Live365 Going Away?

[Smile4Me]

We received an email saying that Live365 was going off the air at the end of January. Has anyone else heard this and what are your plans to get Disney park music after Live365 goes away for good?

 

[Alacrity]

I saw a note to that effect as well.

I can recommend:
http://www.subsonicradio.com/ and

http://www.uabmagic.com/

I also read the Mouse World Radio was moving to another provider from Live365. I'm afraid I don't use that one so I didn't note the details of their new provider though.

 

[ArielRae]

How are they going off the air if they are still selling memberships? I haven't seen anything about this. Is this temporary or permanent? I have at least 10 Disney stations I listen to and none have said on air about it. Live 365 Facebook page doesn't say anything about.

 

[Smile4Me]

I'm not sure how they are still selling memberships. Here is the email we got on December 30-

December 30th, 2015

Dear Live365 Listener,
For 17 years, Live365 has offered small webcasters the opportunity to stream music and talk programming, providing an alternative distribution channel for diverse, quality content on the Internet in a legally responsible way.
Recently, the Copyright Royalty Board, the governing entity for establishing the sound recording royalty rates that are paid to copyright holders, has published the new rates for 2016-20. The previous provisions for small webcasters to opt for a percentage of revenue model were not renewed.

The current provisions end at the end of 2015. The absence of this license will make legally streaming copyrighted musical content prohibitively expensive for many small to mid-sized Internet broadcasters. Live365 relies on this license for many of their broadcast partners and, as such, has hard decisions to make regarding their future in the streaming industry.
Two weeks ago, Live365 faced an additional blow, losing the support of its investors who have helped the company with its mission for over a decade.

The company was forced to significantly reduce staff and is now actively looking for partners to help continue the service into 2016. At this time, Live365 is planning to keep their stations active while getting the word out about this investment opportunity. With nearly two decades of Internet streaming experience and thousands of paying customers, this could be an ideal situation for a company looking to diversify into streaming audio.
CEO N. Mark Lam has begun initial discussions with possible business partners as the company looks to new options in the new year.

Dean Kattari, Director of Broadcasting for Live365:

"The true value of Live365 lies in it's diversity of content - it's a sanctuary where you can hear music and other content that it so unlike the template broadcasting that is heard on most terrestrial radio. These stations are the hard work of real human beings who use Live365 to share their vision with the world. It's a home for musical discovery because many of these stations play emerging artists that terrestrial stations are reluctant to take a chance on. It would be a great loss for this to all go away."
While Live365 is going through this process, we understand that our listeners will have questions about how all of this will affect their service so we have provided a simple FAQ section to help answer some of them.
We thank you for being part of the Live365 family and hope for the best in 2016.

Rock on,

The Last of the Live365ers


FAQ
So what happened?
Please refer to the full PR bulletin here. Basically, Live365 may not be able to continue service for our broadcasters after January 31, 2016; so streaming audio may stop at that point.
Can I still get support for my current services?
We will be deferring all inquiries to email correspondence only. Technicians will be accessing emails 7 days a week throughout January to assist our listeners. For Inquiries, please email listensupport@live365.com.
How does this affect my VIP services?
Many of our stations will continue broadcasting until January 31th. You can use that time to research other streaming provider options.
I prepaid for the year/3 months/6 months, am I eligible for any refunds?
Prorated refund of services will be facilitated by requests sent to Refund@live365.com. Please note these emails will be handled with the highest priority.
So that we can quickly reply to your requests, please include at least one of the following:
Username - Email address - Account number
Why is my preferred station is not broadcasting?
Due to the new rulings of the Copyright Royalty Board, some of our stations (Personal Broadcasters) will not be issued a new license for 2016 so they might stop broadcasting at the end of December. Our Pro Broadcasting stations should continue for the duration of January.

 

[NeedMoreMickey]

I hope I will be able to find Disney music after 1/31. Sometimes I think it's the only thing that keeps me from slapping a co-worker

 

[hsmamato2]

what???? what about the disney stations??? anyone know where to find them now?

