Todd Mundt

The great folks at Weather Underground in Ann Arbor always seemed to get this Internet thing before others did, and their latest contribution is a new iPhone app: WunderRadio.

When I saw news about it yesterday morning, my first thought was Wow, now I can easily listen to NOAA Weather Radio from Little Rock AR. Perhaps not a great reason to spend $5.99 for it. What makes it worth considering is Wunderground’s partnership with RadioTime to offer easy, searchable access to many tens of thousands of Internet radio streams, utilizing RadioTime’s database to display station logos, as well as what’s currently on the air. The app also grabs your GPS location, and serves up a listing of nearby radio stations that stream

I don’t know exactly what the new Public Radio Tuner app from APM will offer (beyond the basic info we’ve heard), but the ability to get a listing of nearby station streams via GPS, and “what’s on” info are two nifty elements that could add some great new functionality to the APM app. RadioTime’s database isn’t always correct, but a closer partnership between station and developer (certainly the case with the APM product) could give stations more control over updating this data. I’m willing to bet APM is planning to include features like this in updated versions.

This whole mobile thing is exciting - it greatly expands our listening options when we’re out and about with our devices (iPhone and others) and when you combine it with the aux jack in your car, it’s an even bigger deal: now it’s not just your iPod’s library playing through the car stereo, now it’s KCRW while you’re driving to work in Louisville KY, WNYC while you’re driving in Chicago because WNYC has The Takeaway, or Chicago Public Radio while you’re walking to work in mid-town Manhattan because they don’t carry The Takeaway.

This is simply the next step in a transformation that’s really nothing new. The Internet doesn’t make the act of broadcasting to listeners obsolete; it probably won’t make the use of AM and FM transmission obsolete for a long time; but it does mean that I’m no longer a prisoner to what one, two or even three public radio stations are offering on the legacy radio in my area. If my local station’s Morning Edition sounds like crap, and I already know what the weather will be today, why wouldn’t I listen to Maureen on KPBS’s Morning Edition on my commute? I have more than a hundred different Morning Editions streaming to me at any given moment in the morning.

Izzi Smith was saying this way back in 2004 and 2005, holding up his Treo at conferences. Remember?