5 ms·

Pandora: Giant of Internet Radio Nears Its 'Last Stand'

56 points by nickb 18y ago

ashu 18y ago
That makes me really really sad :( Pandora is one of the rare services which just scream quality. The service itself is great, the web interface is slick, the ads are slick, the iPhone app is amazing.
- vaksel 18y ago
  yeah I have OpenPandora running all the time(its the program to run Pandora w/o going to the site), it made me stop listening to my mp3s since with the pandora after you fine tune your preferences almost all the songs you hear are the ones you like.
- fallentimes 18y ago
  "Our artists and copyright owners deserve to be fairly compensated for the blood and sweat that forms the core product of these businesses," said Mike Huppe, general counsel for SoundExchange." Keeping in mind that traditional radio does not pay any fees for playing music, Mike Huppe is in for a treat if Pandora is shut down. Tons of infuriated, tech savvy users will have his name and an axe to grind. I don't think SoundExchange aka the _RIAA_ (nice try Suit factory) fully understands what they're getting in to. Also related: This is not about the artists; the majority of those fees go to the labels - not the talent. Besides what does Mike Huppe know about blood and sweat? He shuffles papers around all day. http://pview.findlaw.com/view/1570397_1?noconfirm=1 http://pview.findlaw.com/view/1570397_1?noconfirm=1 Edit: I've been reading traditional radio still pays fees. Regardless, they are a fraction of what Pandora may have to pay.
  - tdavis 18y ago
    I wonder how many times a person's identity can be stolen. I want to help find out.
  - deleted 18y ago
    [deleted]
  - Xichekolas 18y ago
    Well I just used prankdialer to rick roll him. Sadly that is about as much power as I seem to have without actually making an effort.
  - helveticaman 18y ago
    I find some satisfaction in the losses the two publicly traded labels are making: Time Warner: 21 million USD in loss EMI: 260 million GBP loss (~ 520M USD) There is no info on the others, but it would be hard for them to make big bucks while Warner Music Group's stock drops 74%. http://finance.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&chvs=Linear&chdeh=0&chdet=1199480400000&chddm=97025&q=NYSE:WMG&#38 http://finance.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chd...;
  - sabat 18y ago
    Not sure what you read, but traditional radio does not pay fees to the record industry. Zero. They do pay ASCAP/BMI fees, however. Those are just for the performance, and the artists actually do tend to get the money from that. (That's as opposed to the money the RIAA gets from CD sales, etc., which the artists almost never see.)
    - fallentimes 18y ago
      I read something about this "They do pay ASCAP/BMI fees" - my original post was too general. I should have specified exactly what type of fees each medium paid (internet vs FM/AM vs satellite).
    - indiejade 18y ago
      Conversely, radio stations are often paid by major labels to repeatedly play/promote certain artists. If you've ever listened to a "popular" music station and wondered why certain songs seem to get played again and again -- sometimes as much as every hour -- that's why. There's actually some kind of psychology thing involved; the more times a person hears a song, the more likely that person is to end up liking it. This whole thing reeks because it's basically the RIAA and major labels getting into a big huff because they are losing control over the outlets that they used to control.
      - netcan 18y ago
        An irony of this kind of business is that if someone isn't going to buy, it's still to the benefit of the vendor if she has it. The only issue is that it's almost impossible to distinguish between a give-away that cannibalises a sale & one that does not. Presumably, terrestrial radio is not seen as a potential replacement for CDs while internet/satellite is. It's all rubbish of course. In a way, 'stars' might be a lot worse off without piracy. Consumers might be drawn to free music given away by weird artists (Radiohead, NIN). Presumably a lot of those would be artists with 0 sales & nothing to cannibalise. Take, software as an analogy. How many users of pirated MS Office would otherwise use Open Office? In the south, these might have become the standard if not for piracy.
      - 18y ago
- netcan 18y ago
