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Music Media

Coming Soon, Roadcasting 331

Posted by CmdrTaco from the you-can-cast-anywhere-else dept.
ByteWoopy writes "from Wired.com 'Stuck in traffic and sick of Howard Stern, you may soon be able to tune in to the music collection of the person in the car in front of you. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University are developing an ad hoc networking system for cars that would allow any driver to broadcast music to any other vehicle within a 30-mile radius. Developed by a group of current and former master's students at the Human Computer Interaction Institute, the Roadcasting project would allow drivers to stream their MP3 music collections by Wi-Fi or similar technology to any other vehicle within range that is equipped with compatible hardware and software. '"
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Coming Soon, Roadcasting More

Coming Soon, Roadcasting

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  • The *.AAs are going to have a field day, after hearing this...! :-)

  • So... (Score:5, Funny)

    by nathan s ( 719490 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:19AM (#12695160) Homepage
    ...if the hot chick in the Benz starts playing "Naughty Girl" when I tune in, then I should take it as an invitation to follow her home?
  • And next we will see the RIAA complaining about how these new broadcasters are not paying royalties for said music. One wonders if they are building in a verification system so that the powers that be know just what songs you played, how many people were listening, and how many of your children you must now give to the RIAA for the pleasure of using their music.

  • VAN (Score:5, Funny)

    by ari_j ( 90255 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:20AM (#12695173)
    This is what you would call a Vehicle-Area Network, or VAN for short.
  • I'd like to hear them ask the RIAA for funding.
  • Great. Now I can hear the bling bling of the ricers around me.

    I'M. SO. THRILLED.

  • Sounds similar to a system in Cory Doctorow's EST (Score:5, Informative)

    by arevos ( 659374 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:21AM (#12695187) Homepage
    Cory Doctorow's Eastern Standard Tribe had essentially the same system described. I wonder if these chaps got their inspiration from EST, or if it's a case of life imitating art.
  • This is kind of like social networking, only without all the hassle of being social.

  • Tune in, Turn on, Turn left (Score:4, Funny)

    by ackthpt ( 218170 ) * on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:22AM (#12695199) Homepage Journal
    hey, welcome to traffic jams from station 620-LPT, the black thunderbird! It's 5:30 PM and how's your coolant level? We've got the Smiths coming up, but first, the driver of the Red Explorer, your left turn signal has been on for the past two miles, are you turning any day now? [cue music]
    • That's awesome. A clever road-DJ like that could become something of a legend and/or celebrity among the 8-5 folks.
    • Will this be any different from the kids that got themselves a Geocities page, thought they would make some money from all the traffic (ha!), and slapped banner ads all over it?

      "Now, a word from our sponsors. Don't change the channel - they pay my car payment."
    • What I'd really like to see is a way to broadcast messages to other drivers, like:

      "GET OUT OF MY WAY, MORON!!!"
      or
      "SLOWER TRAFFIC KEEP RIGHT!!!"
      or
      "TURN OFF YOUR BLINKER!!!"
      • Slashdot humor value aside, I think it would be a tremendously bad idea to give drivers this sort of inter-car communication. Can you imagine the road rage one would invoke by streaming "FUCK YOU ASSHOLE!" into someone's vehicle instead of a simply giving him the finger? Talk about dangerous freeways.

  • Ummmm handheld radio? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by trevdak ( 797540 )
    How is this different from, say, a handheld radio with microphone input hooked up to an ipod? Also, I would expect it would be unusable in NYC because advertisers would just broadcast on every channel possible.

    • Re:Ummmm handheld radio? (Score:5, Funny)

      by YrWrstNtmr ( 564987 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:43AM (#12695498)
      How is this different from, say, a handheld radio with microphone input hooked up to an ipod?

      Because you have not inserted enough buzzwords into the concept.

      WiFi
      ad hoc network
      *casting
      nodes
      mesh

      I could go on, but you get the idea.

