What: Chondo, a Seattle-based online radio broadcaster that plays the music of Africa and the African diaspora. Chondo is the Swahili word for drum.

Who: Michael Eastman, 47, founder and chief executive.

What it does: Chondo is a collection of 17 advertising-free channels of music from Africa or with African roots, including reggae, hip-hop, jazz and soul. The subscription service charges $6.95 per month.

Employees: Three full time and 15 working under part-time contracts.

A history of music: Eastman was never far from music growing up in Mississippi. His father, a jazz musician, runs a blues club there. After graduating from Harvard Law School in 1983, Eastman moved to London and began collecting international music.

Origins of an idea: Eastman moved to San Diego in 1996 and discovered online music using RealNetworks' RealPlayer software. He listened to an online music broadcast by a friend, an American disc jockey in Beijing. "The seeds were really planted to figure out how to marry my love of music from around the world with this technology," he said.

Writing his way in: Eastman said he was driven to learn more about the business, and began a letter-writing campaign to RealNetworks' offices looking for a job. He said he tried every way possible to get in, including sending more than 20 letters to the company. It took him a year, but he finally got hired in Seattle as a director on the sales team.

Learning the ropes: He spent five years at RealNetworks, figuring out the industry and his place in it, and left last November. The next month, he started Chondo, which uses RealNetworks' technology, but kept a low profile while building the service. Last week, the company held its launch party at Afrikando Restaurant in Seattle.

Finding an audience: Various online radio services have one or two channels devoted to African music in a broader lineup. Eastman said his is the first to focus on the niche. He said he expects to find subscribers in Seattle, one of the top markets in the U.S. for world music. "There aren't many cities that can say they have as many per capita world music fans," he said. He also expects Chondo will interest the African-American population in general.

Online giving: Chondo will give 10 percent of its profits to the Trickle Up Program, trickleup.org, a New York-based charity that provides seed funding, training and other support to impoverished people around the world.

— Kim Peterson