Staff writer

Switch on your computer and take a "sound trip," WSMJ-style.

Wanna hear the latest dance hits from the U.K.? Just click on the KISS100 icon for instant access to the popular London-based FM station.

Or maybe you're in a merengue mood; if so, check out the latest sounds of Colombia on Rumba Stereo.

Software developer SEVEn Co. recently debuted World Sky Music Japan, an Internet service bringing FM radio stations worldwide to computers throughout Japan on a real-time, 24-hour basis.

WSMJ utilizes browser software called WAK-WAK, a high-speed online service that also offers travel information and up-to-the-minute news from the nations represented.

Featured in the WSMJ starter package are eight FM stations from five countries: the United States, Britain, France, Brazil and Colombia.

The number will rise to around 30 by next year, according to SEVEn official Tatsuro Yagawa.

"Our objective is to make world music more accessible, pulling it together in one package for listeners in Japan," Yagawa said.

Gathering world music on the Internet is not necessarily a new concept, and there are several Web sites offering links to radio stations worldwide.

Live Radio On The Net (live-radio.net/), for example, is a free site providing links to some 2,000 radio stations in 100 countries, from Barbados to Myanmar.

The only requirements for these sites are that you have a sound card and speakers.

WSMJ is different in that it is not just a list of links, but a self-contained site.

Listeners can wander from station to station, taking in the music and news from each, without having to open new browsers.

With Live Radio On The Net meanwhile, many sites have embedded RealAudio players, making it necessary for listeners to open a new browser to continue browsing.

Simply put, whereas the content of other sites could be likened to dozens of radios each offering one channel, WSMJ is one radio offering, at present, eight channels.

Additionally, many Internet radio sites provide a mixture of shows, with little indication of whether, for example, China's Radio Xihu is news-, chat- or music-driven.

WSMJ, however, is unashamedly devoted to music -- of a variety SEVEn officials feel confident is suited to the Japanese market.

Careful study of music and music media trends by Yagawa, who was formerly an employee at Tower Records, led to the initial music genre selection.

"It was evident that Japanese have wide musical tastes, but that there was a lack of media to allow them to listen to those genres here and a shortage of information sources dealing with them," Yagawa said.

The stations themselves were chosen after consultation with music experts in the selected countries who suggested popular stations that emphasized music rather than chat.

Yagawa said there is a trend in Japanese FM music stations to gravitate toward talk-based shows, which results in a reduction of music content and a loss of adult listeners.

"Japanese radio listeners are mainly teenagers," he said. "Once they reach their 20s, they stop listening. We believe this is not because they don't want to listen to radio, but rather because there's an absence of the kind of radio they want to hear."

SEVEn's solution is to ultimately provide unlimited choice to subscribers of the WAK-WAK browser.

Yagawa said the Internet service is just the beginning of a wide-reaching multimedia project for WSMJ.

As Internet-linked mobile phones here become more powerful, the company also hopes to utilize WSMJ to make a "mobile phone radio walkman."

The company is also looking to fill gaps opened up by next year's digitization of radio stations.

It is also hoping to compile original online radio programs to form franchises with stations overseas that join the WSMJ project.

These original shows will combine the overseas radio programs in its WSMJ package and local radio shows, which will then be sent by satellite for broadcast to interested stations worldwide.

Yagawa said this will also help promote Japanese music in other countries.

Japan's expanding and diversifying foreign population was also a major consideration when developing WSMJ, he added.

"We also wanted to create an environment whereby we could provide foreign residents with a means to easily access their own country's music," he said.

Although the WAK-WAK browser is currently only available in Japanese, SEVEn is working on an English- language version, Yagawa said.

Membership to WSMJ is available at www.wakwak.com/contents/music/index.html for an access fee of 300 yen.