It wasn't risky to go with an all- request format at WNTR-FM (107.9), radio executive Jennifer Skjodt says.

Skjodt, vice president and market manager for WNTR and two other Indianapolis-based Entercom Communications stations, launched the unconventional "My 107.9" at the beginning of the year.

It's now audio roulette at the highest number on the FM band, where "Ice Ice Baby" by Vanilla Ice, "Supermodel (You Better Work)" by RuPaul and "Relax" by Frankie Goes to Hollywood are rescued from pop culture's scrap heap on a daily basis.

Listeners submit their wishes by phone, e-mail and social media Web sites Facebook and Twitter.

But more than shaking up a playlist simply because a previous format failed, Skjodt says My 107.9 anticipates new technology for measuring how many people listen to radio.

Portable People Meters -- devices that are carried in the manner of pagers or cell phones -- will debut in Indianapolis this summer.

The PPM shifts Arbitron rating calculations from written listener diaries to electronic records of all station signals a listener encounters.

Arbitron made Philadelphia and Houston the first PPM cities in 2007.

"Generally, what we've seen so far is that wide-variety stations perform well," Skjodt said. "They attract a very large audience."

Entercom executives hope people will choose commercial breaks on other stations to pursue a surprising nugget playing on My 107.9.

"We try to say, 'This may not be your favorite song. But if you sit through this, the next song is probably good,' " says Scott Roddy, My 107.9's chief listener advocate.

Radio consultant Robert Unmacht, a principal at Nashville, Tenn.-based IN3 Partners, says he's skeptical when mainstream stations make claims such as My 107.9's "We play everything you want."

"Call up and ask for bagpipe music," he said.

Roddy says extreme oddities sometimes are broadcast in the wee hours, but they aren't rejected, and listeners are given notice of when their picks will be aired.

My 107.9 isn't the only place Indianapolis music lovers can find variety. Non-commercial radio station WITT-FM (91.9) may satisfy Unmacht's definition of "free form," and Jazz-City.com streams everything from old-school Louis Armstrong to cutting-edge Jaco Pastorious on its Web site.