Wi-Fi Hi-Fi
It’s not often that I get to scoop the entire blogosphere, but I think I’ve got a good chance of being the among the first to mention the latest thing from SliMP3 maker Slim Devices: the Squeezebox. Over the weekend, I had the opportunity to hang out with both the brilliant new Wi-Fi music player and its creator, Sean Adams, and I can say without reservation that both are extremely cool.
The Squeezebox, like the SliMP3 before it, is a very clever concept: rather than trying to turn their music player into a TiVo-style set top box, Sean and company have designed a “thin” client that connects to your stereo and merely streams music from your computer. It has a remote control and a little readout that displays song metadata and allows you to browse your library in a way that will be very comfortable to users of the iPod and iTunes. The server-side software has a slick web-based interface, integrates with iTunes, is completely open source (GPL) and mostly written in Perl, and presents some marvelous hacking opportunities.
While the SliMP3 required an Ethernet connection, however, the Squeezebox makes a good thing truly great by incorporating an 802.11b/g wireless interface. I suspect that this little innovation will finally eliminate the major barrier preventing a lot of people from embracing such a device (read: ugly ethernet cables).
One of those classic “Ah ha!” moments came for me when I was browsing Sean’s prodigious music collection through a Squeezebox connected to the stereo in his living room, and was told that all of the music was actually coming from a server in his office in Mountain View. The Squeezebox may be a relatively simple device, but it hints at some amazing possibilities!