Jelli
Jelli was an interactive radio broadcasting service that was launched in 2009 and ended in 2014, when it changed its business platform towards its cloud based sales products for radio stations. The company is based in San Mateo, California.
Overview
Jelli was created by Michael Dougherty (formerly of Tellme Networks) and Jateen Parekh (formerly from the Amazon Kindle project).[1]
Using the concept of crowdsourcing, Jelli is a modernised version of All Request radio, billed as a "multiplayer video game on a radio station".[2][3][4]
Jelli debuted on CBS Radio-owned KITS in San Francisco on June 28, 2009.[5][6] After starting out with a Sunday night Jelli show on KITS in 2009, Jelli was further expanded to a Monday through Friday night show called "Free for All" in January, 2010, hosted by DJ White Menace. Jelli shows were broadcast on KITS six nights a week.
On June 29, 2014, Jelli ceased operations as a user-controlled radio platform and turned its focus to selling advertising through the services of co-owned Radiospot.[7]
Format
Listeners select songs for a radio station via the internet at jelli.com, or an app on either Android based phones or iPhones. Listeners vote on songs to determine the play lists of their online streaming stations and participating radio stations. Users can submit "NO" votes or "YES" votes for selected songs; winning songs are played on the radio. Once the song is on the air, users can vote "Rocks" or "Sucks" for the track. If enough users vote "Sucks", the song is pulled off the air immediately, even during a live FM broadcast. A Jelli chat room provides listeners with a place to socialize, request their favorite songs, and organize a community-controlled playlist.[8]
User of the Week
User of the Week is a weekly virtual award given on Jelli. Users can earn it by participating in shaping the playlist by casting votes, rocketing and bombing, and voting on the "Now Playing" track. When a user earns User of the Week honors, they are provided with a special badge for their profile page and they can request a "sigtone", or short, 5 second sound clip that is played before one of the their rocketed tracks is played on the air. A sigtone can be any short bit of audio like a song or a movie clip.
T-Bone
T-Bone is the name of the automated announcer on Jelli. When new songs make it onto the air he will announce "This song was just rocketed up by a new jelli user" or the screen name of the user who applied the rocket. From time to time he will also tell jokes or make announcements.
Participating stations
Jelli's success with KITS led to a further expansion of Jelli to other radio stations, and in October 2009 Jelli announced a syndication deal to distribute its programming throughout the United States through the Triton Media Group, beginning in early 2010.[9]
In May 2011, Jelli announced it would launch a 24/7 version of its format in the Las Vegas metropolitan area. On June 30, 2011, KXLI and KYLI launched the new Jelli formats, with KXLI carrying a Rock format, while KYLI offers a Top 40 Remix.[10] On June 24, 2014, KYLI ended its three-year partnership with Jelli to adopt the Pulse 87 Dance/EDM brand and was relaunched as "Pulse 96.7," bringing that brand back to radio just three years after its demise at WNYZ-LP/New York City and its failed attempt to expand the brand to other cities.[11] Two days later after Jelli's announcement that it would cease operations on June 26, 2014, both classic rock WJLI/Paducah, Kentucky and Top 40/CHR KSKR-FM/Roseburg, Oregon immediately dropped the "Jelli" monikers and the platforms altogether. The remaining affiliated stations continued to broadcast Jelli shows until 11:59 p.m.(PDT) on June 29, 2014, when the platform shut down for good.[12]
Former Jelli Affiliates
| Station Callsign | Station Location | Start Date | End Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| KITS | San Francisco, CA | 28 June 2009 | 30 May 2011 |
