No SHOUTcast in VLC 1.1 because of license Incompatibility with AOL

Even after great features and capabilities added in the recently released VLC 1.1, a major point of unrest among the fan community is the removal of the SHOUTcast Module. This used to be one of the most prominent features in VLC. SHOUTcast Radio is a website which provides a great categorized listing of Internet Radio Stations and the reason for no longer supporting it is the ridiculous licensing terms associated with its use.

As it seems, AOL employees have been constanly mailing VLC developers to either comply with the licensing terms or remove the module. And even with a media player with such a large user base, AOL is hardly willing to negotiate. After looking at the licensing terms its just a "My way or Go away" situation laid down by AOL.

The only solution that was going to work was only if VLC agreed to ship it with an integrated spyware and adware based SHOUTcast Radio Toolbar from Nullsoft. That's probably because this is how the company collects user data, provides ads and earns revenue which was not possible with VLC's free integration.

Due to such senseless terms and conditions(for FOSS; AOl is rather enjoying being an evil), even the popular Music Player Amarok has also removed SHOUTcast Integration.

However, VLC developers have adopted the opensource framework similar to SHOUTcast, Icecast Directory. And as per Videolan's request,

If you know and like a radio station currently listed on the SHOUTcast directory, please make sure this radio is also available on the icecast directory and let the radio owner know about how AOL treats their content.

lets do it .

Further Reading: VideoLAN