In what may mark the first viable system allowing audio delivery over the Internet for offline listening, Audio Highway has announced the testing of Listen Up, a handheld personal musical appliance that allows users to download musical programming over the Net, then play it back over earphones and low-level broadcasts to car stereos.
On Thursday, the Consumer Electronics Show awarded Listen Up its Innovation '97 Award. Already announcing content deals with Muzak, the Associated Press, Newsweek, Berlitz, and MCA records, the Cupertino, California-based Audio Highway has initially targeted commuters eager for drive-time listening.
Audio Highway is hoping that the free downloads and customizable content will entice enough consumers to buy the Listen Up units and deal with the requisite tedious downloading and the added annoyance that comes with toting around yet another device. The company is also betting on its proprietary delivery system that will force all users to log on to the Audio Highway Web site to obtain the programming, which seems, so far, to be very mainstream.
While interested by possibilities of the technology, some Internet audio experts question the selection of content and providers.
"It could be a good first step, but they'll have to keep asking themselves, 'What's there that you can't get more conveniently?'" asks Kim Danders, executive producer of RadioSegueway, a weekly digital culture radio magazine.
"Why would you spend time downloading a news program for your drive, when you could just turn on the radio? The value of audio programming on the Web is niche marketing, not stuff that you can get easily elsewhere," said Danders.