  >"That makes me really sad" Id say it makes a lot of people angry. It's also another step in making people reconsider the concept of copyright for music. I think someone's mentioned it here in the discussion: Copyright protection is not an inalienable right (like the right to remain silent), it's an instrument designed to have some desirable result (like tax deductions). Copyright in this case is preventing innovative products & services, and very probably harmful to the art itself. 'Small' artists & genres have the most to gain from the potential of free music.
- stcredzero 18y ago
  Pandora is flat-out one of the best marketing opportunities for the music industry. If they were smart, they'd be harnessing that, not trying to kill it.
culley 18y ago
Among other things Pandora is good at is getting good PR when needed to help in it's Washington Lobbying. This is at least the second time they've threatened to pull the plug to get positive legislation passed. I agree they are a great service. It's nice to see even small tech companies take the fight to Washington (instead of ignoring them ala Intel, Microsoft and Google)
- stcredzero 18y ago
  I know for a fact that Microsoft does quite a bit of lobbying. I would be surprised if Intel and Google weren't also in that game.
cstejerean 18y ago
I would gladly pay either a subscription or a per song fee to Pandora. At .2 cents per song it would be worth it.
- timr 18y ago
  ...and you've just made the comment that makes me highly doubt that this is anything but a PR coup for the company, in their efforts to lobby the bureaucrats. With millions of active users, I don't think Pandora would just fold up their tent and go home. Like the story says, there are lots of potential ways to monetize the service.
- stcredzero 18y ago
  I hope this helps pave the way for micropayments.
fallentimes 18y ago
Please no. The Pandora founder has been through so much and I love their service.
gigawatt 18y ago
I can't for the life of me understand why SoundExchange thinks that charging exorbitant rates that force all web streaming music sites out of business will help its artists make more money. 8/100 of a cent x millions of songs played is infinitely better than 19/100 of a cent x ZERO songs played. Are they stupid or stubborn?
- qqq 18y ago
  Sounds like they want to force web radio to run more intrusive advertising or to charge fees. And if web radio won't, then they see it as giving away songs too cheaply that they want to artificially keep high-priced.
- netcan 18y ago
  I think it comes back to not really wanting the internet to happen. And not necessarily irrationally. The recording industry world has been in a pretty sweat spot. The current (& past) world creates a substantial income built on 1. selling albums, 2. strict adherance to a 90/10 rule (revenue/artists), 3. Periphery industries that support 1 & 2 (eg: movie soundtracks, radio). Almost any step is a step away from that cushy world. So any slowing of change is good.
  - stcredzero 18y ago
    sweet spot
tptacek 18y ago
I remain confused by why people believe that "the community" should be able to set price caps on artwork owned by corporations. If Warner Music wants to charge $5 a play for Mylie Cyrus, I'm certainly not going to pay it, but how is it "wrong"? I'm surprised and happy that Pandora and Last.fm can exist at all, but I don't understand what entitles them to exist. We don't have a "right" to consume major label music.
- jamesbritt 18y ago
  "...should be able to set price caps on artwork owned by corporations" Because copyright protection is not a right, but a limited privilege granted by the United States Constitution and intended to "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts", not to make a sure $ for some corporation. Hence the idea of compulsory licensing, for example. If the cost of the license, though, is prohibitive, it has the same effect of refusing a license, which (one could argue) would interfere with the progress of science and useful arts.
  - tptacek 18y ago
    The "limit" on copyright is duration. The market owns price. You haven't answered my question.
    - mrkurt 18y ago
      That's one of the limits, yeah. You also get things like "fair use". You're correct that price is not currently a restriction in every case, but there's a good case to be made for compulsory licensing (which is partially a price limit). Copyright law creates artificial monopolies. Market based pricing breaks down in the face of a monopoly. Given that we're dealing with state enabled monopolies, it seems reasonable that we should clamor for changes to the framework they operate under.
    - jamesbritt 18y ago
