“While Pandora has claimed that they’re not worried about Apple’s new venture… they should be,” Cameron Graham writes for technology Advice. “Pandora’s user base is only a little over a third of iTunes’ 575 million users. And since iTunes Radio will be built into iTunes, the service will be in the hands of practically every one of those users come September 18th.”
“Pandora is free to use, as long as you don’t mind the occasional ad. As of last month, they also lifted the 40-hour listening cap on their free service. If you do want to remove ads, however, a year of Pandora One will cost you $36,” Graham writes. “A year of ad-less iTunes Radio will be only $24.99… and will include a year of iTunes Match service which backs-up a user’s iTunes library to the cloud and allows streaming access (even for songs you didn’t purchase from iTunes). The lower price and streaming cloud service will be hard for Pandora to respond to.”
“Pandora’s catalog features around a 1 million songs,” Graham writes. “iTunes Radio however, has direct deals with all three major record labels and appears to be leveraging exclusive iTunes store content for radio use as well… Exclusive album releases and studio sessions will make their way onto the [iTunes Radio] service before they come out in stores. That’s a big win for a service whose point is to help users discover new music.”
Read more in the full article here.
“Opening the music app on an iOS 7 device, I was greeted by iTunes Radio asking if I was ready to try it out. As someone who listens to a lot of music and primarily uses streaming music services, radio has lost its appeal, but my initial intrigue gave way to some overwhelmingly positive first impressions,” Tyler Hayes writes for Fast Company. “Pushing buttons and navigating through the radio section of the former “iPod” app, everything isn’t just smooth and responsive, it’s also pleasant to use.”
“Everything about Radio is intuitive from the layout of featured stations to digging into a current song and seeing what other music the band has to offer.,” Hayes writes. “The design and goal is clearly focused on listeners purchasing music–but even so, iTunes Radio feels like the first truly modern take on what terrestrial radio wishes it could be… A ‘buy’ button lives next to every song, or a wish list one for those hesitant, and it feels like this is how modern radio should function.”
“The ability to look back, click on a song to hear a clip, and then buy it is the service’s crown feature,” Hayes writes. “If you’re currently listening to a station and click on a song in the history, it pauses the music, plays the clip, and then fades back to the stream when the clip is done. Exactly what you’d hope for and expect.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: We’ve been using Apple’s iTunes Radio all summer long, since it first became available in the iOS 7 beta, and it has provided us, family, and friends with many hours of enjoyment — without a hiccup. It is extremely well-thought-out and executed; one of Apple’s very best, it’s a prime example of company at the top of its game.
We haven’t touched Pandora since the day we first launched iTunes Radio. This situation will soon be repeated by millions of iPhone, iPad, iPad mini, iPod touch, Apple TV, Mac, and Windows PC users.
The pain looming for Pandora will be intense, especially as it quickly becomes a ghetto for Android settlers who simply do not buy products in the way that Mac and iOS users do. Music labels will take note and act accordingly.
Upon general release with iOS 7 on September 18, 2013, iTunes Radio will become the #1 Internet radio service in the U.S. and, likely follow suit in every country in which it debuts.
Related articles:
Anticipating customer surprise, Apple begins training support staff on iOS 7 and iTunes Radio – August 29, 2013
Pandora would be wise not to write-off Apple’s potent iTunes Radio – August 26, 2013
Apple’s iTunes Radio to debut in September with McDonald’s, Nissan, P&G, Pepsi sponsorships – August 21, 2013
Apple’s new iTunes Radio is designed to be the largest streaming radio service – July 13, 2013
Apple announces iTunes Radio – launches this fall – June 10, 2013
Hopefully it will come to Canada someday.
What do you mean, someday? Canada is consistently one of the first countries to launch any of the new products and services from Apple.
Your right about that, but I don’t see the CRTC allowing it to happen. I hope I’m wrong.
The CRTC hasnt heard of iTunes yet….
