This week Pandora is launching its on-demand music service with features like what other subscription services including Apple Music and Spotify offer. Before now Pandora has primarily served streaming radio stations based on artists and tracks. Pandora Premium opens the service’s catalog of music up to on-demand access for a monthly fee.
If you’re an Rdio user, you have a week to download your playlists before the service goes offline at 8pm ET/5pm PT on Tuesday 22 December. Although the company was acquired by Pandora last month, its new owners are not continuing the service, but instead incorporating some of its technology and talent.
You can download an archive of your collection, and also see your listening stats, by logging in at the company’s ‘farewell’ page.
Rdio has posted a few stats to the page, showing that the most-played album was Nothing Was The Same by Drake, while the most popular song was When I Was Your Man by Bruno Mars.
Via Engadget
Pandora announced today that it’s acquiring Rdio for $75 million with plans to integrate the competitive music streaming service’s technology into its own service pending the usual government approvals.
Expand
Expanding
Close
When Apple Music officially launched earlier this year, we ran a poll seeing where people were switching from to use the service. A surprising 33 percent of the 18,000 responses said they were switching from Spotify to Apple Music, while another 23 percent said Apple Music was their first streaming service. At the time, however, anyone using Apple Music was getting it for free. In fact, 17 percent of people said they were using the service, but only during the trial.
As we noted earlier today, however, the first 3 month free trials are wrapping up, which means it’s time to see who’s sticking with Apple’s streaming music service and who’s leaving…
Popular music streaming service Rdio is today announcing an expansion of its support for connected speaker systems and smart TVs, including Google’s new Google Cast for Audio platform introduced earlier this year.
In addition to supporting speakers that integrate Google’s Cast for audio platform, the music service is now available on Harman/Kardon, Denon, and the DTS Play-Fi Whole-Home Wireless ecosystem featuring leading brands such as Definitive Technology, Phorus, Polk Audio and Wren. The company also noted that it’s now available on Samsung smart TVs and arriving soon on smart TVs from LG and Hisense.
Previously Rdio was only available on Sonos speakers and setup boxes like the Apple TV and Google Chromecast.
Rdio is available free with ads or as an ad-free service for $9.99/month unlimited or on certain devices for $3.99/month with a limited number of on demand songs per day.
Rdio has likely been feeling the squeeze from the launch of Apple Music, and is today adding live streams of 460 traditional AM/FM radio stations, reports the Los Angeles Times.
The rollout, which starts Wednesday, includes 460 stations owned and operated by stakeholder Atlanta-based Cumulus Media Inc [including] long-running stations such as Cumulus’ KLOS-FM (95.5) in Los Angeles and KFOG-FM (104.5) in San Francisco, along with talk radio and sports outlets …
Apple Music has been available to the public for almost three weeks and while subscriber data hasn’t been revealed by Apple, early reviews were generally positive. The service is not without its flaws, however, and users have been quick to point them out. With the service having been available for a couple of weeks, though, we’re curious: Are you using Apple Music? If so, did you switch from another streaming service to Apple’s or is this your first venture into streaming music?
With the launch of Apple Music just around the corner, music lovers currently subscribed to competing services like Spotify and Rdio may be looking to jump ship and give Apple’s offering a try. Apple first confirmed in a Beats Music FAQ that there will be a Beats Music update that allows users to import their libraries to the newer service, but users with music collections elsewhere seem to be out of luck without any official migration tool.
Thankfully, there’s an unofficial route to import all of your playlists from multiple services to Apple Music, but you’ll need to act before the 30th if you don’t already have a Beats Music account as Apple could turn off new subscriptions (and trials) at any moment.
Apple announced its streaming music service at WWDC this week after months of much anticipation. The service includes many of the features that our own Mark Gurman reported on months in advance. Earlier this year, I broke down my own thoughts on what features the service needed to have in order to convince me to switch from Spotify. Those requested features included excellent support for my previously acquired music; well-designed, cross-platform apps; exclusive content; competitive pricing; and a killer radio functionality.
No competitor to Apple Music has anything that even remotely resembles Beats 1.
Expand
Expanding
Close
Apple Music was introduced yesterday at WWDC and has since prompted reactions from many other streaming music companies. When Apple enters a new market, it always shakes things up enough to warrant some concerns from its competitors and Apple Music is no different. Rdio, Spotify, and Pandora have each responded to the Apple Music announcement in their own way:
Update: Rdio officially announced the new plan today.