      • In all fairness, this is a research project. It doesn't need to be justified or marketed, so even if there are other ways to do this, that's OK. It may be a stupid application of the technology, but researching self-organizing mobile networks is cool regardless.
        • Research project? yeah, I guess.

          Research for whom, though.
          "Roadcasting was commissioned by a "major automaker" looking for applications to make use of mobile ad hoc networks that will be included in production cars in the next few years."

  • Listen to whose music? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by YrWrstNtmr ( 564987 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:23AM (#12695212)
    I'd rather just set this up at the house, and 'cast to my car.

    Of course, the FCC and RIAA will be all over this.

    'Public performance'
    'clogging the spectrum'
    'private radio stations'

    May be a good concept, but the implementation will be a bitch.

  • No chance you this kind of system will succeed. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by flowerp ( 512865 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:23AM (#12695214)
    Am I the only one to see a problem here? Why should I potentially buy such an audio sharing system if no one else has one? The classic chicken and egg problem!

    Plus, the broadcaster's association as well as copyright holders would be lobbying against it. See how Apple had to cripple itunes music sharing?

  • ...Attention everyone, attention. You. You in the white truck, You are following too closely. and You in the grey sedan, please try to stay at least 5 mph above the limit, and you, the girl in the red celica, please write down your phone number and hold it up to the window. It is very critical that you all do this. Thank you. And now back to regular programming...

  • RIAA comments aside (Score:3, Insightful)

    by lavalyn ( 649886 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:25AM (#12695262) Homepage Journal
    I doubt your neighbouring drivers have any better taste in music than whatever station is repeating the same drivel they call music on the air. Sadly, there's a reason (other than sheer repetition) why "top 40" are there - people do like songs like that.

    In the same vein, your taste in Chinese rap probably doesn't appeal to many people driving around you either.

  • Network Traffic (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Doc Ruby ( 173196 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:26AM (#12695266) Homepage Journal
    Instead of a point-to-point application, this tech must become a P2P medium to have any value. Not only do populations of neighboring cars change constantly, quickly, and with little warning (use your blinkers!), but who wants to interact with the mostly random person in the car next to you? Maybe a cocommuter friend somewhere else in a 15-minute pod of traffic, but not the mostly random guy picking his nose and karaoking to "Sister Christian" in the Hyundai that just cut you off.

    Meshes of short-range, low-power highway devices can, instead, form a medium layer in a TCP/IP network. Nothing about the neighboring cars' identity matters, just that they support the protocol, and have enough spatial density. Then they can bridge the gap to high bandwidth hops to the Internet. Along the way, they can aggregate traffic data, which can inform traffic jockeys and drivers to optimize flow (though, ironically, reduce necessary density). This project is a nice demo, but it needs to get buried in the protocol stack before the rubber really meets the road.

  • Uh... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Fizzlewhiff ( 256410 ) <jeffshannon@hotm ... m minus language> on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:27AM (#12695289) Homepage
    Just roll down your windows, you can already hear the crap they are playing.

  • Sonic Attack (Score:3, Funny)

    by nugneant ( 553683 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:27AM (#12695297) Journal
    Great! I'm loading mine with Barbera Striesland outtakes, Yoko Ono, Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music, Melt Banana, Whitney Houston, some Pia Zadora, and as much Tiny Tim as I can find! Then I'm taking over the highways and freeways like Max before me!

    I can imagine other drivers ceeding the right of way as they scramble at their dials to disable "auto download" whenever I get near. Or even better, I'll take a small boombox and crank ghetto rap, Phish Bootlegs, rare techno remixes, and other stuff to get noticed. THEN they get -Kazaa! - SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEECHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHWO ULDN'TITBELOOOOOOOOVERLYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIEA IEAIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    About time guerilla warfare techniques had application on the open road.

  • Who cares about music? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Colin Smith ( 2679 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:28AM (#12695306)
    I want to be able to tell the twat in front of me to put the bloody phone down and stop weaving over the bloody road.

  • "Khaaaaaaaaan!!!"