Ill stick with Pandora. Its built into the stereo on all three of my cars and is available on almost all of my non-apple devices.
Thank you for telling us your plans. That’s very interesting and very useful information.
Stereo, lol.
My next iOS device is going to be a car. Before then, all my “stereos” have an aux input; I know, kinda fancy.
Get a BMW in Space Gray. 😉
I have a MINI in space gray an love it:)
Where I live I’d have to call the color “gunmetal.”
Does your car radio have bluetooth? If so like mine your iOS device will play directly to your car stereo with music even if your iPhone is in your pocket. Mine does and it works great.
All your stereos belong to us.
U have non-Apple devices???
Let me guess. You crap in your iToilet and clean your ass with your iPaper. Then, to freshen the air, your release your iFragrance from your iSprayCan. What a thrill it must be to be you.
Yes, yes iDo.
iWish iCould.
User ignorance if you think it would be painful to switch from Pandora.
I love iTunes match, so having ad-free radio is just a bonus. I can’t stress how good this is to anyone on that’s on the fence over spending the money. It syncs up all you songs (most of them anyway—depends on rarity) and allows you to download a pristine copy off their servers at a high bitrate. The reason this is important is, you can download better versions of all your early, super small MP3s.
(To do this, you have to make sure the song is backed up in the cloud. Once you’re sure of that, you just need to delete the copy off of your hard drive and then download it from the cloud.)
What worries me about deleting a song is whether iTunes will have a better copy. I plan to do this in order to update my collection. Is there an easy way to tell before doing it or do I have to manually look up each song. An “update collection” button would be awesome.
They’re all the same quality, whatever they use for new releases. I’m not at my comp and my wife is mad at me or is check
Keep the peace at home, it pays dividends. Give and take, maybe give some first.
The key to a happy life is a happy wife! Twenty-seven years and counting.
Indeed.
44 years and counting.
iTunes songs are all now 256 bit aac’s. The only way you would have a better copy is if you set the import function in iTunes to a higher bit rate, or you selected lossless import.
I’m not stating my question properly. How do I know if they carry the song at all? I’m seeing if I can be lazy here. If I delete a song that iTunes doesn’t carry then they cannot provide a better copy and I might then delete my only copy. While I’m willing to do the work looking up each song that seems horribly tedious. I have thousands of songs. Is there an easy way to know if they carry what I have without tediously looking up each track in their store first? Example, I have every Black Sabbath song ever released and the Apple Store does not carry most of their albums. If I delete one of those songs then try to download it what happens then?
iTunes tells you if it can’t match a song. If it doesn’t have the song, you can upload it yourself. You don’t delete songs from your iTunes account first. Plus, you don’t have to delete anything from your computer hard drive, but you get them on your iPhone, etc.
Thanks!
Given Apples coming car interface, won’t this also put a bit of ‘hurt’ on Sirius?
Siriously, will it?
Interesting.
I haven’t thought about that, but I see how that could be an issue for Sirius.
I drive about 4k miles a month, and I put in a car stereo that I use only to stream Sirius, iTunes, audiobooks, and Spotify from my iPhone.
I suppose if you only listen to Sirius for the music, there isn’t much reason to keep the subscription. But if you listen to their talk channels, then keep the Sirius subscription.
The other thing is that if you have a normal Sirius subscription with another car receiver, it’s only like $6 a month to keep the streaming/app option.
just shut down my Sirius subscription last week. I find that I am not using it and it breaks up all the time anyway. BT in my cars. Stream MLB.com. Can’t wait for iTunes Radio.
Sirius has a significant amount of exclusive content, so that should help protect it. However, I’m sure it’s being impacted by internet radio and even just iPods in general.
TuneIn app, anyone? Been enjoying it for a while here.
I value access to music but my interest in owning recorded music is not what it was. Yesterday’s collections, even in digital form, have become today’s clutter. Simplicity is best.
