Radio Free America is…
Radio Free America is a FREE online / mobile platform for college, independent and non-commercial / educational stations and their DJs / Program Hosts - along with the listeners and the contributors that make up the broader community. We provide not only the streams, but essential tools and services - free of charge - to optimize the radio experience for all users and stations. Our cloud-streaming and cloud-storage environment will support and enhance these public radio stations, allowing them to preserve and distribute the innovative, free form content served up in this, the last bastion of non-commercial radio entertainment.
Why?
Radio By the People, For the People
Radio Free America is about taking independent radio media and making it available to the masses. “That’s already been done”, you may say, but you may be surprised at how limited it is. While some of these stations exist online, they are scattered - difficult to discover - and largely unknown beyond their locale.
For most college stations, the Program Directors and DJs struggle to maintain their online feeds and are severely limited with how much of the media they can stream (it’s expensive!) and what tools they have to help them engage and understand their audience. The Radio Free America tools provide totally cool solutions and new opportunities for these Program Directors and DJs, thereby bringing this community together.
Among the best new features in the Radio Free America platform is the program archive. In keeping with the DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) we will be offering archiving software that allows DJs and Program Hosts to store their shows to be available online anytime. We’re going to let users search these archives for the shows they want, and allow users to help be a part of the radio resurgence by adding meta information and tags to the media (if you don’t understand what that means, then trust us when we say this simple action will be very appreciated by Stations, DJs, Bands and Contributors).
Moreover, Radio Free America is where Bands meet Fans!
College DJs and Program Hosts are always looking for new music, podcasts and all kinds of radio talent in order to stay fresh and relevant.
And…
Bands and Artists (musicians, journalists, storytellers, poets & pundits) are looking to be heard, discovered and played by the independent and college radio DJs - today’s tastemakers.
Enter Radio Free America - the natural online environment for this meeting - complete with a custom recommendation engine, instant messaging and the coolest player to facilitate the best experience for all parties.
Anyone can be a Contributor on Radio Free America. Your upload of original material will be available and discoverable on our platform, throughout the college and non-commercial radio community.
So, in this respect, Radio Free America is a directory for a constant stream of fresh, innovative, undiscovered, open source, freeform expression.
Interested?
Take a look at the video above and see what the Program Director and some of the DJs have to say, courtesy of our good friends at KUNM - University of New Mexico.
Why Radio Free America was created
Online Radio is a big business. Corporate behemoths are assimilating radio stations as we speak, and molding them in their own image. If you have an opinion on what ClearChannel has done to radio, then you already know why this is important.
Independent and College radio is one of the last forms of non-corporate controlled media left. They are the unencumbered voice of freedom on the airwaves - a forum for new music, new ideas, alternative views, relevant news, information on events and the promotion of local talent.
Radio Free America is a non-partisan advocate of non-commercial radio providing these stations with the tools necessary to compete with their mainstream commercial counterparts. Our purpose is to make independent media as available and easy to search as online mainstream commercial radio stations - with much more fun and discovery. We are here to bring together the last vestiges of true indie media and make it available to all.
What’s in it for you - and everyone in the Radio Free America Community
For Stations - Cloud-streaming & cloud storage, online station profile, media encoding and duplication, analytics, audience engagement and station management.
DJs - Archive programs for on-demand listening, online DJ profile, analytics, audience engagement, content sharing, real-time group engagement for shows, fan management, discover and interact with new artists.
Listeners - Discovery, online personal profile free streaming, recommendation engine, crowd based tagging and station meta support, personal profile, instanced ‘chat’ rooms with stored threads and content engagement, mobile player, saved shows and stored favorites.
Bands / Contributors - Upload your content, Band / Contributor profile, gain exposure and be recognized in this most relevant community. Free streaming, recommendation engine, crowd based tagging and station meta support, instanced ‘chat’ rooms with stored threads and content engagement, mobile player, saved shows and stored favorites.
Most importantly, we’re going to provide these services for FREE to everyone.
Your donation helps make that happen and no matter what size your donation, you will always be a ‘founding member’. For us, this is much more than just at title. As we grow, we will remember your early support, include you in every instance and seek out ways to show you our never ending appreciation. :)
Our Prizes
We hope you'll enjoy our items. These are pieces that we know we can make beautifully and deliver as promised as we start this journey. However, this is just the beginning of our ‘schwag’ program. We will continue to introduce great new Radio Free America items and will share them first with you, our founding members.
In our mind, the most important prize from Radio Free America goes to everyone who loves public radio. It's the preservation of this last realm of free expression and the corresponding benefits from it, which we all share and hope to enjoy into the future.