      "The "limit" on copyright is duration. The market owns price. You haven't answered my question." Yes, I did. See the other comments on compulsory licensing as being state-sanctioned price limit, if my own answer was not clear enough. Also, a reasonable counter-question is, what gives someone the right to prevent me from making a copy of a digital entity? Intellectual "property" is quite different from physical goods, and the fact that the Constitution has a special clause for copyright suggests that IP was not meant to be equated with, say, land or other material things. Perhaps copying is the real right, with government offering to restrict that right for a period of time so as to offer incentives to people to make their creations public.
mynameishere 18y ago
Traditional radio pays nothing in performance royalties ??? Like hell they don't. http://www.bmi.com/career/entry/C1519 http://www.bmi.com/career/entry/C1519 By the way, BMI employs a regular gestapo who go around hitting venues of all sizes for licenses. I'm being facetious, but it does suck when a little coffeeshop has to stop having open mic night because of it...
- theantidote 18y ago
  You aren't being that facetious. My father was a restaurant manager in the 70s and he had to catalogue every record he had, how many times each song was played, and then cut a check to the appropriate record companies to avoid getting sued by them. This wasn't a chain restaurant or anything either, just a small little one. They are really assholes about playing your own music, luckily you are allowed to play internet, terrestrial, and satellite radio for free (they have yet to impose a fee on that I guess) and Pandora counts as internet radio so it makes a great solution for businesses. Actually now that I think of it, Pandora should offer a business or premium plan. Because businesses have to display the name of the song/artist playing when they play the radio, Pandora should offer a simple, ad-free song title display that businesses can use when playing their songs. There's some revenue! Yay! Stay in existence please!
mattmaroon 18y ago
Seems silly to not just cut out the free service and start actually charging people.
tweety 18y ago
Although I can't access Pandora anymore (wrong continent!) it sucks to see how the greedy bastards are managing to squeeze out of existence yet another genuinely innovative service. I'm also afraid of the other US-based indie web radios going under, sort of bizarre as they're NOT even playing any major label content, yet the same deals through SoundExchange / Copyright board apply :-o Though keep in mind, US != world, and webcasters elsewhere can have fairer licensing deals so perhaps this will give a chance for innovation to flourish elsewhere (damn well hope so!)
adrianwaj 18y ago
They should do an independent artists and non-RIAA version. Now that they have people's musical taste profiles and an established user base, the next step is to profile many more said tracks.
- tweety 18y ago
  They totally should, BUT it seems SoundExchange STILL gets the money through something like lobbied-through by RIAA legislation of compulsory licensing even for non-label music (now that I'd call borderline criminal) http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/04/30/riaa-stamps-hard-on-independent-radio-stations http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/04/30/riaa-... http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/4/24/141326/870/429/327063 http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/4/24/141326/870/429/32706...
  - adrianwaj 18y ago
    Sounds like SoundExchange are not only passing-off but should be subject to anti-trust laws. Other solution: Pandora opens-source its software and open-content its listener profiles to allow overseas based clones, and then find a different business model. Can MusicBrainz start sound-profiling tracks?
- netcan 18y ago
  That's actually an cool idea. I mean, if they can really pick your preferences effectively, you don't need 'stars' anymore.
kenver 18y ago
It seems that all the parties involved have something to lose and nothing to gain by Pandora shutting down. Surely it's in everyones interest to keep it going. If the royalties gained aren't as much right now does it really matter? Surely getting something is better than nothing at all. Pandora is arguably the best known service and keeping it going might offer further opportunities for everyone in the long term.
- sabat 18y ago
  The RIAA wants them gone. Period. They think they'll "win" when that happens.
Eliezer 18y ago
If you shut down, be sure to open-source the code so that it can be parallelized into a distributed Pandora that helps take down the RIAA forever.
deleted 18y ago
[deleted]
mediageek 18y ago
Its sad to hear this news. I guess the music industry is not acknowledging the fact that pandora is infact helping them make money.