Tastes change and variety keeps things interesting. I tend to prefer stations that keep their selections fresh and serve up a familiar tune every now and then. Looking forward to trying iTunes Radio.
If it’s only available to folks with ios7 devices, That’s a subset of those with iTunes. While that subset will grow over time, Pandora is available to EVERYONE, even those with only a computer. My iPod Touch 4gen won’t have access. I’m not buying a new Touch just to see what Apple Radio is. It seems that it is NOT iTunes Radio, it is ios7 radio.
iTunes 11.1 has iTunes Radio built in. Using it right now. It is iTunes Radio.
iTunes 11.0.5 claims that it is current. I see not radio option.
You have to download the developers beta of iTunes 11. The version is 11.1 b48 to have iTunes radio. For that you have to be registered as a developer.
iTunes 11.0.5 is current and does not have Radio as such. Are you using a Mavericks beta?
The current iTunes Radio is just a collection of internet radio feeds – local radio stations, band specific feeds like Beatles Radio, etc.
iRadio is not a collection of internet radio feeds, it’s personalized and customizable. It’s Apple’s version of Pandora. And it will be available on all iDevices running iOS 7, any computer running iTunes (when iTunes is updated for iRadio) as well as AppleTVs (when AppleTV OS is updated for iRadio).
And virtually everyone who can upgrade their version of iOS historically has done so. It’s free and easy, remember?
There is no pandora in Canada to my knowledge.
Apple will fill the bill for me.
I’ve only been using iTunes Radio for a few days, but so far I am not thrilled. The streaming quality is great, but the song inclusion in stations doesn’t work as well for me as Pandora’s. I know you can “train” it, as in Pandora, by skipping songs or liking them, but I’ve had to do this a lot more in iTunes Radio than in Pandora when creating a new station. Also, after a bit, there seems to be an ad after every song. Finally, I’ve had it play the same song twice in a row a couple of times. I do like the slider that allows you to skew the song selection more towards hits or deep cuts, though I haven’t played with it much.
I’m waiting for the official release. At least give it until then. Commercials are supposed to be every 15 minutes if memory serves. I expect to pony up the $25 to upgrade my collection and give the radio a good test. We just cut out our cable TV and kept just the internet. We’re hoping to have iTunes radio in the living room and spend a lot of time tweaking it.
Does it do comedy or just music? Lots of comedy albums out there.
Oh, I’m not giving up on it. No comedy, yet. 🙁
Now that I have iTunes Radio I made my own comedy channel. I added names like: George Carlin, Mitch Hedberg, Ron White, Bill Cosby. So I have my own comedy station and it works great.
I made my own comedy station with: George Carlin, Mitch Hedberg, and Ron White. It works great!
Pandora stock is flying higher and higher. The hedge funds are making out like bandits from that tiny company. Pandora’s institutional ownership is around 100%. The big money loves Pandora.
On the other hand, iTunes Radio isn’t going to help Apple’s share price at all. The big money will continue to avoid Apple like a plague. Hopefully, iTunes Radio will help sell a few more Apple products. The whole problem with Apple is that shareholders never seem to benefit from services that those other companies do even though Apple makes more profits from those services. Within a few months, Apple will probably make more money than Pandora has made for all the time it’s be around. Apple shareholders will see nothing from it.
I rely heavily on Pandora for music throughout the day. The main reason is because their app is on most of the devices I use (UEsmartradio, TiVos, Sony surround sound system, iOS devices). While the iRadio app may never land on my TiVos or Sony surround sound system, I have AppleTVs also plugged into those HDTVs, so I can hit iRadio through that. The only device I use, that I suspect will never have access to iRadio is my UEsmartradio – it gets lots of use through out the day, since it’s in my Home Office, and I listen to Pandora and Sirius Internet Radio all day long on it.
Last night, I replaced that great device with an even better device – a set of Bose Soundlink Series II bluetooth speakers – now Sirius Internet Radio and soon iRadio can and will be heard on those while in my Home Office.