What we’re going to do with your money
To cut to the chase: use it to get best of class hardware, design and development and make the Radio Free America platform free to all. Financial access to the tools and services is where the mainstream commercial stations overpower the independents.
It’s expensive to implement the resources necessary to compete. To lay out the specific equipment and tools Radio Free America is employing will divulge proprietary information that we have worked hard to develop, but the lion’s share of money obtained from this funding effort will go toward acquiring the hardware necessary for this monumental task.
We at Radio Free America are putting our own ‘skin in the game’ and all of our combined experience to ensure the best design (Legwork), and the best development (BlueModus) and now we just need the final bits ~ the equipment to make this a reality.
Who’s involved
The success of our IndieGogo campaign is not a requirement for the success of Radio Free America. It’s going to take a bit longer, and we may have to sell some body organs on the black market (just kidding), but we’re going to make this happen one way or another.
Kenneth Pushkin - Radio Free America has been a dream and life goal of Kenneth for quite some time. Those who know him can attest to his voracious dedication to making this happen, and his consistency in driving for best of class in all areas. He’s put together the vision, the team and the resources. A friend to all indie radio and indie bands, he has spent years fine tuning and crafting this concept - and now it’s ready. Kenneth is a philanthropist, successful serial entrepreneur, art scholar, musician, and all around good guy.
Bryon Taylor - I started my first streaming media company 15 years ago, BanTV. Back then I was looking to make video streaming available and creating our own video for online streaming. We were holding our own with some pretty great services like Sputnik7, Heavy, and others that were blazing digital trails back in the early days of streaming. I held the position of VP, Public Relations, but coordinated the technology and strategy for the other elements of the site. There is no doubt that back then, we were ahead of our time . Now, 15 years later I hold the same position in a similar model. In this time, I have not been idle. I’ve run the digital strategy for big youth brands like Airwalk, Vision Streetwear, Sims Snowboards, Lamar Snowboards and a host of others. More recently I’ve managed digital projects for Bacardi, Grey Goose, Dewars, and too many others to mention. I’ve been project lead on 4 Webby award winning projects , a few SXSW honorable mentions, and a smattering of other recognitions, though mostly with the help of using the right people - the same people we’re working with to bring you Radio Free America. But most importantly, this is my shot to take all the things I have learned, all my streaming media digital background and focus it on a project that I love - Radio Free America will not fail.
BlueModus - What kind of project do you get when one of the best development companies in the world has spent a year planning, diligently mapping out the processes and figuring out a structure to make the Radio Free America platform work? You get a solid platform that does exactly what it is intended to do. Led by industry vets David Conder (Chief Architect) and Troy Hall (Solution Lead) to name two of many involved.
Legwork Studio - One of the most respected and Innovative design houses in the country right now, and we are honored to be working with them. Legwork Studio needs no introduction for those who are familiar with this winner of multiple webby’s and numerous other awards. If you are not familiar with them, you should check them out, it is worth the time and you will quickly see the caliber that is Radio Free America.
You - Radio Free America belongs to everyone. That’s is why our motto is ‘Radio By the People, For the People’. Let’s do this together. Not in the cheesy “your donation makes you a part of the team” kind of way, but in a genuine “we will build a better platform if we do it together” kind of way. Join our social media pages, give us your suggestions, and have the chance to say that you collaborated in the creation of Radio Free America. Your participation will be welcome at every level. We will provide tools to engage and show our thanks to those who help us make Radio Free America a platform that lives up to it’s potential.
Join us now at:
Facebook.com/radiofreeamerica
Twitter.com/radiofree
The Closing Pitch:
Radio Free America is not just a set of tools on a web platform, it is a chance to make a difference in independent media and the world around us. Access to information, talk from all sides and viewpoints, music we would never hear on a mainstream station, and views not influenced by corporate control or profits - that’s what Radio Free America is about.
There are so many great options on Indiegogo, we feel that we have the potential to stand out among them. Preserving and maintaining one of the last forms of independent media is important and our promise to you is that we will not let this fail.
Your donation is priceless. The value that College and Independent radio stations and their DJs & Program Hosts bring to us is beyond estimation. They must be celebrated and supported for the benefit of us all - the Bands, the Contributors, and the Listeners that make up the Radio Free America community.
If you have any questions, we are available to any of you for the next 60 days. Give us a call on Skype at Radio Free America or email at info@radiofreeamerica.com
Thank you for your time, and please consider becoming a founding member of Radio Free America.