PraiseVoice Network

This question has come up more often than any other. It seems many people wish for something like a jukebox where you select a song to listen to. This is a great idea and we have such a jukebox too, but why the radio? To answer this question in the best way possible, it is necessary to explain between “on demand” and “live streaming” technologies both used to listen to music online. This obviously determines the technology of choice.

• On demand technology allows you play a music or video file only when you suits you to. It will be the same file for all listerners even if they opened it at different times. That is, if user A in France clicks on the link for file “Silent night” at 6:00 pm GMT, it will play from the beginning (or designated start time) and can be stopped anytime. The same will apply to user B in USA say at 11: 00 PM GMT. Notice that the user experience is independent of the webmaster’s intervention in this case.
• On the other hand, Live streaming works almost the same as traditional radio or TV transmission (at least conceptually). The program to be listened to is controlled by an individual (or a group of individuals) remotely and whatever changes is carried out by the presenter affects all users. For instance, if user A connects at 6:00 PM GMT and user B comes at 7:00 PM GMT, the latter will be forced to pick from where the former already is (position of stream at server). Much the same way in traditional Radio transmission. I will not go in the specifics of the technology itself, given the scope of this post.

Now, what was the big idea with the Radio? Does it give a better user experience that a self serve setting? Certainly, or not depending on how you look at it. When I created praiseVoice I was excited about sharing the music but I was also concerned with copyright infringement. The Radio reduces the risk of piracy remarkably. The Reason follows from the explanation above because streaming technology doesn’t give the user much of a choice as of what they can do with files. As a matter of fact, in streaming technology you are given access to the server but not the files. On demand you enjoy the benefit of accessing both. Another benefit of “Radio” over whatever else the user wants is uniformity. While someone may argue it’s a good idea to let people do whatever they want, it is also a good idea to do things together. So, if there are 25 listeners worldwide at any given time listening to the same song, chances are they will more than likely pray, think about, read about, . . . the same topic. Of course this has its limitations and that’s why there’s the PraiseVoice On demand. Briefly as security is concerned, streaming is the best choice.