| WKRL | Syracuse, NY | 8 March 2010 | 7 April 2012 |
| WPST | Trenton, NJ | 8 March 2010 | c. October 2013 |
| KISN | Butte-Bozeman, MT | 15 March 2010 | c. 2013 |
| KENR | Missoula, MT | c. April 2010 | 2 June 2013 |
| KTRS | Casper-Riverton, WY | c. April 2010 | 27 June 2014 |
| WBOS | Boston (Manchester), MA | c. April 2010 | c. October 2011 |
| WBLI | Long Island, NY | 28 June 2010 | 4 December 2011 |
| KXTE | Las Vegas, NV | 12 July 2010 | c. late 2010 |
| WYSP (WIP HD3) | Philadelphia, PA | 18 October 2010 | 30 June 2014 |
| KNDE | College Station, TX | 10 January 2011 | c. 2013 |
| KDOT | Reno, NV | 10 January 2011 | 29 June 2014 |
| WKLS | Atlanta, GA | 10 January 2011 | 28 August 2012 |
| WQPO | Harrisonburg, VA | 1 February 2011 | 30 June 2014 |
| WJYY | Gilford, NH | 7 February 2011 | 2 June 2013 |
| KSMX | Clovis, NM | 7 March 2011 | 2 June 2013 |
| WCYY | Portland, ME | 21 March 2011 | c. 2013 |
| WKZQ | Myrtle Beach, SC | 8 April 2011 | 30 June 2014 |
| KEEY | St. Paul, MN | 5 June 2011 | c. 2013 |
| KXLI | Las Vegas, NV | 30 June 2011 | 30 June 2012 |
| KYLI | Las Vegas, NV | 30 June 2011 | 27 June 2014 |
| KSKR | Roseburg, OR | 1 October 2011 | 26 June 2014 |
| WHTE | Charlottesville, VA | 1 December 2011 | c. 2013 |
| WNUZ | Mercersburg, PA | 5 March 2012 | c. 2014 |
| WFUS | Tampa, FL | 11 May 2012 | 20 June 2014 |
| KSGG | Reno, NV | 31 May 2012 | c. 2013 |
| WJLI | Metropolis, IL | 26 December 2012 | 21 June 2014 |
| WGRX | Fredericksburg, VA | 7 January 2013 | 28 June 2014 |
| WEBN-HD2 | Cincinnati, OH | 29 March 2013 | June 2014 |
Jelli in Australia
Jelli was also part of a partnership with the Austereo Radio Network, involving a station called Hot 30 Jelli, which was launched on November 1, 2009. The station was then renamed to Choose The Hits on February 1, 2010. It was broadcast online, on Digital Radio and on 2Day FM in Sydney, Fox FM in Melbourne, B105 in Brisbane, SAFM in Adelaide and 92.9 in Perth between 10:15pm and midnight on Monday to Thursday nights.
The Austereo partnership was terminated effective May 24, 2010. Jelli is no longer being carried on the air in Australia, and users are being forwarded to the main Jelli page if they attempt to reach the Choose The Hits section of the website. [13]
References
- ↑ Wired citation
- ↑ G4 TV's Electric Playground interview
- ↑ CNET, "Jelli's crowdsourced radio opens to the U.S. and Australia"
- ↑ VentureBeat, "A Pretty Novel Social Music Experience on the Radio"
- ↑ San Francisco Chronicle, "Crowd sourced radio to go national"
- ↑ San Jose Mercury News, "Jelli: Making old-fashioned radio hip again"
- ↑ "Jelli User-Controlled Radio Shutting Down" from All Access (June 25, 2014)
- ↑ Wired, "Crowd in the Cloud to Program Radio"
- ↑ Radio Ink, "Jelli Goes National With Triton Media"
- ↑ Radio Insight "Jelli to LMA Two Las Vegas Area Stations"
- ↑ "Pulse Headed For Las Vegas" from Radio Insight (June 24, 2014)
- ↑ "Jelli To Shut Down User Controlled Platform" from Radio Insight (June 26, 2014)
- ↑ Austereo finds new digital partner - themusic.com.au 26th January, 2010
Supplementary references
- Entrepreneur’s Edge: Jelli.com (Video), Reuters, May, 2010
- Music Start-Up Jelli Raises $7 Million, New York Times, May, 2010
- Jelli CEO Mike Dougherty & CBS Radio-SF VP/Programming Michael Martin, FMQB, April, 2010
- Jelli crowd-sourcing launches with 10 stations, including a second CBS outlet, Radio-Info.com, March 9, 2010
- Jelli puts social networks to work picking radio tunes, USA Today, March, 2010
- Jelli’s User Controlled Radio Gets A Big Win: Live 105 To Use It Daily, Techcrunch, January, 2010
- Jelli raises $2 million to democratize radio with well-known angels aboard, Venture Beat, January, 2010
- For Radio Listeners, A Louder Voice, Wall Street Journal, December, 2009
- Jelli: Making old-fashioned radio hip again, San Jose Mercury News, November, 2009
- CNBC Squawk Box interview, November, 2009