Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows • Hacker News Board

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#11

Post by lancefisher » Sun, Oct 25, 2015, 10:43 PM UTC

squiguy7 wrote: post #2

I have found Pandora's selection frustratingly repetitive and looked toward using other services because of it. I have made a bunch of radio stations and cycle through them but they always have the same songs mixed in. Now that I have Spotify premium, I see no reason to use Pandora again. Spotify has radio if I want to use it or I can just turn on any song or album I want. That's a big plus in my opinion.

I used to measure Pandora channels in TTC or time to Coldplay. Every station would get there over time.

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#12

Post by healsdata » Sun, Oct 25, 2015, 11:03 PM UTC

akurilin wrote: post #10

squiguy7 wrote: post #2

I have found Pandora's selection frustratingly repetitive and looked toward using other services because of it. I have made a bunch of radio stations and cycle through them but they always have the same songs mixed in. Now that I have Spotify premium, I see no reason to use Pandora again. Spotify has radio if I want to use it or I can just turn on any song or album I want. That's a big plus in my opinion.

Is there a fundamental difference between Pandora and Spotify Radio? Do they pick songs somehow differently?

I think the approach is different, so it results in a different experience.

In Pandora, your only option is to start a station by seeding it and that is saved as a permanent artifact. The perception is that you've created something, but your only way to mold it is to rate songs. I tried for a long time to create a station for "Female Vocals J-Pop" but could never get it to stop playing male vocals.

On Spotify, things are presented as a playlist. They have a set number of songs and the idea is that they were curated by someone -- Spotify or another user. When you seed something from an artist or song, it creates a playlist with a limited set of songs. That playlist barely stays accessible through the UI unless you choose to save it, and then you have access to curate it.

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#13

Post by metric10 » Sun, Oct 25, 2015, 11:27 PM UTC

rpedela wrote: post #4

squiguy7 wrote: post #2

I have found Pandora's selection frustratingly repetitive and looked toward using other services because of it. I have made a bunch of radio stations and cycle through them but they always have the same songs mixed in. Now that I have Spotify premium, I see no reason to use Pandora again. Spotify has radio if I want to use it or I can just turn on any song or album I want. That's a big plus in my opinion.

I have found that if a station gets stuck, liking or disliking songs will get it to play different ones.

Problem is, sometimes you're just sick of the song, not that you hate it and don't want t hear songs like it. Pandora has a "don't play this for a month" option, but even that's too short. It's also not available on in the iOS app (or at least it wasn't before I cancelled my Pandora subscription earlier this year). They just don't seem to get that people don't want to listen to the same music over and over again.

I think the bottom line is that Pandora needed to evolve, but they've stubbornly stayed the same, just like their stations.

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#14

Post by massysett » Sun, Oct 25, 2015, 11:33 PM UTC

I like Pandora because it's simple. Ironically it's Apple that has the reputation for making simple things, but Apple Music is a maze. It has this heart button as well as star ratings. What's the difference? What effect do they have? Why do I still have this "iTunes Store" and this "Music" on my phone? I can't buy songs through the "Music"?

With Pandora I hit thumbs up if I like it, thumbs down if I don't. Simple.

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#15

Post by hugh4 » Sun, Oct 25, 2015, 11:40 PM UTC

rpedela wrote: post #4

squiguy7 wrote: post #2

I have found Pandora's selection frustratingly repetitive and looked toward using other services because of it. I have made a bunch of radio stations and cycle through them but they always have the same songs mixed in. Now that I have Spotify premium, I see no reason to use Pandora again. Spotify has radio if I want to use it or I can just turn on any song or album I want. That's a big plus in my opinion.

I have found that if a station gets stuck, liking or disliking songs will get it to play different ones.

I find that the moment I tell it I dislike something it gets spooked and goes back to one of the songs I told it I liked years ago. Which I probably did like, then, two hundred plays ago.

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#16

Post by rahimnathwani » Mon, Oct 26, 2015, 12:04 AM UTC

rhizome wrote: post #9

squiguy7 wrote: post #2

I have found Pandora's selection frustratingly repetitive and looked toward using other services because of it. I have made a bunch of radio stations and cycle through them but they always have the same songs mixed in. Now that I have Spotify premium, I see no reason to use Pandora again. Spotify has radio if I want to use it or I can just turn on any song or album I want. That's a big plus in my opinion.

I have found Pandora's selection frustratingly repetitive It's such a stupid reason for businesses like this to fail because of conservative licensing strategies for music.

Is Pandora's limited selection really the result of restrictive licensing? IIRC Pandora pays the statutory rate for internet radio plays, and doesn't need to negotiate with labels for rights or price breaks.

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#17

Post by tunesmith » Mon, Oct 26, 2015, 12:06 AM UTC

Funny, because Pandora turned profitable in 2014. Much like musicians have seen their royalty earnings potential decrease in the face of music-streaming companies that are debt-financed, Pandora is seeing its earnings potential decrease due to other debt-financed companies (Spotify), or bigger companies that can have loss-leader departments (google/youtube, apple).

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#18

Post by kryptiskt » Mon, Oct 26, 2015, 12:18 AM UTC

I wonder why we haven't seen something similar to what Netflix and Amazon is doing with music. That is, cutting out the middleman and pay some artists to make exclusive music for them.

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#19

Post by johnward » Mon, Oct 26, 2015, 12:49 AM UTC

tunesmith wrote: post #17

Funny, because Pandora turned profitable in 2014. Much like musicians have seen their royalty earnings potential decrease in the face of music-streaming companies that are debt-financed, Pandora is seeing its earnings potential decrease due to other debt-financed companies (Spotify), or bigger companies that can have loss-leader departments (google/youtube, apple).

Spotify is not profitable even with paid subscribers?

Re: Pandora Shares Plummet as Competition Grows

#20

Post by patientfrog » Mon, Oct 26, 2015, 12:55 AM UTC

bendykstra wrote: post #7

squiguy7 wrote: post #2

I have found Pandora's selection frustratingly repetitive and looked toward using other services because of it. I have made a bunch of radio stations and cycle through them but they always have the same songs mixed in. Now that I have Spotify premium, I see no reason to use Pandora again. Spotify has radio if I want to use it or I can just turn on any song or album I want. That's a big plus in my opinion.

One feature that I really wanted when I used Pandora was the ability to create groups of stations that stay out of each other's musical territory. Add a bias against songs that are a better fit on other stations in the group and a bias towards songs that fit best on the current station.

the "shuffle" station feature does exactly this.