Has anyone made money with internet radio?

I would love to start up my own radio station or a couple. I priced out bandwidth which is around $130/mo for 20 streams. The RIAA wants to take another $70 for licensing fees. That turns into $200/mo just for 20 streams!

I understand you can put up advertisements, or BUY THIS SONG banners that link you to amazon, or even offer subscriptions... but it just doesnt seem likely to clear any profit unless you are on top.

Does anyone here have any experience on the profitibiliy of internet radio?

 

i don't think it would be profitable...considering there's so many of them

 

Well I think if you stick to a certain genre such as electronic music, your only competing with 50 or so on shoutcast... and most of them do not have many listeners. I dont think getting a lot of listeners is the problem, i think its are you going to pull revenue from your radios site.

 

IMO most people who listen internet radio are savvy enough to download the song they want via one of the P2P programs...

In addition I think that most people prefer to listen to via WinAmp hassle free process, find point click, listen (no www interface for people to see (for click here to buy this song)...) and they can rip the songs w. Streamripper for WinAmp for that matter...

And people dislike commercials... there are so many commercial free choices that they would go else where to avoid them...

But hey you can try it out for free and be up and running in 5 minutes...

Just follow the guide on http://www.shoutcast.com/download/serve.phtml

From what I know rules are no more then two songs from the same album per hour and no RIAA fees... (but check in w. the rest of the rules)

board for help: http://forums.winamp.com/forumdisplay.php?forumid=140

 

i havnt done internet radio for profit but i have done pirate radio (live on air)

the way they make there money is by say having 2 hour sets per dj/whoever and in between sets play some pre-recorded ads, if its aimed at a local group, try asking shops in the area if they want advertisment and stuff, also as far as the website goes you can also sell ad space on there too!

 

Id think that there would be way to may people out there doing it already. When I open shoutcast I see that the top 5 have 5,000 listeners+ at any given moment. How does someone get to that level?

 

Did you make a decision on this?

 

If you do carry it out please keep us all informed.

I would not be interested in doing it but i would in finding out how its going for you

 

I dunno...i saw this website a while ago, i can dig it up if you want, where it was only $10/month for a radio station.

I am considering it right now... (just need to find the site again)

 

Let us know the url if you find it.

 

we are starting up one aswell, but this one is for a local group, talking about recent things in the area and also music they all like etc etc! we got sponsors in the neighborhood, like sponsor of today is Bakery Bercoop, for the finest bread blablabla!

 

pod cast is the way to go..

 

I've cooled on the idea now, think it was just a whim, lol

 

If you were born in wales you must have heard the tales of chester fans, and what we done to you. We went to wrexham Town .......................................

Hey Hey Will.

Pity the game got cancelled last week. Im a chester lad myself

No hard feeling though hey

Give me a shout sometime

 

Thanks for all your responses guys. I am putting the idea on hold right now because other projects have come up. I think the website you guys were referring to that is $10/mo is digitallyimported.com