  • Wow... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by TripMaster Monkey ( 862126 ) * on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:30AM (#12695341)

    This is easily the dumbest thing I've seen all day.

    In fact, there is only one reason why I like it....but it's a big reason.

    The RIAA is bound to hate it, and drive themelves into seizures trying to regulate/kill it.

    And anything that drives the RIAA crazy and wastes their time is aces in my book.

    ^_%
    • Your nick is Tripmaster Monkey and your claiming that THIS is the stupidest thing you've seen all day?

      • Your nick is Tripmaster Monkey and your claiming that THIS is the stupidest thing you've seen all day?

        It was...until I saw your post.

    • Re:Wow... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by fritz1968 ( 569074 )
      The RIAA is bound to hate it, and drive themelves into seizures trying to regulate/kill it.

      That's nothing. (I'm not sure on the point I am about to make, but) wouldn't a Federal department (on broadcasting) have a problem with this? With a 30 mile radius, the car is basically a mobile radio station... subject to regulation.

      just my $0.02

    • Re:Wow... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by gclef ( 96311 )
      I disagree...if they can really pull off 30 miles, that's a big deal (that covers big parts of most major metro areas), especially to radio.

      Morning and evening drive-time are the biggest money-makers for radio (it's almost the only time many people listen to the radio anymore). If you give people the ability to stream indie feeds into their cars, drive-time suddenly gets much more competitive, especially if your cost to stream to cars approaches zero.

      My only concern is: who's allowed to be a stream sourc
  • "Hey good looking, we'll be back to pick you up later!"
    • Oh god, I am so glad I'm not the only one to think that.

      (ObBitching: Slashdot is dumb to make me wait 20 seconds to post this. Don't discriminate against me because I'm a fast typist, OK?)

  • No way in hell (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Leroy_Brown242 ( 683141 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:33AM (#12695376) Homepage Journal
    FCC, RIAA, and the bible thumpers will never allow this.

    FCC:
    Uncontrolled language and content. They get on Howard Stern for some little crap. What about the Hippy who scream obsenities from his VW bus about conspiracies and how much weed he smokes? They'd never allow it.

    RIAA:
    You think they'll allow free playing licenced music? Also, pirated music will get played and they'll get their panties in a bunch.

    Bible Thumpers:
    All the free thinking and freedom of speach will drive these guys crazy. Now any idiot with a radio will have access to swearing and sexual content potentially!
    "Oh noes! Sexy talk! Won't anyone think of the children!?"

    • Won't anyone think of the children!?

      Odd, that's the same battlecry that the likes of Diane Feinstein use. Methinks you're too limited in vision as to who'd down your rights.

      Once again I remind the users of Slashdot who wanted to limit the access to music based on content? It wasn't Ma and Pa Kettle, it was the oh-so-liberal and free thinking Tipper Gore.
  • How could you ever get sick of Howard Stern? (read with copious sarcasm)

    • Re:Howard Stern? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by spif ( 4749 )
      Seriously though, Stern is an enemy of the FCC and Clear Channel, which makes him a friend in my book. He drives conservative politicians and religious freaks nuts, too, which is just gravy. If he were on all day I'd listen to him, especially when he starts talking about the people who hate him and how hypocritical and ridiculous they are.
  • What are they going to broadcast? Traffic reports and whining kids?

    "Traffic on Main street approaching Elm is stop-and-go. I can't tell if there is an accident or whether it is just volume because there is a U-Haul van in front of me... Billy! Stop hitting your sister! Wait, we're moving... Nope, we've stopped again... I know, Sally, but the traffic isn't moving... Ok! The U-Haul is turning onto Elm. Rats! There's a Fedex truck. Now I'm behind a Fedex truck... Billy, sit your butt in that seat r
  • Wardialing, Wardriving, Warspying is dead. Now is the time of podcasting, roadcasting, etc. I, for one, welcome our new buzz-slinging overloards.

