Hi folks, I found out about Spinner.com months ago through Toonhead-online.com. I've downloaded the Spinner.com plug-in for Winamp and I've been listening to Spinner for quite a while now. One thing I liked about Spinner was that they had an easy listening channel. My grandmother likes easy listening and I turned the channel on for the two of us to go to sleep with. Last weekend, I ran Winamp and got an error message saying that Winamp couldn't connect to Spinner.com. I went to Spinner's web site and what came up wasn't anything about Spinner, but a web site for ... Radio at Netscape. ? I thought to myself, "Uh-oh. I'm a Microsoft Internet Explorer user. I don't think I'll mess with Radio at Netscape since I don't use Netscape's web browser." I had heard several years ago that Nullsoft, AOL and Netscape are under the same umbrella if you will--part of the same company. I downloaded the Radio at Netscape player from the site at Spinner.com and installed it. A song began to play. Fine audio quality, but the program wasn't very accessible. I had to route my PC cursor to my JAWS cursor and move around in the program to find out what I could listen to. After 30 or so songs, a box pops up saying "Are you still there? You've listened to 30 songs in a row," or something like that. I have to click the OK button in order to hear more songs. I Thought, "well this is silly." I had to leave for a while, so I exited the program. I came back later and started Radio at Netscape again. This time, the program said that a newer version of the program is available and would I like to download and install it. I clicked "yes" and the newer version was downloaded and installed. The newer version must still be in its beta stages because the older version is the one people download from the Spinner.com web site. The newer version is more accessible as at uses the user's default web browser--in my case, Internet Explorer. But there are several things about this newer version of Radio at Netscape that I strongly dislike. (1) The newer version touts AOL for Broadband and Radio at AOL *all over the place*. Not only was this newer version downloaded and installed, but a small downloader for downloading AOL for Broadband software was installed on my system. Icons named "Try AOL for Broadband" were placed on my desktop, in my start menu, and in my favorites in Internet Explorer. Icon values for AOL for Broadband were placed in the registry. Links for trying AOL for Broadband were scattered all throughout the Radio at Netscape program. (2) This newer version must not support Windows 95 and/or computers with not that much memory. Currently I'm using a computer with Windows 95, 2 gigs of hard drive space, 32 MB of RAM, Internet Explorer 5.5 and a cable modem. (Go ahead, laugh. :-) Yes I am planning on upgrading to a fast XP desktop computer in the next couple months when I get my tax money back.) Anyway, the newer version of Radio at Netscape runs v-e-r-y s-l-o-w on my computer. My computer chokes and gags on it. (3) And this is the thing I dislike the most: Users of this newer version of Radio at Netscape are only allotted so many minutes per day to listen to any of the channels on the service. When users' times are all used up, they are given the message to join AOL so they can listen to Radio at AOL where they'll be able to listen to channels unlimited. Now I'm sorry, but that is ridiculous! I mean, is it just me, or is AOL becoming just like Clear Channel? Well, that discussion is for another time, another list, but anyway, I find that limitation to be another one of AOL's desperate ways to bait in more AOL for Broadband victims--uh I mean customers. Without hesitation, I uninstalled Radio at Netscape and deleted any shortcuts, links and references to AOL for Broadband on my system. Ee-gad. Does anyone know where I can listen to easy listening music--the standards like Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Nat King Cole, Barbra Streisand and, Doris Day and others? If so, let me know on or off list. Thanks. _______________________________________________ PC-Audio List Help, Guidelines, Archives and more... http://www.pc-audio.org
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