This month’s Fan Site is Gdradio.net. Here is what John Whalen has to say about the site…
Gdradio.net is a website that offers fans of the Grateful Dead a wide range of resources, information and entertainment. Over the past 5 years gdradio.net has steadily grown from a small online radio station into a regular online destination for over 3,000 deadheads a day.
Gdradio.net began in March of 2003 as a small idea, an online radio station that would play complete Grateful Dead shows for anyone that was interested. At first it was hosted directly from my personal PC and could support 20 listeners simultaneously. Eventually word got out about existence of the site and its popularity has since grown exponentially. Thanks to contributions from loyal listeners and sponsorship from deadhead-friendly companies such as GratefulBeans.com, gdradio.net has been able to grow to meet the needs of the ever-growing listener base. The music now streams from a dedicated off-site server but I still manage it.
The site currently features over 1000 shows from the Grateful Dead, Jerry Garcia Band, Ratdog, Phil Lesh and Friends, Reconstruction, Legion Of Mary and other related bands, with more being added all the time. It also features The Grateful Dead Hour (hosted by David Gans) every week, and on occasion has special programming, such as an almost live simulcast of the 2008-09 New Years Eve concert at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco, CA
A live chat board is always active with regular users, discussing a wide range of topics. There is also a message board that always has a few dozen lively threads going on at any time. A monthly raffle gives visitors to the site an opportunity to win prizes such as CDs, DVDs, concert tickets and more, so there is almost always something for everyone.