Easy Stream Configuration

Whether you’re a ShoutCast or IceCast newbie or a seasoned streaming professional, Centova Cast makes it easy to configure your stream.

Common options are included in the first few tabs, while advanced options are tucked away in additional tabs.

AutoDJ Support

In addition to providing total control over your streaming server, Centova Cast also provides comprehensive autoDJ system. Never again you will need your own PC to broadcast the stream!

Upload your media (MP3s, etc.) directly to the server via FTP, manage your media through Centova Cast’s comprehensive AJAX Media Library system, and schedule your media using Centova Cast’s advanced playlist scheduling system.

This provides a complete, all-in-one solution for setting up an Internet radio station.

AJAX Media Library

Centova Cast’s AJAX media library brings a familiar, desktop-style media management interface to the web.

Media can be searched or browsed by artist, album, title, or genre. Tracks can be added to a playlist simply by dragging and dropping them on the desired playlist. This drag-and-drop functionality can be used to instantly schedule the selected tracks to play at a given time, or on a repeating schedule.

Playlist Scheduling

Centova Cast supports multiple playlists for each stream. Each playlist can be configured individually to control precisely how and when it will be played — at a specific time, on a repeating schedule, or on a rotation schedule with support for ranking by popularity (known as “weighting”).

Four types of playlists are available. Through a combination of the playlist types offered by Centova Cast, you can achieve total control over your media scheduling, and completely eliminate the need for expensive third-party source software to schedule your tracks.

• General Rotation

General rotation playlists handle the bulk of the media played on your stream.

By creating multiple general rotation playlists with different “weights”, you can ensure that popular tracks (such as new releases) are always played more often than your less popular tracks.

• Interval

Interval playlists play on a recurring basis, either every few minutes, or after every few songs.

Interval playlists are ideal for jingles, station identification, commercial advertisements, promotions, or any other media that you’d like Centova Cast to automatically play frequently and repeatedly.

• Scheduled

Scheduled playlists play on a specific date, at a specific time, and can be configured to repeat every day, week, month, or year on a recurring schedule.

Scheduled playlists are ideal for daily/weekly countdowns, pre-recorded shows, weather forecasts, or any other media that you’d like to have Centova Cast play automatically at a specific time.

• Immediate

Immediate playlists play immediately when they are activated (after the current song completes). They are ideal for spur-of-the-moment playback of tracks such as requested songs or announcements.

Stream Start/Home Pages

Centova Cast provides each stream with its own AJAX-driven, interactive and informative start page.

Features include:

• Stream status and current song
• On-demand content downloads
• Recent tracks list
• Song request form
• Station tune-in links.
• Map of listener location

Most of these are also available as a standalone, AJAX-driven JavaScript widgets which the stream owner can use on his own web site.

Statistics & Reports

Centova Cast provides the most comprehensive streaming radio statistics system commercially available today. It provides information about listener trends and demographics, data transfer, track performances and popularity, user agents, and much, much more.

• Recent Activity

The recent activity report provides a high-level overview of your stream statistics, including details of listener trends, average session times, total listening hours, data transfer, track playback, and more.

Listener activity for the past 48 hours is also plotted for easy reference.

• Listener Overview

The listener overview provides information about listeners’ usage of your station.

Average session length is charted and graphed, and top listeners are ranked according to listener minutes and number of sessions. Listener countries are automatically determined, and the software used by the listener to tune into the stream is noted and identified as a media player or stream ripper to assist in abuse detection.

• Listener Countries

The country overview provides information about the countries from which the majority of your listeners are tuning in.

Top listener countries are charted and graphed according to listener minutes and number of sessions.

• User Agents

The user agents report provides an overview of the software programs your listeners are using to tune in to your stream.

Top user agents are charted and graphed according to listener minutes and number of sessions. Each user agent is also classified as a legitimate media player (such as WinAmp, iTunes, etc.), or a stream ripper (a program used to steal music from your stream) to assist in abuse detection.

• Track Statistics

The tracks report provides information about the frequency and popularity of the tracks played on your stream.

Track popularity is determined based on the number of tune-ins/tune-outs during a particular song over the past 30 days, and this is used to compile a “least popular” and “most popular” tracks list. This provides an excellent indicator of your listeners’ tastes for particular songs.

The total airtime and number of performances of the top songs over the past 30 days is also reported.

• Historical Statistics

Centova Cast provides detailed daily and monthly data transfer and listener statistics, complete with graphs, allowing both the client and the administrator to track listener trends and resource usage

Individual stream statistics are provided to each client, and a master server-wide statistics page is provided in the server administration panel.

• Music Licensing/Royalties

Centova Cast provides monthly, downloadable spreadsheets containing the complete list of songs you’ve played on your stream in the past month, including detailed information about the date, time, and audience of each performance.

A performance summary spreadsheet is also available (not shown) which provides aggregate reports on the playback frequency, number of performances, and monthly TLH for each song.

These reports can greatly simplify the royalty reporting process required by many music licensing agencies.

• Live Listener Statistics

Centova Cast’s live listener statistics provide a realtime look at who is listening to your stream right now, including listener countries and user agent information.