  • ugh... (Score:3)

    by utexaspunk ( 527541 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:38AM (#12695432)
    Am I the only one who is tired of all this podcasting [wikipedia.org], bodcasting [zdnet.com], roadcasting [roadcasting.org], godcasting [businessweek.com], and rod casting [stcroixrods.com]?
  • Won't there be some kind of legal issues for doing something like this? You're basicly making a public broadcast of your music collection.

    If you're like most people, you're going to have significant amounts of commercial music in your collection. If this kind of thing catches on, I wonder if it will be a brand new attack vector for the RIAA.
  • "This is the next big challenge for the RIAA," said Schultz. "If they thought file sharing over P2P networks was a threat to their business model, then this is a whole different challenge that they have to adapt to, because there's no way they can police this."

    The RIAA can lobby electronics makers and car companies against the production of cheap hardware that does this, and therefore effectively kill it. They have managed to greatly reduce the number of internet radio stations. It is no fun to broadca
  • Is what monkeys do poocasting?

  • Words with the music... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by It doesn't come easy ( 695416 ) * on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:48AM (#12695560) Journal
    Hey, it might be nice to have words to go with the whuump whuump whuump from the car next to me...
  • With the exception of commercials, I don't see how this would differ from radio in anyway. Instead of being confined to listen to whatever is playing over the FM radio waves from the local tower you now have the ability to listen to the EXACT SAME MUSIC coming from other peoples mp3 players. Tuning through 100 casts of 50cent and Toby Keith to find someone else casting something I'm interested in is not my idea of a productive way of finding good music. I'll stick to my own collection instead while drivi

  • What's the use? (Score:3, Informative)

    by just fiddling around ( 636818 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:52AM (#12695602) Journal
    I don't know why I should get a new expensive system, while FM transmitters are cheap [radioshack.com] and don't require a new radio in the listener's car...
  • So if you live near a lot of traffic, not only do you have to put up with drivers that can't keep their hands off their horns, now these people will also generate lots of interference. And why? Aren't AM, FM, and a few hundred stations on satellite radio enough?

  • fm modulator (Score:3, Informative)

    by aberson ( 461047 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @11:55AM (#12695638) Homepage
    just like tuning into to the neighboring car's FM modulator transmitting their ipod...
  • become irrelevant? Cut through the mediator and reclaim the airwaves! Are you sick and tired of corporate TV/radio? Well, broadcast your own without *gasp* ads or commercial breaks.

    In the near future mainstream TV/radio/media will be talking to themselves. Grassroots (communist) radio/music here we come...
  • Plenty of nice, kind, near-deaf people have been sharing their music with me for YEARS by the simple method of having gigantic speakers in their cars and blaring their music at a volume high enough to produce visible distortions in the air.

    But now, with modern technology, they can annoy people who CHOSE to listen to whatever melody-impaired song they're playing.

    Sadly, people on the sidewalk may loose out on such a chance, so they'll still have to employ their nuclear-powered speakers to continue their gen

  • Makes me Think Of Desertcrossing Radio (Score:4, Interesting)

    by szyzyg ( 7313 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @12:00PM (#12695705)
    I've driven to Defcon a few times and there's a somewhat official convoy which travels from California to Vegas, this convoy has it's own radio station which is usually better than anything you can get on commercial stations ;-)

    I remember once getting left behind - my then girlfriend (now wife) wanted to get in&out burger, and we had to catch up. Being a DJ I'd submitted a mix to desertcrossing radio, and it was scheduled to be played before we got to vegas. So I spent the next hour or so racing to catch up and get back in radio range. We did get back in time to hear my slot, and we were greeted with the sight of 50+ cars all string out on a hill in front of us with their hazard lights blinking.

    Easily my favourite Defcon moment ;-)

  • here's a novel idea... "ear-casting" (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tenebrious1 ( 530949 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @12:00PM (#12695711) Homepage
    How about creating some device that will let iPod users listen to their own music? Some sort of personal speaker system that pumps their music directly into their own ears, so no one else can hear it, so it bothers no one else, that allows them the flexibility to listen to their particular style of music? There *must* be some way to do this!

