Listen to Penn Jillette Live on Free FM

As a hardcore skeptic myself, Penn Jillette, the "...larger, louder half of comedy-magic team Penn & Teller...", has always been one of my favorite people.

Penn's Free FM radio show appeals to those of us who want comedic topical discussions, with a large dose of skepticism thrown in for good measure. You can listen live every weekdays from 2pm - 3pm EST, or you can subscribe to the podcast which contains the highlights (though recently it's been featuring almost all of the show) and is updated at the end of the week.

CBS Radio gives those of us who live outside the target cities a way to listen live online at Penn's Free FM page. This is great if you want to contribute to the show as they take live phonecalls and read emails from listeners.

Having said that, I hate being tied to a webpage while listening to online radio, especially if that webpage doesn't work properly in alternate browsers like Firefox or Opera, so it's important for me to be able to find the location of the stream and use that in other applications such as Media Center.

A little bit of detective works reveals the source of the playlist:

http://tuner1.dc1.sonixtream.com/playlists/923freefm/923freefmWFNYFM.asx

And that playlist references a streaming server:

http://bdcast-infinity-wfny-fm.wm.llnwd.net/bdcast_infinity_wfny-fm

A simple .asx file can now be typed (or pasted) into your text editor of choice:

<asx version="3.0"> 
<param name="allowshuffle" value="yes" />

<title>Online Radio</title>

<entry>
<title>Free FM</title>
<ref href="http://bdcast-infinity-wfny-fm.wm.llnwd.net/bdcast_infinity_wfny-fm" />
</entry>
</asx>

All you have to do at this point is save as an .asx file into your "My Documents\My Music\My Playlists" folder and import it into Windows Media Player's library. It will then show up in the "Playlists" section of "My Music" in Media Center.