Naturally, curiosity got the best of me as I spent some time recently browsing the available apps for my new Nokia N95 8GB... low and behold, there was included on the deck a link to download the new, Open Source, Internet radio application... who wouldn't want to try this?? Free music, I'm all over that!

Once installed, the application is friendly and efficient, providing access to a seemingly endless list of radio stations from around the Globe. Stations are presented by category or genre, geographic location, language, or listed by favorites. Clicking the "Station Guide" option brings up all of these available categories.

As an initial test, I opt to list by country and look around Canada to see what's available. To my surprise I find that the radio station from my old University (U of Victoria, BC) is listed - CFUV.  I simply click on the station title, it loads on the screen, and immediately begins to play. Under the options tab I can easily add the station to my favorites for quick access in the future. Clicking the station information tab provides me with additional information about the station like location, call letters, and genre. A nice feature of the application is the way that the music continues to play while you navigate around in search of other cool music stops. As a test, I navigate to Brazil stations, load one and the music fades out from the UVIC music and the new selection fades in... quite clever.

Browsing by language is likely a popular way to select some entertainment. Currently there are some 304 English stations and many others are available including Finnish (only 2??), French, Dutch, German, Greek, Hebrew and any other language you can think of are provided. After surfing around the UI you can easily return to your currently playing station and song by clicking the Options / Go To Now Playing selection.

Perhaps the most pleasant surprise in using this cool, free service is the excellent sound quality provided by the N95 8GB... listening to the music through the loudspeaker is actually very bearable and borders closely on the enjoyable. Obviously some speakers or a nice headset would provide a much better listening experience but having the option to simply play aloud is nice.

Video Review:

About S60 Internet Radio... This is a reference implementation of HTTP Internet Radio streaming (Shoutcast) for S60 2nd and 3rd Edition devices. It is intended primarily as a learning tool for the S60 developer community. The S60 Internet Radio reference application is a fully working example of an audio application developed for the S60 platform. The application supports SHOUTcast streaming audio playback. Currently, MP3 and AAC+ streams are supported.

The application also supports local playback of audio files in the following formats: MP3, AAC, eAAC+, MP4, M4A, WMA, 3GPP, AMR, and WAV.

Supported Devices:
S60 3rd Edition
Nokia 3250, E60, E61, E70, N71, N73, N80, N91, N92, N93

S60 2rd Edition, Feature Pack 3
Nokia N70, N72, N90

S60 2rd Edition, Feature Pack 2
Nokia 6630, 6680, 6681, 6682

See http://opensource.nokia.com/projects/s60internetradio/index.html