Our site weighs less than one song

Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red. The chat is moderated by humans, which keeps it friendly, weird and welcoming. The studio is small, the monitors are loud and the coffee machine has its own on-call rotation.

Why we did it

We test new segments live, keep what works and quietly retire what does not. We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red. 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.

Every show on ArrayFM starts with a simple rule: play the track you would send to a friend at 2am. 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. Our community Discord is where most show ideas start and where most bad puns go to live forever.

• New shows every weekday at 06:00
• Low-data mode for mobile
• Podcast feed updated nightly
• Weekend throwbacks from 08:00

We test new segments live, keep what works and quietly retire what does not. The best feedback we ever got was a single line: “you made my deploy go faster”. We learned early that a stable stream matters more than a fancy one. Morning shows are for energy, weather, traffic and the one story everyone at work will talk about.

Questions we keep getting

We measure success in hours listened, not clicks, which keeps us honest about what actually matters. Good radio sounds effortless, but every minute on air has at least ten minutes of prep behind it. A radio station is really a promise: that there will be something good playing whenever you tune in. We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning.

Radio has always been about company, and that has not changed just because the transmitter is now a rack of servers. We test new segments live, keep what works and quietly retire what does not. Late nights are for experiments: long mixes, ambient sets and the occasional field recording. The studio is small, the monitors are loud and the coffee machine has its own on-call rotation.

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

We measure success in hours listened, not clicks, which keeps us honest about what actually matters. Our schedule is built in blocks, with softer sounds in the morning and heavier beats after dark. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. When a listener sends a track we have never heard, it goes straight into the next hour. The station started as a side project in a spare room and a borrowed microphone.

From the request line

Radio has always been about company, and that has not changed just because the transmitter is now a rack of servers. The mixing desk is older than some of our interns, and it still sounds better than anything new. The station started as a side project in a spare room and a borrowed microphone. The studio is small, the monitors are loud and the coffee machine has its own on-call rotation.

We still print the weekly playlist and pin it on the studio wall, mostly out of habit. The studio is small, the monitors are loud and the coffee machine has its own on-call rotation. The station started as a side project in a spare room and a borrowed microphone. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor.

# stream health check
while true; do
  curl -sI $STREAM | head -1
  sleep 30
done

A good transition is invisible: you only notice it when it goes wrong, like a page that flashes white between clicks. We test new segments live, keep what works and quietly retire what does not. Our schedule is built in blocks, with softer sounds in the morning and heavier beats after dark.

How it works

The best feedback we ever got was a single line: “you made my deploy go faster”. Most of our DJs have day jobs in software, design or support, which explains the jokes. Listeners tell us they tune in while they code, study, drive, cook and occasionally while they should be sleeping.

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. Every Friday we look at the numbers, and every Friday the numbers say people want more synthwave. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red.

The mixing desk is older than some of our interns, and it still sounds better than anything new. Morning shows are for energy, weather, traffic and the one story everyone at work will talk about. Every Friday we look at the numbers, and every Friday the numbers say people want more synthwave. We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning. We believe the music should never stop just because you clicked a link.

What comes next

We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning. The studio is small, the monitors are loud and the coffee machine has its own on-call rotation. The archive now holds more than two thousand hours of shows, all searchable by track and guest. Some of our most-loved segments started as a joke in the green room.

The chat is moderated by humans, which keeps it friendly, weird and welcoming. Every show on ArrayFM starts with a simple rule: play the track you would send to a friend at 2am. The mixing desk is older than some of our interns, and it still sounds better than anything new. We still print the weekly playlist and pin it on the studio wall, mostly out of habit. When a listener sends a track we have never heard, it goes straight into the next hour.

• Weekend throwbacks from 08:00
• Transcripts for every talk segment
• Low-data mode for mobile
• Community playlist every Sunday

Our engineers obsess over latency because a stream that stutters is a stream people switch off. The chat is moderated by humans, which keeps it friendly, weird and welcoming. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red. Listeners tell us they tune in while they code, study, drive, cook and occasionally while they should be sleeping. Our community Discord is where most show ideas start and where most bad puns go to live forever.

The numbers

Behind the scenes, the playout system is a small pile of open source tools glued together with very careful shell scripts. Late nights are for experiments: long mixes, ambient sets and the occasional field recording. We test new segments live, keep what works and quietly retire what does not. Our favourite metric is the number of listeners who stay through the ad break. The chat is moderated by humans, which keeps it friendly, weird and welcoming.

Most of our DJs have day jobs in software, design or support, which explains the jokes. Our schedule is built in blocks, with softer sounds in the morning and heavier beats after dark. Behind the scenes, the playout system is a small pile of open source tools glued together with very careful shell scripts. Listeners tell us they tune in while they code, study, drive, cook and occasionally while they should be sleeping.

A station is only as good as its worst transition.

Accessibility matters to us, so every show gets a transcript and every page works with a keyboard. Some weeks the playlist is meticulously planned; other weeks it is a group chat argument that somehow turns into a show. The station started as a side project in a spare room and a borrowed microphone.

The setup

We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. We keep the site lightweight on purpose, so it loads fast on a train, a tired laptop or a phone at 5% battery. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red.

We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. We still print the weekly playlist and pin it on the studio wall, mostly out of habit. Every show on ArrayFM starts with a simple rule: play the track you would send to a friend at 2am.

# stream health check
while true; do
  curl -sI $STREAM | head -1
  sleep 30
done

Behind the scenes, the playout system is a small pile of open source tools glued together with very careful shell scripts. Some weeks the playlist is meticulously planned; other weeks it is a group chat argument that somehow turns into a show. We keep the stream running around the clock, which means someone is always awake, caffeinated and slightly too excited about a B-side.