2. It should then appear in the menu of playable media types in the rounded corner box just below the play button. So select this:

If You Cannot See Internet Radio in iTunes

Here what to do:

iTunes Internet Radio panel

What You Need

Obvious really: an internet connection and an App.

As stated above the App can be a piece of software on your desk computer or mobile phone or be built into dedicated hardware that is designed to look and operate like a standard radio. Doing an internet search reveals thousands of options. You may choose packages that are free or subscribe to special benefits. Many of the free ones even allow recording of what you hear live or at pre-arranged times for replay later.

Not Podcasting

Obviously internet radio is not podcasting, which is the supply of short audio clips, but a high proportion of internet radio players allow the replay of these. The name comes from an amalgamation of the name of the early MP3 players called iPods (which are still sold) and broadcasting.

You Probably Already Have An Internet Radio App

Yes if you have Apple iTunes or Windows Media Player or the mobile Music Player app then these will tune into Internet Radio. Let’s have a look how...

iTunes or the mobile Music Player app will enable selection of Internet Radio stations. However this may not be enabled. Hover over the image to the right to show what you should see. The choice is so large it’s been split into 25 genres.

History Of Internet Radio

The internet has a long history. It started to grow outside of scientific establishments in the late 1980‘s. Commercial use seemed pointless at the time because nobody was able to display what was being sent out. That obviously grew. However since the dawn of the BBC 70 years before radio was seen as a good method of mass communication. However reception could be very poor especially in remote locations. By the early 1990’s computer connections were beginning to be rolled out widely. Digital audio had been proved feasible decades before and in 1982 the CD was launched. These computer networks became more useful for sending information out including teaching. On occasions live audio would be sent out. In 1993 the first dedicated audio streams were provided and from those the idea of an internet radio station developed.

What Is Internet Radio

As the cost of the necessary equipment and connections came down then streaming audio to a waiting audience became financially feasible. A few websites listed what one must do to listen to that stream. Today nearly every radio station is available online. One can go to their website and open up a streaming panel.

Nowadays dedicated devices and computer applications, for desk computers or mobile phones, exist cheaply to act like a ‘radio’ to make it easy to search out these ‘stations’ and place them in one of your preset memories. They are styled to look and operate just like a traditional radio which anyone can use without any expertise.

How Does An Internet Radio Know

The internet radio doesn’t have a tuner to scan for stations in the way that any of us will have in the past. Yet the internet is vast so the obvious question is: How does it know where the internet stations are ? Anyone can start an internet station by registering it, with some technical details, with one of the free registers like: StreamDir, Reciva, iHeard, StreamFinder, Shoutcast, PartyTuner, RealRadios etc. When you buy your equipment or download your app the manufacturer will maintain a database that looks at these and provides the necessary method to hook up. A bit tricky for them but easy for you.              For example heres one: Create Your Own Radio Station

All my life I worked in quality TV but now it seems the originality has been replaced with ‘reality’ fly-on-the-wall voyerism or quiz shows because they’re cheap. Comedies have to follow a formula of set up the one liner and then trot it out. The brains have gone. The crazy eccentric asconced view on the every day now needs to be sleazy. I love radio. It can be mundane but so often it’s varied, thought through, a friend when you need one and wonderfully portable. Nowadays it’s even more portable - let’s see how....

1. Check that Internet Radio hasn’t been disabled in your Restrictions tab of your Preferences. Make sure it is NOT checked.

3. If it doesn’t appear in the rounded box just below the play button scroll down to the bottom of that list to Edit Menu:

4. 4.Then, in the dropdown list that says Show these items in the menu check the box that says Internet Radio. I’m not sure why they make this such hard work but here’s how you do it. Then click Done.

A lot of people really don’t like WMP12 because it hasn’t been updated since 2009 yet it’s still bundled with Win 8 and Win10 thus it won’t play certain formats of media most notably MP4. However you’ll be pleased to know that it can stream Internet Radio. Initially, just like Apple above, no controls are visible so you will need to enable Media Guide. In order to do this follow the steps here:

        Livewire: How To Use Streaming Windows Internet Radio

Given the dated state of WMP12 a large number of companies offer free players for instance AIMP2, Nexus Radio, etc. This very tasty one called Saturn by Desktopmetronome (which costs £10.64 at time of writing) took my fancy.

If you don’t like the iTunes option then there are a lot of free alternatives like Pulsar, Radium, Last.fm and this player called Snowtape shown right.

These are all downloaded apps please don’t forget that there are website players too - which are therefore platform independent.

My apologies for not covering other operating systems like Linux. Furthermore I completely understand if you’re not as keen on this technology as me and there is another way to just dip your toe:

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