  • . . . ONLY if *I* get exclusive no-bid contracts to provide the equipment police will use to catch these evil drive-by Music Pirates!
  • How about instead of streaming music, you just get to hear me swear and belittle you as you drive at 55 in the fast lane? Thats much more pleasurable for me so long as its a one-way conversation and you're easily intimidated.
  • I'm already doing this...

    A sticker in the window "iTrip 89.9 FM" and anyone with a radio can listen to my mix. Not that I want someone riding my bumper on the highway just to keep listening, but it's small enough that they can't read it except in bumper to bumper city traffic anyhow.

    Hack an iTrip with an additional watt or so of transmit power and a simple wire antenna, and you're good for a couple hundred feet.

  • All the Honda Civics with coffee-can mufflers already have this technology, and you don't need to buy any special equipment to receive the music. Just listen. You'll hear the bass half a mile away.

  • it's almost physically painful to imagine all the work that's going to go into setting something like this up, only to produce a result that is pretty much infinitely shitter than just playing your own mix CD, and definitely infinitely shitter than being about to hook up your ipod to the radio.
  • These kinds of developments are certainly cool, and I can see that this system could go beyond music.

    But right now its primary design is for music broadcasting, and unlicensed public performances are definetly not legal. So wtf do these guys think they're doing?

    How can they possibly argue that this device will mostly be used for legal activity when the primary purpose is to broadcast from someone's personal collection of music.

    Honestly, this is pretty stupid. Radio stations pay huge fees to broadcast m
  • Pump up the volume and open the windows. It won't reach 30 miles but it's free of licensing restrictions (zoning restrictions are another matter), at least until the RIAA figures out how to collect for public performances on roads.

  • Ghetto version (Score:3, Funny)

    by BluedemonX ( 198949 ) on Wednesday June 01, 2005 @12:20PM (#12695951)
    Just turn up dat hoopty G-trigga joint and shake da windowze of all da cars around y'all aaa-ight?

    You don't need no fancy equipment and nobody around you needs it neither. Just some bling 22 inch rims yo, a big ole bass can in the back, a power amp rated in gigawattz and da latest remix of "doan make me smack you, ho" an' you can be "roadcastin'" down the road at 3am.
  • The RIAA announces that they are supporting the development of a new form of roadside camera. Instead of photographing cars travelling to fast or ignoring traffic lights this one will photograph "roadcasters". They hope that future legislation will allow them to directly bill the relevent drivers.
  • No more need for an expensive car player, just broadcast from home using the same technology!

    And hey, maybe it'd be possible to somehow setup a text message system where you can type in:

    artist - album - track# ...and it plays from there? I'm sure this could totally be done. It may not have as many benefits if it's just you (because an mp3 player would do a better job), BUT what if you setup a server and told all of your friends the number to text, so that you can all use the same service (and setup a qu
  • Let me predict the natural path this will take:

    1. Broadcasts of music from car to car
    2. Ability to specify the sending and recieving car
    3. Broadcasts of voice and text
    4. Ability to send graphics
    5. Ability to send live video
    6. Guys sending live video feeds of their privates to innocent woman driving by

  • If a convoy of cars broadcast jazz to each other, would that be a traffic jam?
  • its called winding your window down and turning up the radio.
  • I'd rather sit in silence then have to listen to that crap you call music!
  • I already get to experience the joy of roadcast.
    There I go, minding my own business, listening to 87.9 FM -- WPOD, which somehow knows to play only songs I own and songs I like, and then all of a sudden my Mighty Wind and Bon Jovi singing in spanish gets interrupted by the staticky sound of Limp Biskit... I look to the car on my left and see that the dude in the souped up Honday is bobbing his head to the music in my car, and i realize-- his XM Radio FM transceiver relay can beat up my dinky little iTrip.

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