Rdio Announcing Free Music Service Ahead of iTunes Radio Launch This Week

Time to fire it up and see.

It'll be hard to compete with a service that's built into an app that is commonly used and comes stock with 700+ million devices. But hey, good for them.

You know, besides the fact that they pay out essentially nothing to independent musician. Good for them.

I can finally use Rdio without having to pay

Are they claiming that they aren't concerned about iRadio just like Pandora did?

So, I find Rdio a bit lacking, but the app is easy to use, I recommend it over other streaming sites (unless you're already paying for them), but if you're just chiming into the streaming market, give Rdio a try.

Shame the free playing won't be coming to the UK though.

iTunes Match at $25 a year, including ad-free radio...seems like a win-win. Especially because it'll be so convenient to finally BUY the music you're listening to.

Spotify, Rdio et al, just don't turn enough revenue to really pay artists anything---it's quite pathetic.

This sucks. Canada gets nothing. No iTunes Radio, not Spotify, no Pandora, and Rdio still costs money here after the free trial.

stuffradio said:

This sucks. Canada gets nothing. No iTunes Radio, not Spotify, no Pandora, and Rdio still costs money here after the free trial.

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I fell your pain. But soon(I hope), soon they'll iron out the contract deals and we'll get at least iTunes Radio. Apple tends to keep pushing into more and more markets with their services. I doubt they hold stuff back on purpose, pretty sure it's usually because of legal/contract stuff.

WhackyNinja said:

I can finally use Rdio without having to pay

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Just the radio stations or do you get on demand listening too? Is it better than spotify or pandora?

Do you think this will be for mobile too?

Honestly, this is the start of the end for subscription music. There is no one that is winning except the customers who want their stuff for free, which is stupid because they've had that privilege all along, and it's called tuning into your local radio station.

eMusic is having a booster sale where they'll match your purchase with free credits. If you can afford $50, do it and buy $100 worth of the music you're listening to on Spotify/Rdio/whatever. Load it into iTunes, buy iTunes Match or use something like QuikIO and call it done.

The only reason I advised my parents to use streaming services is because of my brother. I don't want them to have to deal with buying albums and/or songs that won't get played a year later considering his brain is not ready to commit to those kind of decisions since he's 11. But this is absolutely not the solution to those of us that actually do appreciate albums after 10 years.

And that's why I stopped paying for Spotify, because when you're playing the same few albums for three months, you have to consider that you paid $30 for that privilege when it could have costed you only $15 to just buy them outright. Even less when you consider all the Amazon deals for $2.99-$4.99.

musika said:

It'll be hard to compete with a service that's built into an app that is commonly used and comes stock with 700+ million devices. But hey, good for them.

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-...ll-have-to-wait-for-apple-s-itunes-radio.html I aint getting iTunes Radio anytime soon. But Spotify works fine here. And if Rdio does too, I might consider it.

Mjmar said:

Do you think this will be for mobile too?

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If I'm not mistaken Rdio's players are all just html5, in which case the webapp should work fine on iOS.

0029937 said:

I fell your pain. But soon(I hope), soon they'll iron out the contract deals and we'll get at least iTunes Radio. Apple tends to keep pushing into more and more markets with their services. I doubt they hold stuff back on purpose, pretty sure it's usually because of legal/contract stuff.

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I am a bit skeptical unfortunately as Pandora was unable to come to Canada. Supposedly, the copyright association in Canada wanted 50% of gross revenue for royalties from Pandora. Well that would make Canada a cost center instead of profit so they didn't come to Canada. Granted, Apple has more weight in negotiations but we shall see. Don't hold your breath. There are some simple changes like DNS that would allow a canadian to use Pandora though.

Timing is everything...

musika said:

It'll be hard to compete with a service that's built into an app that is commonly used and comes stock with 700+ million devices. But hey, good for them.

You know, besides the fact that they pay out essentially nothing to independent musician. Good for them.

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Hard to compete? All you need to win is have the fewest and least obnoxious ads.

ChrisA said:

Hard to compete? All you need to win is have the fewest and least obnoxious ads.

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Which you can only afford to do longterm if you have a sustainable business model (Apple).

This, like iTunes Radio, is great for radio lovers, but I won't ever use it because I listen to albums. If this is going to replace the ability to sync albums to the iPhone app, I'll get rid of my account and go back to Mog.

I may be in the minority, but I'm happy to pay $10 a month for access to millions and millions of songs and albums, and happy to pay to NOT listen to anything resembling radio.

musika said:

It'll be hard to compete with a service that's built into an app that is commonly used and comes stock with 700+ million devices. But hey, good for them.

You know, besides the fact that they pay out essentially nothing to independent musician. Good for them.

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I'm not following your 'Good for them' remark; it seems to be in direct conflict with your May 2 "How to Make an Independent Musician Broke" TP post you quoted. Please clarify.

By the end of the year.

macs4nw said:

I'm not following your 'Good for them' remark; it seems to be in direct conflict with your May 2 "How to Make an Independent Musician Broke" TP post you quoted. Please clarify.

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Sarcasm

musika said:

Sarcasm

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Got it....