Apple is slated to launch its streaming music service next month, but Rdio is trying to cut off a portion of Apple’s market with a new service. BuzzFeed News reports that Rdio plans to introduce a $3.99 a month streaming music service. The service, called Rdio Select, will be significantly limited, which is to be expected given the low price point…
Apple won’t take the wraps off of its upcoming Beats-based music streaming service at its March 9 “Spring Forward” event, according to music industry sources briefed on the launch timeline. Instead, Apple currently plans to introduce the service, at least in beta form, at its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in early June. The WWDC keynote likely takes place on Monday, June 8th, and that’s the event where the debut will occur. The new iTunes music streaming service is based on technology acquired from Beats Music, including curated playlists, cloud-based libraries, and offerings customized to the musical tastes of individual users. The service will be priced as high as $7.99 per month, which is less expensive than current $9.99 pricing for Beats Music, Spotify, and Rdio…
Image: Forbes
When Apple enters a new business, you know it’s not going to do so in a half-hearted, small way. When it launches its Apple-branded Beats Music service later this year, it’s a no-brainer to predict that it’s going to be a big deal for the music industry. With Apple’s deep integration of Beats into its existing iOS/iTunes ecosystem exclusively revealed by Mark Gurman added into the mix, I wonder whether the unique selling points being notched up by Apple could be enough to leave existing big-name players like Spotify, Google Play and Rdio dead in the water?
That’s rather a grand idea, of course. As of last month, Spotify reached 15 million paid subscribers–up 50% in the last six months alone. Beats Music had only a little over 100,000 subscribers at the time Apple bought the company, and is rumored to have only 2-3 times as many now. But an Apple-ified Beats Music service has four things going for it …
Expand
Expanding
Close
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8q0yZomXuSw
Google today announced Google Cast for audio, which the company says takes advantage of Chromecast tech to send audio to third-party hardware like speakers, A/V receivers, and sound bars. The feature will allow users to tap a “cast” button from within music and radio apps on Android, iOS and the web to stream audio to Google Cast enabled speakers.
Expand
Expanding
Close
Streaming music service Rdio has reduced the price of its family membership plans to match the deal Spotify announced last month of half-price subscriptions for additional family members. This means the first member pays the standard $10/month fee while up to four extra family members get their own account for $5/month.
Rdio has offered family memberships for several years now, but this price reduction brings the service into line with Spotify. As with Spotify, each family member gets their own playlists, keeping things tidy – especially now that you can listen to Rdio in your car thanks to CarPlay support.
With our Family Plan, say goodbye to having only one person being able to listen at a time — or having to share favorites and playlists that aren’t really your own. And say goodbye to friends wondering why “you” are listening to your kid’s music that’s overcrowding the Home feed.
Interestingly, $5/month is rumored to be Apple’s target price when it relaunches Beats Music under its own branding. The company has reportedly been asking record labels to reduce the fees they charge for music streaming to make the deal possible. It has been suggested that the relaunch may take place in February.
Apple has been under pressure to launch a true on-demand music streaming service in addition to iTunes Radio as the money continues to move from downloads to streaming.
Rdio today announced support for CarPlay, allowing its users to listen and control content from the subscription music service using the built-in touchscreen of CarPlay-enabled vehicles.
CarPlay Support. Control Rdio playback and navigate your favorites and playlists from the built-in display in CarPlay-enabled cars.
Vehicles with CarPlay, Apple’s new feature that brings an iOS-like experience to in-dash touchscreens connected to an iPhone, first hit the road earlier this year in pricey new Ferrari models followed by an aftermarket solution from Pioneer. The service only has a handful of app partners so far, but we noted in our recent review that not all apps are playing nice with the feature yet. Apple currently lists iHeartRadio, MLB At Bat, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, CBS Radio, and its own Podcasts and Beats Music apps as supported apps.
Expand
Expanding
Close
The Rdio music streaming service is preparing to release an updated version of its mobile app later today will place a new focus on its free “stations” feature as competitors like Spotify, Pandora, and Apple’s one-two punch of iTunes Radio and Beats Music crank up the pressure on the service.
Rdio claims its free music library is as much as fifteen times bigger than those of competing apps. Like other online radio services, the new Rdio will automatically create playlists and stations from that library based on a user’s music preferences. Curated stations from musicians and other celebrities will also be available, much like in iTunes Radio.
Users of the Shazam iOS application have begun noticing that Shazam is testing a new “Listen Now” feature with the Apple-owned Beats Music streaming service. Like it does with iTunes Radio, Spotify, and Rdio, this feature allows a user to tag a song with Shazam and then instantly play it in Beats Music. We tested the feature this morning and it works as advertised. You’ll need a Beats Music subscription or a 14-day free trial in order to make use of the feature. With Beats now under Apple’s wing and Shazam a key partner for Siri in iOS 8, it makes sense that the trio would integrate in a fashion such as the new Listen Now button in the Shazam app. You’ll need the latest Shazam update to make use of the feature.
