BBC Radio's Streaming Changes Leave Long-Time Listeners In the Lurch

New submitter grandrollerz writes: Despite streaming online since the RealAudio days of the late 1990s, the BBC has announced that most of its radio stations will become unavailable to international users later this year. Starting in Spring 2025, only talk news stations BBC World Service and BBC Radio 4 will remain accessible outside the UK. This change is due to rights issues and the launch of a new BBC audio website and app that will replace BBC Sounds for international users. The BBC Sounds app will be available exclusively to UK audiences, although UK users traveling abroad for short periods will still be able to use it. This move has disappointed many long-time international listeners who will lose access to their favorite BBC radio stations. It follows a similar move to further commercialize its services where in 2024 the BBC and Amazon Music struck a global deal to make BBC podcasts available on Amazon Music outside the UK, but only for subscribers to Amazon's Prime and Amazon Music Unlimited services.

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