Spotify launched in the US today, to become the third serious provider after MOG and RDIO services that offer unlimited streaming of their catalog for a rather small-ish monthly fee. Napster, Real, ZunePass, Thumbplay (now sold away), also offer a similar service, but they never managed to capture the market the same way. I have used all three services above over the last year (some in a short trial mode, some through lengthy subscription), so here's how I see them go down.
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Member since:
2009-08-18
@Eugenia
In the UK for ages we had Ad based listen to anything free service ... now we have 10 hours a month ... before I upgraded (it was less than a couple of pints of Ale down the local).
It concided with this article
http://www.themusicvoid.com/2011/04/spotify-labels-trying-to-kill-a...
Which you may be interested in.
Spotify is IMO a good way of stopping piracy because the price is just right, it is cheap enough that it is more effort to pirate than to pay to use it.
I really like it.
Last.FM is a different niche IMO ... more social music.
Edited 2011-07-14 21:29 UTC
Member since:2007-11-23
You hit the nail on the head. Spotify at 5ukp a month is a no brainer, less than the price of a single album. I never bought a lot of music ( a few albums a year maybe ), nor pirated it, preferring to listen to online streaming radio etc. However at 5ukp a month I took the plunge and have not regretted it at all, very pleased customer here. Price and service is just right.
Member since:2006-08-02
Member since:
2011-07-14
Don't count out Rhapsody yet. They may not have the hype lately, but various sources still claim Rhapsody has the most subscribers in the US. Not to mention the other various on-demand services offered that you did not mention. Slacker Premium, Qriocity, Kazaa, and Grooveshark all want a piece of the market as well.
Other than that I agree with your observations. Rdio simply has too few songs to make it worth while.
Member since:2005-11-13
Last time I tried them, they had some gaping holes in their library, but that was admittedly a few years ago. I ran into the same problem with Zune.
I wish iTunes would come out with a streaming service, assuming they had their entire library available for streaming. Hell, I'd buy an iPod just for that.
Member since:
2006-01-04
If Google and Amazon implemented their music services with half a brain just hashing your legal files on the client and then looking for matches that are already on their servers should speed up uploading quite a lot.
Most digital music in this world is copied from just a few sources. Most people don't rip their stuff, only geeks do.
Wuala already does that and for popular files the upload is just the time it takes to encrypt and hash the file.
But yeah, at the moment uploading sux.
Member since:
2005-07-06
Member since:2005-06-28
GrooveShark is theoretically unlimited, since it's the users who upload songs, not the service. But the service is under fire from labels (sued), and its mobile apps are ousted from app stores. So I don't see this is as a serious contender to be honest. It might work for those who don't care getting a licensed, consistent-quality service, but not for the rest.
Edited 2011-07-14 22:09 UTC
Member since:2011-07-14
Member since:2007-04-25
I use Grooveshark from time to time to give my friends a link to a song, but the catalog is painfully spotty and inconsistent (because people usually do a crappy job tagging their libraries)... I can't imagine using it to listen regularly.
Unfortunately I live in a wrong country, so I can't check out any other service, but I imagine I'd have a much better time using them.
Member since:
2005-11-13
Member since:2006-07-04
Member since:2006-02-15
Member since:2006-02-15
Agreed. The free Spotify subscription is just meant for sampling the service without having to pay for it, it's simply not meant to be a full-blown service without any payments.
I've been a Spotify Premium subscriber for a long time now and I'm absolutely delighted with it. I just wish they'd make a tablet-optimized version of their Android client, the phone-optimized one is simply unuseable on a tablet.
Member since:
2011-05-31
I've been using MOG for about a year now and it's been great, until recently. The iPhone app no longer remembers where you left off after quitting and reopening. IT USED TO DO THIS UP UNTIL TWO UPDATES AGO! WTF are they doing over there?! Plus I hate the "queue" (Especially because of the bug I just described. It kinda sucks to have to scroll through your entire queue to get to the song you were just playing that's 100 positions in! ). Keep the queue if you must MOG, but sometimes I just want to play a few songs from an album and be done with them... Oh well maybe Spotify will float my boat 
Member since:
2006-01-28
Member since:2006-02-15
I want the music stored on my server, thank you very much. I am perfectly capable of streaming it to any device I may want to use it.
With a service like this it's a whole lot easier to find new bands to listen to. Going through YouTube for example is tedious and slow whereas in Spotify et. al. you just tap on "Next." I've found dozens of bands that I would've never found otherwise just by stumbling around on Spotify.
THAT is exactly the strength of these kinds of services.
Member since:2007-09-22
Might as well create an interface around Youtube so you can click next then.
Obviously that already exists:
http://blip.fm/
But I'm not a user of any of the mentioned services or blib so I probably have it all wrong. :-)
Edited 2011-07-15 12:29 UTC
Member since:
2011-07-17
Spotify has confirmed that they are not currently offering a Radio option for their service in the U.S.A. It is DOA until this is enabled.
http://getsatisfaction.com/spotify/topics/where_is_the_radio-l8mms
http://getsatisfaction.com/spotify/topics/wheres_the_radio-1h5n7b
Member since:
2005-07-06
Is this a podcast? For some reason it’s in my podcatcher feed linking to http://osnews.com/audio/