PC Touts NextRadio FM App

PC Magazine thinks the NextRadio FM app is pretty fab.

Calling it “old school streaming,” the piece notes that many cellphones sold in other countries include the ability to listen to FM, but the concept is still relatively new here.

At issue for vacationers and travelers, PC notes, sometimes the Internet isn’t available, PC notes in a review for the Connected Traveler, “international roaming means you count your data byte by byte, which counts out streaming.”

FM is also more power-efficient for your device than Internet streaming, it adds.

RBR+TVBR observation: Carriers and handset makers tend to enable the FM chip in their devices sold in countries where Internet access is unreliable and/or expensive and those consumers use FM to listen to music. Here, carriers tend to favor their own streaming services in their device feature-sets. NextRadio is making inroads, though, with the recent AT&T deal to activate the FM chip in new Android devices next year, in addition to the current Sprint arrangement.