Podcast #44: building radio for the web

We keep the site lightweight on purpose, so it loads fast on a train, a tired laptop or a phone at 5% battery. Local artists make up almost a third of what we play, and that number keeps going up. The request line gets more messages than ever, and our DJs read every single one on air.

What changes for listeners

The archive now holds more than two thousand hours of shows, all searchable by track and guest. The request line gets more messages than ever, and our DJs read every single one on air. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor.

If you have ever wondered why a song sounds warmer on air, the answer is a ridiculous amount of compression. Good radio sounds effortless, but every minute on air has at least ten minutes of prep behind it. Our community Discord is where most show ideas start and where most bad puns go to live forever. Listeners tell us they tune in while they code, study, drive, cook and occasionally while they should be sleeping.

• Late-night mixes with no talking
• Community playlist every Sunday
• Listen on the web, in the app or on a smart speaker
• Chat moderated by real people

We measure success in hours listened, not clicks, which keeps us honest about what actually matters. Late nights are for experiments: long mixes, ambient sets and the occasional field recording. Every Friday we look at the numbers, and every Friday the numbers say people want more synthwave. Morning shows are for energy, weather, traffic and the one story everyone at work will talk about.

What we learned

We believe the music should never stop just because you clicked a link. Our engineers obsess over latency because a stream that stutters is a stream people switch off. We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning. Local artists make up almost a third of what we play, and that number keeps going up. Every show on ArrayFM starts with a simple rule: play the track you would send to a friend at 2am.

If you have ever wondered why a song sounds warmer on air, the answer is a ridiculous amount of compression. Our community Discord is where most show ideas start and where most bad puns go to live forever. The archive now holds more than two thousand hours of shows, all searchable by track and guest. We keep the site lightweight on purpose, so it loads fast on a train, a tired laptop or a phone at 5% battery. We keep a strict no-autoplay policy on the site: you press play, and then we never interrupt you.

Play the track you would send to a friend at 2am. That is the whole format.

We test new segments live, keep what works and quietly retire what does not. Our community Discord is where most show ideas start and where most bad puns go to live forever. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red.

How it works

Our community Discord is where most show ideas start and where most bad puns go to live forever. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. Radio has always been about company, and that has not changed just because the transmitter is now a rack of servers. Behind the scenes, the playout system is a small pile of open source tools glued together with very careful shell scripts. The best feedback we ever got was a single line: “you made my deploy go faster”.

The request line gets more messages than ever, and our DJs read every single one on air. We keep the stream running around the clock, which means someone is always awake, caffeinated and slightly too excited about a B-side. The chat is moderated by humans, which keeps it friendly, weird and welcoming. A good transition is invisible: you only notice it when it goes wrong, like a page that flashes white between clicks. We believe the music should never stop just because you clicked a link.

curl -s https://arrayfm.example/api/now-playing | jq .track

The archive now holds more than two thousand hours of shows, all searchable by track and guest. Some weeks the playlist is meticulously planned; other weeks it is a group chat argument that somehow turns into a show. The request line gets more messages than ever, and our DJs read every single one on air. The station started as a side project in a spare room and a borrowed microphone. We measure success in hours listened, not clicks, which keeps us honest about what actually matters.

Lessons from the studio

We still print the weekly playlist and pin it on the studio wall, mostly out of habit. The chat is moderated by humans, which keeps it friendly, weird and welcoming. We measure success in hours listened, not clicks, which keeps us honest about what actually matters. Morning shows are for energy, weather, traffic and the one story everyone at work will talk about.

Behind the scenes, the playout system is a small pile of open source tools glued together with very careful shell scripts. We still print the weekly playlist and pin it on the studio wall, mostly out of habit. Our schedule is built in blocks, with softer sounds in the morning and heavier beats after dark. We measure success in hours listened, not clicks, which keeps us honest about what actually matters.

If you have ever wondered why a song sounds warmer on air, the answer is a ridiculous amount of compression. A radio station is really a promise: that there will be something good playing whenever you tune in. We learned early that a stable stream matters more than a fancy one.

What comes next

Our community Discord is where most show ideas start and where most bad puns go to live forever. The best feedback we ever got was a single line: “you made my deploy go faster”. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red.

Radio has always been about company, and that has not changed just because the transmitter is now a rack of servers. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. Some of our most-loved segments started as a joke in the green room. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red.

• Late-night mixes with no talking
• Live sessions from Studio [0] every Saturday
• Request a song from any page
• Stream in 128 kbps MP3 or 320 kbps AAC

The mixing desk is older than some of our interns, and it still sounds better than anything new. Listeners tell us they tune in while they code, study, drive, cook and occasionally while they should be sleeping. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red.

Behind the scenes

A good transition is invisible: you only notice it when it goes wrong, like a page that flashes white between clicks. We keep the stream running around the clock, which means someone is always awake, caffeinated and slightly too excited about a B-side. Our favourite metric is the number of listeners who stay through the ad break. We learned early that a stable stream matters more than a fancy one. We keep the site lightweight on purpose, so it loads fast on a train, a tired laptop or a phone at 5% battery.

We keep a strict no-autoplay policy on the site: you press play, and then we never interrupt you. Accessibility matters to us, so every show gets a transcript and every page works with a keyboard. Every show on ArrayFM starts with a simple rule: play the track you would send to a friend at 2am.

The music never stops. That is not a slogan, it is a technical requirement.

We keep the stream running around the clock, which means someone is always awake, caffeinated and slightly too excited about a B-side. Listeners tell us they tune in while they code, study, drive, cook and occasionally while they should be sleeping. If you have ever wondered why a song sounds warmer on air, the answer is a ridiculous amount of compression. We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning.