Music Choice, stick a cable box up your ass!

One of the reasons I have digital cable is for the music channels. Music Choice, in the middle of April, is going to drop two of the four channels I listen to. I put on, according to my whim, bluegrass, classic rock, blues, and americana (sort of country/rock). They are dropping bluegrass and americana, due to their “diverse listenership”, and adding more pop, hip-hop, and rap channels. Look, fuckers, I am part of your diverse listenership, and to top that off, I’m the one who pays the fucking cable bill!

Not only that, but your diversity sucks anyway! For instance, on the Americana channel, you’ve interested me in Pam Tillis and Fred Eaglesmith. (Band in the Window and Millie’s Cafe, respectively) In all my time (off and on, one year) of listening to it, you’ve only ever played the one same song (the one that got me interested) by either; you constantly repeat the same songs by other artists too. You’re not a fucking radio station; get that into your head!

In other words, Charter Cable, if after your bankruptcy, you expect Music Choice to continue to draw paying customers, you might want to think again.

Try internet radio instead - radioio works well for me.

I have heard great things about Pandora as well.

A very busy screen, and I’m still waiting for the music. Unfortunately, my computer is not tied into my stereo speakers like my TV is, and probably never will be.

I’ve tried Pandora, but I had to pay attention to it; it wanted to know whether I liked the music or not, which is fine, but often I’m sitting over at the table reading and I just want the music to roll.

However, now that the music has started, it’s interesting. Does commercial-free really mean it? If I shell out some bucks, do I get to listen to only music?

The only input Pandora requires now is for you to click on a button once in a while so it knows you’re still there. Let it run too long and a button will pop up asking if you’re still listening.

Wow, that sounds really obnoxious. It would be like if Sony made a radio that required you to push the power button ever 15 minutes to keep it from turning off. Ridiculous, that is.

Yes, I see why Pandora would do it, but that doesn’t change the fact that it would annoy the heck out of me. Especially considering that I’m likely to be listening to music while I’m doing something else, like cleaning, repairing, or cooking. To have to interrupt myself every so often just to keep the music running seems like a pain in the ass.

By once in a while, it is meant a long once in a while. Certainly much less than every fifteen minutes. I love Pandora. I have one station with about a billion seed artists so I don’t have to up vote or down vote anything.

As to the OP, I listen to Americana sometimes on Music Choice too. It disappeared a while ago and then came back. I hope that it will return again.

We run Pandora at my office. Its mix feature is great because you can run some really diverse music through it (we combine Blues , country, Frank Sinatra standards and hard rock). Everybody is happy. Also, we can vote down songs and have them banned from play for 30 days. (any Paul McCartney, Journey, Steve Miller, Doors crap that pops up gets instantly voted out)

The reset feature can be annoying but its also helpful. I have to hit it about every 45 min to an hour. The nice thing is it turns itself off in the evening after we’ve gone for the day.

Frank, are you familiar with WUMB-FM? They are not unfamiliar with Fred Eaglesmith, and (I am guessing) a host of artists that will appeal to you.

You can stream them live and hear a range of folk artists from the '60s to present day. They will occasionally structure their programming around a theme. Last week was Bob Dylan day, with the whole day devoted to his songs (whether by him or other artists). I believe that programming this Friday will be focusing on the works of Richard Thompson. They are the first place I heard of Feist, and I’m listening to Newton Faulkner right now, thanks to them.

And they also have streaming channels that are tailored toward more specific tastes. For example “X Stream Folk” (my favorite) is hardly extreme, but instead features newer and younger independent singer/songwriters. Many of them are local (to the Boston area, my neck of the woods), but it is by no means exclusive to them.

They are listener supported. With all that entails (I know, and certainly up to your own judgment), but I have been supporting them for years and haven’t regretted a dollar if it helps them keep what they are doing.

To all who are able to run Pandora in your offices: Count your blessings, and hope that your employer never implements nannyware to cut down on streaming.

More like every couple hours. I tend to run it while raiding in WoW, and it’ll only shut off once or twice during that 3-4 hour span.

It does take a little tickering to get set up towards your tastes, but soon enough you’ll be able to play it without needing to give much input. I rarely need to alter my main stations these days.

No.

Sold!

I’ll try that first, and then Mr. Moto’s suggestion, and then pandora. Or… maybe… all three.

I’ll suggest SomaFM.

The ‘Boot Liquor’ and ‘indie pop rocks’ channels have both led me to discover some good music. The folks they have running the programming do a fine job. Boot Liquor can play some good Americana style tunes.

Plenty of streaming options too. I tend to use the 128k Windows media feed, and WMP keeps an active log of song played for the last hour.

Fair enough, but if you but a bit of effort in, it pays off wildly. I seriously have no idea how I found new music before Pandora.

Not to detract from your rant about valuable cultural elements being bulldozed over by business morons, but hooking your computer up to your stereo wouldn’t be that difficult.
If you go into your stereo through a mic input all you’d need is a patch cable, and maybe an adapter if your stereo’s mic input plus is a different size then your computer’s. Plug one end into your computer’s audio out and the other into your stereo’s mic input. Total cost even including adaptors should be under $10, prolly under $5. Unless you need a long ass cable to join the two then more of course.
If you’d prefer to use the RCA inputs (red and white stereo connectors) like your TV uses then you can buy a special cable that’s stereo headphone mini connector (may or may not be the technical term, but the plug your computer speaker, and headphones use) on one end and RCA cable on the other. Usually they cost $3 around here. Then your computer can connect to RCA jacks. I used to use one, along with the S-video jack on my laptop, to connect my computer to my tv and use my laptop as a dvd player.

It’s speakers sucked, but the tv’s speakers were awesome.

If you go the RCA jack route you’ll have to crank up the volume on your stereo.
Finally if your an audiophile then your computer may have a digital fiber optic port on the back, that may be able to connect to fiber optic port on your stereo if it has one. I’m not an audiophile so I’ve never messed with that. So that’s all I’ll say on that.

If they’re in different places then this becomes a pain.

I know a few workarounds there, but they’re highly hardware dependent.