Web radio has lot of potential, but Indian market still not professionally ready to go with.

Web casting, yet, another broadcasting technology needs to be geared up in India. Radio Industry in India not yet explored web radio in true professional way. Legal and technological limitation in India, suppress this high potential market of web radio. Web radio works beyond the national boundaries, so it has international market potential. A streaming media system based on windows media technologies typically consists of a computer running an encoder (such as Microsoft Windows Media Encoder), a server running Windows Media Services, and players. The web server often have embedded java based player for easy access, but it utilises little more bandwidth. Many online radio stations allow copying the streaming server link from web server, which can be accessed by the URL of the user music player. Streaming audio is played on a computer, but not saved in local hard disc as in download. The encoder enables us to convert both live and pre-recorded audio to windows media format. The server running windows media services known as windows media server, enables us to distribute the content over a network. Users receive the content which is distributed by using a player, such as windows media player. Internet radio involves a streaming medium that presents listeners with a continuous stream of audio over which they have no control, much like traditional broadcast media; in this respect, it is distinct from on-demand file serving. Internet radio is also distinct from pod casting, which involves downloading rather than streaming. In India the domestic internet infrastructure not yet ready for uninterrupted streaming of high quality at user end, buffering time is still high which result into delay and jitter.

Internet bandwidth of DS-3 which supports maximum 45 megabits per second and STM-1 support 155 megabits per second are very costly. The major infrastructure required for web radio station is high end streaming server capable of handling hundreds of concurrent users and very high bandwidth with encoding device. Streaming with 128 kbps and sample frequency of 44.1 kHz is a standard practice. Listener uses download data packet, where as server utilises upload data packet. As the number of user increases available server bandwidth decreases, which leads to bandwidth bottleneck. Streaming with stereo utilize more bandwidth. Bandwidth at the server end is the most important factor. Bandwidth is the major technical issue. The server should be placed in high and redundant bandwidth geographical area. Making a play list for web radio is very difficult task, as it is accessible to all domain of human population where ever internet is available. Web application server links up audio steaming server to cater streaming radio to the user. Live studio PGM can be encoded by media encoder and connected to audio streaming server which can be via payment gateway.

Pay and use radio is still a way out of reality. As internet radio listener directly log in to web server and web server linkup with the streaming server internally, so several revenue application can be forced to the user screen. Internet radio can be accessed in I-phones web radio application. Internet Radio with Wi-Fi connectivity is increasingly becoming popular. Steaming media server can also be attached with mobile application server, to receive live internet radio.

Analysis of web radio listener, via software can be done instantly. True picture of positive listener at every instant of time is available. Not only that which part of the world listen to the channel most, can also be framed. Total time spent by a single listener can also be calculated. Show popularity graph with real figure can be plotted. Advertisers may justify themselves with real figures of listeners. In a nutshell web radio has lot of potential, but Indian market still not professionally ready to go with.