BY PAUL MALONEY
The Kima system is one of the more impressive attempts at streamlining the process of listening to and enjoying Internet radio. Introduced to the market early in September by Chicago area-based Akoo, the Kima system aims to improve the Internet audio experience by 1) enabling the user to listen to the program over their actual stereo system anywhere in the house, thus 2) liberating the user from their computer.

Streaming audio has not achieved the mass-acceptance of instant messaging, e-mail, music file sharing, online auctions, or any other popular application of the Internet that (while generally unheard of less than a decade ago) has become a familiar part of the daily experience of millions of people.

Internet radio has not vanquished its traditional broadcast ancestor, in spite of the older medium's well-publicized lack of musical risk-taking, repetitive playlists, and ever-swelling commercial sets.

And most certainly, webcasting's less than overwhelming "reception" and adoption by the Internet audience does not reflect the hopes and beliefs of an industry that has put up thousands and thousands of available streams, backed by millions and millions (and millions!) of dollars in investments.

The industry is doing its best at coming up with an explanation. Probably one of the more valid of which is simply this: the process of receiving and listening to an Internet audio program is just too difficult -- and not enough like traditional radio.

That's not to say that downloading a player, finding a station one might enjoy, and minimizing it while working on other things ranks near the pinnacle of human achievement. That's not the point. Traditional radio is easy -- it almost always has been. You turn it on. If you don't like the station, press a button. Go outside, get in your car -- the radio's there. No logging on, no buffering, no drop outs or tinny sound, and no being stuck near your PC.

The system consists of two, nearly identical looking units, just under five inches wide, three-and-a-half inches tall. They have a rounded, "plasticky" silver and black design, each crowned by an antenna which resembles (not coincidentally) that of a cordless phone.

The Kima was a breeze to set up. One of the two units, the "base" unit, plugs directly into the output of your soundcard (the same jack you'd use for speakers or headphones). Here's the magic: the output of your computer's soundcard is converted to a 900 MHz signal -- the same frequency your cordless phone uses. Although precautions have been taken to keep the signals from your Kima and your telephone separate, should Grandma's voice get replaced by Coolio on the other end of the line, the Kima can use one of four channels to transmit. The base unit has an additional quarter-inch output, so you can reconnect your computer's speakers.

The other unit (the "receiving" unit) sits near any stereo in the house, up to 1000 feet away. If you have a stereo system without a tuner, and/or have an extra input available, simply connect the receiving unit to the amplifier with RCA cords, as you would any other component. If your system is more of the clock radio/boom box variety (i.e. no highfalutin' accouterments like external inputs) -- simply tune to 88.1 or 88.3 FM on the radio, and set the same frequency on your receiving unit. That little box actually transmits a (very limited) FM signal for your tuner to pick up. You're "golden" Ponyboy!

With everything in place, you'll now hear the output of your soundcard through your stereo. This means Internet radio, CDs in your ROM drive, and the AOL guy's grammatically incorrect catch-phrase about HAVING mail. So in effect, you could listen to the sound from your computer games over the stereo too -- but you could've just done that by using a cord to connect your PC to your hi-fi. Don't forget, the idea here is being able to listen in different rooms, or even outside!

We tested the Kima in a variety of different ways. First, we listened to the output from the Kima over the RAIN test lab's cool black tuner. We were giddy with delight when the first strains of Louis Armstrong came through the cat-clawed speaker grilles (not that we expected Kima to disappoint, we're just thrilled when we manage to get things right). The levels were a little low, and the signal was a little noisy (fiddling with the FM antenna wire on the Kima receiver helped a bit). To eliminate this, we went ahead and connected the system into one of our stereo's inputs (it was marked "8-track" or something like that). As expected, most of the hiss was gone. Furthermore, cranking up the output on the Kima base unit and the volume on the soundcard brought the sound level up to a more acceptable point.

But the sound still wasn't quite up to par with most of what we hear on the FM dial. The dynamic range wasn't very wide -- the "highs" seemed muffled, and the "lows" just weren't really there. So we picked another station with a broadband stream, figuring the wider bandwidth would improve the sound.

The broadband station was more impressive sounding, yet still not even up to FM quality in side-by-side comparisons. So as a final test, we popped a CD into the PC's ROM drive, and the exact same CD into the stereo's CD player (ask us why we have not two but three copies of Diana Krall's "When I Look in your Eyes"). This improved the performance of the Kima even more, but not to the point that we couldn't tell the difference between the two sources.

This is certainly not to say that the Kima is unlistenable. Quite the contrary, we were very pleased with the unit's ease of use and performance. And perhaps with a higher-end soundcard and better quality streams, the Kima could rival FM stereo.

One possible shortcoming of the system is the fact that yes, you don't need to be near your PC to listen. But if you lose the connection, or want to dial up to another stream -- grab some wood, bub -- you're back in front of the machine. For "one touch remote channel changing," check out another of the fine products out there.

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Internet audio entertainment provider theDial announced today that it will be the "premier custom-branded" radio source for InfoSpace's Go2Net portal site and InfoSpace's metasearch services Dogpile and MetaCrawler.

This is the largest partnership agreement yet for Seattle-based theDial since its launch in November 1999. theDial also powers audio for ClassMates.com, MySimon.com, and Women.com. The service capable of running targeted ads.

From the press release (here): "A recent survey commissioned by theDial (questioning its users and general Internet users) found that 64 percent of respondents believe streamed audio increases a Web site's value. Web sites that license theDial will find that consumers who stream audio spend more time on the site where the streaming audio was originated. According to the survey, more than 60 percent of consumers listening to streaming audio spend anywhere from 15 minutes to several hours on a site."

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From CNet: "MP3.com is launching a new service Monday that will allow music lovers to instantly link downloaded song collections to their wireless devices.

"The service is made possible through a partnership with FusionOne, which provides the technology to synchronize the audio files.

"A song that is downloaded on a personal computer also will automatically appear on that person's mobile phone and other handheld gadgets.

"The deal aims to capture the interest of young consumers captivated with online music and all things wireless...

"MP3.com is trying to distance itself from its legal troubles by expanding its service to wireless devices using only songs approved by the artists and recording industry..."

Read the entire CNet story here.

Kurt Hanson is working from the Strategic Media Research offices today. To reach him, please call 312 726-8300 x. 4401, or e-mail him here.

November 5-7	NAB European Radio Conference, Berlin
November 12-14	Canadian Association of Broadcasters (CAB) "Broadcasting 2000: On-air / On-line," Calgary
Nov. 28-Dec. 1	Radio Ink Internet Conference, Santa Clara, CA, featuring a brand-new national study on Internet radio usage presented by Eric Rhoads & Kurt Hanson
February 1-4, 2001	RAB 2001. Details coming soon.