[ 7. The NME Website | Homepage ]

[ The NME Website www.nme.com ]

The NME homepage invites the readers of its magazine, which has tended towards the indie demographic and has swayed away from the wider genre appeal that the magazine first started with, as it has been criticised by the press recently, an example of narrowcasting in progress. It has always been a huge support for upcoming British bands such as Kaiser Chiefs, The Libertines and Franz Ferdinand. The website provides music news, reviews, downloads, merchandise and message boards. The website also features Gig ticket searches, competitions and various feeds from eBay and other mainstream online auctions and shops, to compare prices on certain merchandise without having to leave the site. The large amount of content on the site to do with all aspects of indie music culture has supported NME and made it one of, if not the largest British music magazine. The sorts of Flash animated adverts that are littered around the site are aimed at NME’s target audience and advertise such things as internet and soft and alcoholic drinks.

[ In Detail ]

The Homepage is made up a number of features. The basic layout of the website is a static navigation banner at the top, with links to each different area of the website, and down the right hand side, there is a list of the less frequently visited links and also the featured links. On the left hand side running down most of the centre too is the main content of the website, with hooks and links to various articles and features.
NME, like Xfm has its own radio station and this is available online from the website, on top of that, the listeners can also view immediate full music videos on the radio’s playlist if they register with the site, thus helping NME’s online surveillance and vertically integrating the audience to NME, these are convenient and small files to allow faster downloads, faster satisfaction but less quality. This, coupled with the email newsletter is able to raise awareness of the site, and keep its audience coming back. Also along these lines is the RSS feed that the site has, which feeds information to the audience automatically. NME puts new media technology to its full use, when it holds awards and at many gigs, it is able to transmit these live via webcam [ webcam ] to viewers and listeners on the website.
Adding to the message boards, there is also a section where people can place word adverts free to advertise, usually for band members. This is an added incentive for new bands to align themselves with NME, and through this, vertical integration and a loyalty can grow between NME and bands in question, thus possibly granting NME sneak previews and other things in future.
The NME website is very intent on gaining loyalty with its demographic, and providing a comprehensive one-stop-shop website to cater for all their needs from lifestyle tips to music downloads, showing good use of vertical integration and online surveillance, whilst still keeping the basic interactivity must-haves onsite too.

[ 5. The Xfm Site | Richard Bacon ]

[ The Xfm Richard Bacon Section www.xfm.co.uk/bacon ]

Richard Bacon’s own section of the Xfm website is devoted to him and his narrowcasted drive-time radio show from 4-7pm. It is humorous and often the jokes are at Richard Bacon’s expense. His website acts as a support for his show and has archives of features that were aired previously, prizes, plus reviews, YouTube pick-of-the-day, interviews with special guests and Bacon Offcuts:

This where all the scrappy, chewy bits of indigestible radio left over from
Richard's show live. All the salty, unpalatable, leftover bits that don’t really
fit anywhere else get out here so you can peruse them at your leisure like a
tramp outside Subway after closing time.

As this shows, Bacon has no hang-ups about being the subject of humour and puns with his name, and this makes his site more appealing to the target audience.

[ In Detail ]
The site has the same layout as the rest of the Xfm site, with the same banners and borders. There are also many different sections inside Bacon’s site. The section named “The Catchphrase Gallery” allows listeners to email in a pictorial representation of any one of Bacon’s catchphrases, such as “At Ease”, “Yes, yes” or “Breasts”. The comic nature of this lightens the tone, and gives the audience a chance to have their picture displayed to everyone via this page, effectively the new technologies are allowing Bacon to entertain his listeners more and make the relationship a little more interactive, instead of him talking and playing music on his radio station, the listeners can also get in touch with him. Most of the features on his site allow the audience to get in touch with him via email, such as sending in their favourite YouTube video clip for the web page [ video clip ] for them to embed into the website or the 5 o’clock shuffle where listeners can request their 3 favourite songs to be played on air, or indeed the Feedback Track where listeners feed back on a newly released song played first on Xfm.
Bacon’s site does not use new media technology to its full potential, but it serves a great purpose, uses it for good benefit. However, it is a very good example of democratisation and interactivity.

[ 4. The Xfm Site | Homepage ]

[ The Xfm Website www.xfm.co.uk ]

The Xfm site offers many different indulgences to their narrowcasted radio station’s listeners. Their main listeners are fans of alternative music, both signed and unsigned, and thus the majority of the website content is based on this. The content comes under four headings: On Air, News, Watch and Listen and Extras. Under the On Air heading, there are such things as DJ homepages, digital radio information, scheduling, playlists with streamed 30 second taster clips available online and other things to do with the radio station itself. The News section contains music news for the kinds of bands that they feature on the radio station itself, Watch and Listen contains videos and audio including podcasts available online, plus Mi-Xfm, a new feature released in February 2007 and Extras contains additional information, a section on film, forums and reviews. The website essentially replaces an Xfm magazine, which would compete against the likes of NME and Kerrang!. This, of course would not be nearly as detailed as a website is, and also not as sustainable because websites cost next to nothing to maintain, whereas magazines cost money to make. The website allows fans to keep up to date with the music world and follow up from the radio show with more information and features on their favourite bands and gig information.

[ In Detail ]

The homepage features one large navigator panel along the top and rollover buttons, which reveal more links to areas of the site. This makes it easier to find where you want to go in the site much easier than having to rummage around, especially for people new to the site. At the top, next to the Xfm logo there is a link to online digital radio, straight from the radio show itself. This allows convergence within the computer itself, as there is no longer any need for a radio and a computer, as now they can be both in one. The homepage has four columns under the four above headings, each displaying various different new features within those sections. Above, there are, again four adverts, one is usually from Xfm itself, but they are usually pertaining to the new music scene or targeting Xfm’s specific audience with such products as new mobile phones or computers, e.g. the live radio streaming is sponsored by the Sony Ericsson Walkman range, there are Samsung T9 adverts, etc. There is a feature called “Watch Live”, which allows audiences to watch gigs on webcam live streamed through to their home. A large area of the website is devoted to the Music Video Jukebox, where audiences can view the latest promo videos, and their favourite music videos streamed [ streaming ] online, on demand. This attracts listeners, as often they have the latest and exclusive videos from artists.

Mi-Xfm, a new feature introduced early 2007 is a browser-based music player. It combines Xfm’s wide library of music with the individual tastes of the audience to create the most personalised radio station, in a truly personalised, proliferative, non-linear, diverse and flexible experience with an enormous reach, larger than the radio station ever could achieve, since it has only specific distribution areas. The release of this feature has been well accepted amongst the Xfm community.

The whole site is a good example of immediacy, proliferation and diversification, as there is clearly something for everyone who has any slight interest in new alternative music.