I’m right there with you … Pandora is in TROUBLE! I would never have gone out and bought a set of $300 speakers to listen to Pandora …
i’ve been using this pandora-like app called Slacker. How come that gets no love?
Slacker has far more music then pandora I love it. Not sure why everyone is so hung up on pandora. Slacker I love the caching feature so when I am out of data range I can still play uninterrupted. And for those on limited data you can cache your stations on wifi and then not use any data.
Pandora I tried it but it never seemed to get my musical taste. It always wants to give me songs that have the same beat or something.
Slacker is 100x better then pandora. Will have to look into iTunes radio to decide but I’m pretty happy with slacker and Sirius xm
Slacker is extremely limited outside of the popular realms. But that’s a complaint about most of these services.
Slacker has a larger library of music then pandora. However I’d love to see slacker on more devices like in cars in such. Not sure why they don’t. Pandora doesn’t license music the same way slacker does which is why they can’t so the music caching so I wonder if the license slacker has doesn’t allow them that.
Today’s music sucks anyway. Take me back to the 1980s or the 1990s. Now that was REAL music.
Excellent sarcasm.
Only a thirteen year old girl would think that. I doubt you were old enough to remember Kirt Cobain, Alice in Chains, Radiohead, Green Day before the year 2000, or rap greats like Biggie and 2Pac. Go back to listening to Justin Bieber and Miley Cyrus.
I mainly listened to Pandora on morning walk. Pandora stops after one hour to ask if stll listening. Dislike. The infrequent ads would be no bother except they are mostly BHO. Dislike. So I finally resorted to Tunein radio. Like. Hopes for iRadio.
I love TuneIn Radio. With that app, I am able to find the best retro music on the Internet. None of this 21st century teeny bopper garbage.
And they have an excellent bunch of jazz stations. TuneIn is brilliant. I also like JazzBird.
=:~)
What I hate about Pandora is it tries to meld my playlists together. If I choose New Orleans jazz, I don’t want another genre intruding. I will give iradio a shot to check out how if it works better.
I haven’t really been able to get into either of them. I would like to see a “Spotify” like vehicle, from iTunes.
I’ve used iTunes Radio more than Pandora. I haven’t listened to Pandora before, and it’s precisely because of iTunes Radio, I began to give Internet radio a try.
iTunes radio is the next “Ping”. I easily and correctly predicted the huge drop in Apple stock after such a weak and iterative upgrade with no surprises. I now correctly predict the abject failure if this venture as well. Without Jobs, Apple is faltering. Releasing crap fugly cases, hideously retarded gold phones, and frankly nothing else innovative.
So whats innovation for you?
a touchphone that you don’t touch? Lol..
We are now 64bitch…
The fact that there is a 64bit capable processor in the phone means very little for at least the next year or so until apps are optimized for it, etc.
Well let me tell you who IS NOT going to be in a world of hurt: Slacker Radio! Sorry but there is just no comparison. It seems pointless to compare features and usability right now as this is Apple’s first iteration. I used iTunes radio in iOS 7 for all of about 5 mins and immediately went back to Slacker Radio. I can see iTunes radio retiring Pandora if they don’t quickly step their game up but not Slacker, Apple’s got a LOT of catching up to do.
I have tried slacker, pandora and a few other services. Slacker is my go to. And now Sirius has the mysxm which will be interesting to see how that goes. I love Sirius and whole that is radio and they compete with terristerial radio not iTunes and such.
But the mysxm might prove to be something good. Now I can’t say what iTunes radio will be like yet but if ping was supposed to the answer to Facebook then I have no hope of this will answer to pandora. Unless this turns out to be better.
Not just Pandora, but all of the streaming music services out there.
Mac Daily News…
DON’T use iTunes Radio or iOS7 when its nit out…
Is there a way to tie my station with my iCloud id and not my iTunes store id? Every who shares this iTunes account all see each others’ stations. Or at least be able to create a station on an iPhone and not have it sync everywhere?