 

[DVC Jen]

Live 365 is indeed shutting Down. After nearly 13 years of streaming Mouse House Radio on Live 365 we will go silent soon. It was a very hard decision my husband and I made. Some stations are or have moved to Radionomy. We looked into it and the user interface is (to us) a royal pain in the ...... bottom. Tracks have to be shorter than 15 minutes in length. What part of Wishes do we edit out? What about Fantastmic!, CoP, the parades? We would end up with tracks we were NOT happy with playing. On top of that we would no longer own Mouse House Radio - Radionomy would. So even if we did edit tracks to the point of ruining them, go through the days and days and day of work getting all of the tracks loaded, clocks and boxes and daily planners filled out and finally get the station going again.. if we didn't meet their requirements for listener hours they would pull the plug on us.

We moved over to shoutcast and paid for a months worth of coverage via Stream Licensing. Yesterday my husband found out how much we would have to pay to continue to move forward with Stream Licensing.. a minimum of $1399.00 up front and possibly more depending on listeners and listening hours. We can not do that. MHR has always been a labor of love for us. We never made a penny from it - but instead spent our own money to have it up and running.

Some tears fell in our home last night. It is still hard for me to wrap my head around. MHR has been a part of our hearts and a way for us to share our love of Disney and the Wilderness Lodge with the world. It was an awesome (nearly) 13 years and if you tuned in once or twice - or all the time, or somewhere in between. Thank you.

I hope at least a few of the other top stations are able to weather this storm better than we have been able to. I think those who have more listeners and or make enough money from advertising to break even have a good chance. We just never tried to even make enough money to break even. We just loved it and didn't mind the 35-50 dollars a month it cost us.

For those of you left searching for your Disney music fix - you can go to shoutcast.com and do a search. You will find a few there. Not sure how many will remain with the increase in royalties they have to pay. Some will - some will not, some will stream illegally I am sure.

 

[pjennings]

Try www.srssounds.com for Sorcerer Radio. You can listen online or through their app. That's were I get my Disney Parks Music fix.

 

[got15]

Try www.srssounds.com for Sorcerer Radio. You can listen online or through their app. That's were I get my Disney Parks Music fix.

I think they are going down as well- that is where I get my Disney Fix as well!

 

[Tinkerchelli]

So Sad

 

[DVC Jen]

I think they are going down as well- that is where I get my Disney Fix as well!

I am pretty sure they are alive and going strong. I think they have moved or at least have a stream on Radionomy.

You can go here and just type - Disney- in the search box. Sorcerer Radio, Reedy Creek Radio, Mouse House (us), Spectro can all be found there as well as a few others.

 

[Lakegirl]

I changed to Spotify and sorcerer radio

 

[erin1715]

I am also desperately searching for a good place to find a variety of Disney park music. I downloaded the Spotify app but when I do a search for sorcerer radio it doesn't come up. How did you all find it?

 

[siskaren]

I am also desperately searching for a good place to find a variety of Disney park music. I downloaded the Spotify app but when I do a search for sorcerer radio it doesn't come up. How did you all find it?

Sorcerer Radio has their own app (it's available on Google play; I don't know about iTunes). You can also find it on the TuneIn Radio app.

 

[Disneypeach]

I loved Live365. In looking around there are lot's of Disney music stations on Tunein radio and Shoutcast radio.

 

[DVC Jen]

go to shoutcast.com and type in Disney in the search bar. You will find several there. Some have also moved to Radionomy - but we (Mouse House Radio) did not because of the time limits it puts on the tracks - also the people who had those stations on Live 365 no longer own their stations on Radionomy. Radionomy now owns them and profits from them. We have decided to keep Mouse House Radio under our control. yes it costs us more money - but I also like knowing that we are actually paying royalties. Radionomy is based in Denmark and they don't have to follow the same laws.

you can also play Mouse House Radio directly from our website as well.