Opinions on Diamond Deals shoutcast server rental service

We are planing on setting up a service where avatars can quickly setup a shoutcast stream for a couple of hours. The avatar simply selects the number of users, quality and time period and pay the vendor the requested amount. The stream would be setup within about 30 seconds and ready to use. To give you an idea of the pricing for 30 users to all listen to a 128KBS stream for an hour it would cost 254 linden on the current pricing system although this is being worked on.

What we want to know is if there would be enough of a market to keep the service breaking even before i start developing software to acomplish this.

(If this is the wrong forum please move it)

Go for it, Kaet. There's plenty of DJ's and musicians in SL who really need access to bandwidth for their shows. So long as you advertise your service in the right places, you'll do better than breaking even.

Sounds reasonable, I can think of a few uses for those myself, having just finished building a live music venue.

Lewis

I have never broadcasted before, I would probably fool around with a stream for an hour or two just to see if it is something I would like to do And I think in the start you may have a few other folks like me =P

Great idea, I've been in need of similar services before and what you propose sounds very convenient.

This is encouraging. I will have to talk to my associate on whether or not to get larger dedicated server. I have already had a few people in world ask me to keep them informed.

you also might want to make up a notecard of instructions for those who would like to learn HOW to use the stream they can rent from you.

I know I was very interested in such a thing about a year ago but got so lost in what programs I needed and what they did the project died before it ever got off the ground.

I think this is a great idea and the pricing seems reasonable. I've been thinking of doing occasional DJ shows someday and this would be perfect for that. It would be great for people who want to have a show every once in a while - saving them from signing up for a dedicated stream hosting service they might not fully use.

Someone started up something like this a couple years ago but I'm not sure what happened to it. I always thought it was a cool idea though.

It's a nice idea, but since we all have broadband, why don't people just set up a quick icecast server on their home computer?
I know it's not entirely feasable for everyone (bandwidth and such), but with a small time investment, you could save some money.

Darkness Anubis,
We had already planed on doing that ^^!

Jesse Malthus,
Even with 2mbs broadband at 128KBS (normal cd quality) you can only have 2 people listening to your steram without factoring in what secondlife uses. Even halfing the quality and had people listen to 64kbs which is notibly poorer but still acpetable and still you would only get 4 people.

So ofcourse you can setup a server but you need a good connection (2mbs+) to do it. We will be hosting the server on 100mbs upload meaning we could get about 700 people at 128kbs.

True, but you can slap up a server on a FiOS connection and PWN.
My connection is about 6-8mbps (I wish I had FiOS...), and if you use Ogg Vorbis' quality number system, you can push a 256kbps MP3 stream at 45kbps VBR.

It's a great idea IF it really does configure and access smoothly. I sure would use it. Would you have speech capability too? What about speaking interface so that there could be 2 or more people speaking at once as in an interview?

You gotta do the math. Lets say you're using a 24kbit stream. Multiply 24x30 listeners. You'll need an upload speed of a constant 720kbps upstream bandwith. At the rate of 128kbps encoding 3.84Mbps upstream bandwith. This is PER SECOND and MUST remain constant or you'll encounter what we internet DJ's call buffering. Now 24 kilobits is equal to 3 kilobytes of data. So its roughly 90 kilobytes of data for 30 listeners per second. Per min equals 5.4megs of data. Starting to come clearer? Average event is 2 hours. 648 megs are transfered for that 2 hours of DJ time. Now assuming you only run 1 event a night you're looking at almost 20 gigs uploaded per month. If you combine this with you're SL usage, regular net traffic, and/or filesharing you'd be adding alot to your monthly usuage. Now granted not every event is gonna have a maxed out listener count, but this gives you an idea how much data is transfered. Many of us have limited bandwith per month and get charged hefty overage fees. Its cheaper and more practical to rent a relay server unless you got dedicated T1's or a few T3's running through your house.

Edit: also IceCast is a pain to setup for the novice since you have to manually edit the XML config file with notepad or similar and have to create all your mounting points manually.

That would have to be done on your end. You're looking at 2 sound cards to get it done right unless you share a mic. If you take VoIP calls you'll need either 2 sound cards or 2 computers.

There's a bunch of different broadcasting programs out there. If you want cheap there's Shoutcast and Oddcast, both are free. If you got the money for professional grade software get SAM3 (aka SAM Broadcaster).

I live in a rural area of England and am only able to get 1mbs otherwise i wouldn’t mind getting a decent connection and hosting the server myself. As for using Ogg Vobis its an interesting idea. Will it work for secondlife though has anyone tested it?




We have already make the vendor for the shoutcast server. It uses dialogs and handles one user at a time. You answer 3 questions on users, bandwidth and amount of time and it will give you a quote which you can accept and then pay the vendor or reject and it will offer you the option to try again. Setup time should be no more that 40 seconds. As for you second question about interviews I'm not totally sure how that can be achieved although I’m sure its possible. The worst case scenario is that you have to prerecord the interview using a voip service and play it like you would a song. I will have a look into it for the tutorial i will write.

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As another idea i was thinking about selling gigs of bandwidth instead of time/quality/number of users which would be ideal for small events etc but thats by the way.

To make matters worse, the 1m you're quoting is your *download* speed. You'll probably find that the *upload* speed on your service (assuming it's ADSL over a UK phone line) is only 256k.

Yea its pathetic. The 100mbs server we will be getting for the project will be fun to download stuff on ^^. Just a note to you all I am currently on holiday in Australia (I live in the UK) so work is slow but I expect the project to be up and working by October all going well.

Yes, Vorbis streams DO work in SL. Many places in SL use Vorbis streams as it is. Great quality definitely better then mp3.

Its not that hard to do interviews, but its a pain and requires a decent amount of system resources so either 2 computers or a relatively new PC (within the last 6 - 9 months by guestimate) with 2 soundcards is needed. You'll need to have 1 pc or soundcard configured for the VoIP software and the other for your broadcasting software. Run the card/pc used for the VoIP to the other one via out-put to the other's line-in. Play the audio streaming to the line-in jack while you're talking. Done.

You're right. My ISP (Insight) doesn't put bandwidth restrictions on my line. I did point out that this is unfeasable for quite a few people.
And yes, Icecast can be a PITA to set up, esp. for an average Windows user. XML is not easy, but it's not intrinsicly hard either.

I'd definitely be a customer, Kaet. Great idea.


I'll look for your service debut announcement ... well, somewhere other than here. :-/