Become Your Own Personal Radio Station!

By kiri stromberg

Music is, and always has been, a very social experience. I know I’ve made several friends by bonding over music at concerts, at parties, in dorms; hell, I had a whole conversation with a woman over elevator music once when we got stuck (the music, thankfully, had turned off). With the internet a secure part of our daily lives, it was only a matter of time before those social connections through music made it to the web. While most of the attention has focused on the uproar around illegal downloading sites, what interests me is the legal stuff- the sites like last.fm, Lala, and Pandora where users can stream music, share what they’re listening to, and browse the selections and recommendations of other users.

A recent article from CNN looks at the newest surge of music sharing as it spreads around the internet. The article mentions several ways users can now broadcast their music interests, like the “now listening” feature on Skype or status updates on Facebook, Twitter, and the music-oriented Blip.fm. What caught my eye was the mention towards the end of the article about a new company called Jook.

(Random sidenote: I don’t know how familiar you are with Asian cuisine, but “jook,” also known as “congee,” is a common kind of rice porridge: an odd association, and probably the first reason why this company caught my eye.)

Jook has created technology for headphones and music players that allows a listener to broadcast what they’re playing and allows others near them to listen in. You can change the mode that your headphones are in from “Me” mode (normal headphones setting, completely private) to “Us” mode (you are broadcasting whatever song you’re listening to) to “U” mode (you are listening to someone else’s music). A light on the headphones changes color to indicate what mode a listener is in.

The company explains on their website that they are trying to bring back the social aspect of music, as personal MP3 players are rather solitary experiences. Their intent was to allow the social sharing of music in an easier and more universal way than speakers or splitting a pair of ear buds.

I still haven’t fully processed my reaction to this. At the very least, it will be interesting to see if the idea can gain popularity in the future. I think I’m mostly curious to see how much this technology will cost the consumer. And hoping I won't be broadcasting to others when shuffle pulls up some of the more embarrassing songs in my collection.