelevant if nobody can hear you. Unless you just talk to yourself and presume people are listening. And that’s what I’m missing.

I must have 15 computers all Macs as when I sold my business I emptied the offices and I also have a couple of normal laptops.

Kindest regards,
Richard

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Hi @Losingwilltolive thanks for the question.

If you’re wondering how to actually live stream a radio station online with listen live button just like the BBC, Heart and other online stations.

You’ll need an online service to do this.

I’d recommend Airtime Pro as they give you all the tools to stream your audio and also build you a basic radio station page online.

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Hi @Losingwilltolive

I went through the exact frustration as you articulated when I was to starting my station earlier this year. I looked at all of the packages offered by the streaming companies. I didn’t want to pay for all of those bundled services. Instead, I decided that all I wanted from my streaming company was their streaming capability. The stream quality was very important to me, so that automatically cut the options down. Many of these services offer only 196kbps. I wanted 320kbps. Since I have a fully functional studio capable of doing all my production, and keeping my station live 24/7 without a cloud option, I wasn’t interested in paying for cloud storage space. Also important to me was their embedded player offerings for websites, I wanted a smartphone app for my listeners to use.

You need to decide what services that you need from them, But understand that the more you take on yourself, the more work you’ll need to undertake yourself. For me, based on my criteria listed above, I chose a company called RCAST.NET. Even then, it wasn’t a perfect solution because I didn’t get everything I wanted from them as they don’t have a smartphone app. But they do offer streaming at 320kbps and the embedded players, and that’s really all I use them for.

You quickly learn that once you hit the air, you’ll want to register your station on all of the other Internet Radio Station directories that you can, So, in my case, I use the smartphone app of RADIO.NET, and that’s what I promote to my listeners to use. It works great.

Finally, as you look at the companies, and their pricing models, don’t be shy to ask them to put a custom package together that meets your specific requirements. Some won’t do this, but my experience is that others will.

Regarding HOW you get your station on the air, I use a program called “Rocket Broadcaster Pro”, it works great once you enter in the stream info provided by the provider you choose. Couldn’t have been easier.

I hope that helps, all the best to you with your personal issues and your radio dreams.

Rob

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