net radio

The lecture on net radio raised the point of the impermanence of the internet, several times.
Your favourite site could be gone tomorrow, or it's format could have changed, so if you are looking for something from memory, it may no longer exist. How inconvenient! Perhaps the solution is to take screenshots, save and download any photos, text or files that you want to keep, in case of server trouble or sites disappearing.

I found it interesting that some radio stations (indie ones rather than commercial) allowed people to visit their websites and listen to or download past shows. This is different than regular radio, which is generally live to allow it to be interactive through call ins, and people being unable to keep what comes out of the radio as a record. Why would someone want to stream/download and listen to a radio show from last week? It loses it's relevance depending on your location, for example in Auckland at 11pm on Sunday night it's not particularly useful to know that it rained in Chicago last Tuesday. I don't listen to either regular radio or net radio, because I have a large amount of music that I like to listen to. If I need more, there's nowhere faster (leaked tracks, albums, unreleased material) or vast than the internet. This is the danger of isolation mentioned in many books about new media, that people will choose to listen to only what they want, thus cutting them out of the public sphere. It's understandable though, to not want to hear DJ prattle, or songs that you dislike.