
Nowadays, almost every FM station offers an online radio stream as well, so it can be heard everywhere and independent of conventional frequencies.įurthermore, there are web-only stations that are devoted to a very specific genre or topic. The classic range of FM stations has been joined by an extensive array of web radio. Not only the technical progress is visible, but also the variety of online offers available has increased.

Invented at the beginning of the 20th century, radio represents the oldest digital mass media and has developed in an extraordinary way to the present.

However, the term radio does not only refer to the device itself but also to radio stations such as National Public Radio (NPR), News Radio 1000 AM and many others. Both transmitted signals are converted into sound, which gives us our daily information. It is a similar principle to antenna and cable television. You can receive radio through terrestrial broadcasting - this works through electromagnetic waves - or through broadband cable as high-frequency electrical signals. We use this term as a shortcut for radio receiver or broadcast receiver, which makes it possible to receive radio broadcasts.

The term radio comes from the Latin radius that means stream.