Shazam, the popular music identifier service that will be integrated into Siri this fall with iOS 8, has received an update today for iOS that brings a major new feature. Shazam has essentially turned its app into a streaming music service of sort by integrating deeply with Rdio. Now, if you tag a song using Shazam, you can listen to the complete song via Rdio right within the Shazam app. In our brief testing today, the functionality seems to work well. You do need the Rdio app installed and an Rdio account.
While Beats Music will soon be owned by Apple, the music service does not easily integrate with iTunes. For instance, there is no official Beats tool to link your iTunes library for streaming from Beats Music. However, an unofficial tool called Beats Importer is a temporary solution that seems to work well for adding iTunes and Rdio Playlists to your Beats Music library. We’ve compiled a tutorial for importing your iTunes Playlists to Beats Music, below:
Subscription music streaming service Rdio updated its iPhone and iPad app today with one notable new feature for version 2.5.9: Push Notifications.
The new push notifications feature will allow you to get notified for a number of different activities within the app such as music that’s being shared with you, subscribers to your playlists, new followers, and more. You’ll also be able to select which notifications you’d like to receive if you, for example, only want to know when users share new music with you and not every time someone subscribes to one of your playlists.
The app also includes “various UI improvements and minor bug fixes” in the latest release.
Version 2.5.9 of the Rdio app for iPhone and iPad is available on the App Store now.
– Push Notifications. Get notified on your mobile device about the activities of your choice, such as music shared with you, new followers, subscribers to your playlists and more.
– Various UI improvements and minor bug fixes.
Apple’s apparent purchase of Beats took everyone by surprise. I must confess that my immediate reaction was to be slightly appalled. As someone whose audio tastes run more to B&O and B+W, I’ve always viewed Beats headphones as over-bassed, over-priced fashion items. But then my tastes in music admittedly differ somewhat from those of the typical Beats customer.
Even so, it’s still a little baffling at first glance. Tim Cook himself said a year ago that Apple asks two questions when considering an acquisition:
Would it help us make a great product, and would the culture fit at Apple?
My immediate answer to both would be “no,” so why would Apple spend $3.2B on a headphone manufacturer with a small sideline streaming music service … ?
Expand
Expanding
Close
Adding to the catalog of Chromecast-supported content, Rdio and Crackle are both adding the ability to play more content from your smartphone, tablet, or browser to your TV today.
Crackle has refreshed its Android and iOS apps with support for Chromecast streaming. The Sony-backed content provider serves up a number of movies and TV shows for free including comedian Jerry Seinfield’s “Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee” original.
Video streaming service Vudu has also added Chromecast support in the latest versions of its Android and iOS apps. The Walmart-owned service includes HD movies and TV shows with no subscription.
Expand
Expanding
Close
Back in February news broke that Warner Music Group made a deal with popular music recognition app Shazam that would see the label have access to Shazam’s proprietary music data gathered from its users as well as the formation of a new Shazam-branded label. Today, Shazam announced another perk of that deal with the app launching its first exclusive single, offering users the first chance to listen to the latest from Grammy Award-winning band Linkin Park before anyone else.
Shazam® today announced that multi-platinum, Grammy Award-winning band Linkin Park and Warner Bros. Records, are launching the band’s new single “Guilty All The Same” (feat. Rakim), and are giving Shazamers around the world the first chance to hear the song. When users Shazam any song today, they’ll see a special link to hear the new Linkin Park track, then will be able to buy it from all major digital retailers after wider release Friday… Last night, Linkin Park fans who had previously Shazamed the band were treated to an exclusive opportunity to hear “Guilty All The Same” via a notification in the app’s News Feed, giving them advance access to the new single.
While the deal with Warner Music Group was originally thought to be mainly Warner’s attempt to get its hands on Shazam’s valuable user data— the data helps labels and services identify what’s popular and what music users are interested in purchasing— we see that the other end of the deal is exclusive content for Shazam. It’s unclear if the Linkin Park promotion, however, is part of the co-branded label deal that Shazam and Warner Music announced they would create as part of the original deal.
In other related music industry app news today, Spotify announced that it has acquired music recommendation service ‘The Echo Nest’, a tool currently used by many similar services such as Rdio, Vevo, and Xbox Music.
Expand
Expanding
Close
