Radio and television have long been popular sources of news, information, and entertainment, so its interesting to see how these more traditional media sources have tried to take advantage of the Internet.

Playing audio and video over the Internet

Until recently, a significant barrier to providing radio and television programs over the Internet has been the large size of audio and video files. But as high-speed Internet has become much more common in larger population centres, online audio has become much more readily available. Online video, on the other hand, remains a challenge, since video file sizes still outstrip the capabilities of many high-speed Internet connections.

If you want to listen to the radio or watch videos over the Internet, your web browser will need to use a special media player. Which media player you need depends on the format(s) in which the audio or video you want to play is offered.

The two most common media players and formats are Windows Media Player and RealPlayer.

Windows Media Player is included for free with all Windows operating systems. You can also download a "Mac OS X" version for free from the Microsoft website at www. microsoft.com. Windows Media Player can be used to present both audio and video content.