Submitted by johnh on July 21, 2004 - 03:59.

First, there was Kerbango. Kerbango was - is still - the most desirable gadget I ever saw (iPod? Get stuffed). Looks fantastic, attach it to a CAT5 cable and you can listen to 10,000+ MP3/Real/whatever-format internet radio stations. No PC required.

Kerbango never made it to market. Everybody who saw a prototype wanted one rightfuckingnow but they couldn't match their $399 target or make enough or whatever the problem was. They got bought by 3Com shortly before Dotcomland went the way of Atlantis before it, where it got chucked into the same consumer category as the Audrey and they perished together.

Time passed.

Much, much more time passed.

And now, Linksys has a new product. Linksys the 3Com subsidiary has a new product. It does the boring play-MP3s-from-your-Windows-box rubbish that all the cool kids with arse-elbow identification deficiency like.

But. It also plays MP3 streams, Windows Media streams and RealMedia streams without a PC. And it has an Ethernet port. And it has a built-in 11Kbps WiFi network interface.

They've built a new Kerbango. They've given it a dumb name - WMLS11B - but they've made a new Kerbango.

This time it also does WMA.

This time it also does wireless.

And this time, IT ONLY COSTS EIGHTY QUID.

You need one of these in your life. I need one of these in my life. Everyone needs one of these in her life.

Colleagues, I'm not wrong about this, and you read it here first. This is the first nail in broadcast radio's coffin. This is yet another nail in DAB's coffin. This is the beginning of the end for geographically-restricted radio and all the crappy programming which goes with it, because if they can make this for £80, the portable comes next, and after that comes the portable with a 3G modem adapter for the car and flat-rate data biling.

And, four years after Kerbango got the chop, it's about bloody time. w0000!

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