56 points by nickb 18y ago

ashu 18y ago

That makes me really really sad :( Pandora is one of the rare services which just scream quality. The service itself is great, the web interface is slick, the ads are slick, the iPhone app is amazing.

vaksel 18y ago
yeah I have OpenPandora running all the time(its the program to run Pandora w/o going to the site), it made me stop listening to my mp3s since with the pandora after you fine tune your preferences almost all the songs you hear are the ones you like.
fallentimes 18y ago
"Our artists and copyright owners deserve to be fairly compensated for the blood and sweat that forms the core product of these businesses," said Mike Huppe, general counsel for SoundExchange." Keeping in mind that traditional radio does not pay any fees for playing music, Mike Huppe is in for a treat if Pandora is shut down. Tons of infuriated, tech savvy users will have his name and an axe to grind. I don't think SoundExchange aka the _RIAA_ (nice try Suit factory) fully understands what they're getting in to. Also related: This is not about the artists; the majority of those fees go to the labels - not the talent. Besides what does Mike Huppe know about blood and sweat? He shuffles papers around all day. http://pview.findlaw.com/view/1570397_1?noconfirm=1 http://pview.findlaw.com/view/1570397_1?noconfirm=1 Edit: I've been reading traditional radio still pays fees. Regardless, they are a fraction of what Pandora may have to pay.
- tdavis 18y ago
  I wonder how many times a person's identity can be stolen. I want to help find out.
- deleted 18y ago
  [deleted]
- Xichekolas 18y ago
  Well I just used prankdialer to rick roll him. Sadly that is about as much power as I seem to have without actually making an effort.
- helveticaman 18y ago
  I find some satisfaction in the losses the two publicly traded labels are making: Time Warner: 21 million USD in loss EMI: 260 million GBP loss (~ 520M USD) There is no info on the others, but it would be hard for them to make big bucks while Warner Music Group's stock drops 74%. http://finance.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&chvs=Linear&chdeh=0&chdet=1199480400000&chddm=97025&q=NYSE:WMG&#38 http://finance.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chd...;
- sabat 18y ago
  Not sure what you read, but traditional radio does not pay fees to the record industry. Zero. They do pay ASCAP/BMI fees, however. Those are just for the performance, and the artists actually do tend to get the money from that. (That's as opposed to the money the RIAA gets from CD sales, etc., which the artists almost never see.)
  - fallentimes 18y ago
    I read something about this "They do pay ASCAP/BMI fees" - my original post was too general. I should have specified exactly what type of fees each medium paid (internet vs FM/AM vs satellite).
  - indiejade 18y ago
    Conversely, radio stations are often paid by major labels to repeatedly play/promote certain artists. If you've ever listened to a "popular" music station and wondered why certain songs seem to get played again and again -- sometimes as much as every hour -- that's why. There's actually some kind of psychology thing involved; the more times a person hears a song, the more likely that person is to end up liking it. This whole thing reeks because it's basically the RIAA and major labels getting into a big huff because they are losing control over the outlets that they used to control.
    - netcan 18y ago
      An irony of this kind of business is that if someone isn't going to buy, it's still to the benefit of the vendor if she has it. The only issue is that it's almost impossible to distinguish between a give-away that cannibalises a sale & one that does not. Presumably, terrestrial radio is not seen as a potential replacement for CDs while internet/satellite is. It's all rubbish of course. In a way, 'stars' might be a lot worse off without piracy. Consumers might be drawn to free music given away by weird artists (Radiohead, NIN). Presumably a lot of those would be artists with 0 sales & nothing to cannibalise. Take, software as an analogy. How many users of pirated MS Office would otherwise use Open Office? In the south, these might have become the standard if not for piracy.
    - 18y ago
netcan 18y ago
>"That makes me really sad" Id say it makes a lot of people angry. It's also another step in making people reconsider the concept of copyright for music. I think someone's mentioned it here in the discussion: Copyright protection is not an inalienable right (like the right to remain silent), it's an instrument designed to have some desirable result (like tax deductions). Copyright in this case is preventing innovative products & services, and very probably harmful to the art itself. 'Small' artists & genres have the most to gain from the potential of free music.
stcredzero 18y ago
Pandora is flat-out one of the best marketing opportunities for the music industry. If they were smart, they'd be harnessing that, not trying to kill it.

culley 18y ago

Among other things Pandora is good at is getting good PR when needed to help in it's Washington Lobbying. This is at least the second time they've threatened to pull the plug to get positive legislation passed. I agree they are a great service. It's nice to see even small tech companies take the fight to Washington (instead of ignoring them ala Intel, Microsoft and Google)

stcredzero 18y ago
I know for a fact that Microsoft does quite a bit of lobbying. I would be surprised if Intel and Google weren't also in that game.

cstejerean 18y ago

I would gladly pay either a subscription or a per song fee to Pandora. At .2 cents per song it would be worth it.

timr 18y ago
...and you've just made the comment that makes me highly doubt that this is anything but a PR coup for the company, in their efforts to lobby the bureaucrats. With millions of active users, I don't think Pandora would just fold up their tent and go home. Like the story says, there are lots of potential ways to monetize the service.
stcredzero 18y ago
I hope this helps pave the way for micropayments.

fallentimes 18y ago

Please no. The Pandora founder has been through so much and I love their service.

gigawatt 18y ago

I can't for the life of me understand why SoundExchange thinks that charging exorbitant rates that force all web streaming music sites out of business will help its artists make more money. 8/100 of a cent x millions of songs played is infinitely better than 19/100 of a cent x ZERO songs played. Are they stupid or stubborn?

qqq 18y ago
Sounds like they want to force web radio to run more intrusive advertising or to charge fees. And if web radio won't, then they see it as giving away songs too cheaply that they want to artificially keep high-priced.
netcan 18y ago
I think it comes back to not really wanting the internet to happen. And not necessarily irrationally. The recording industry world has been in a pretty sweat spot. The current (& past) world creates a substantial income built on 1. selling albums, 2. strict adherance to a 90/10 rule (revenue/artists), 3. Periphery industries that support 1 & 2 (eg: movie soundtracks, radio). Almost any step is a step away from that cushy world. So any slowing of change is good.
- stcredzero 18y ago
  sweet spot

tptacek 18y ago

I remain confused by why people believe that "the community" should be able to set price caps on artwork owned by corporations. If Warner Music wants to charge $5 a play for Mylie Cyrus, I'm certainly not going to pay it, but how is it "wrong"? I'm surprised and happy that Pandora and Last.fm can exist at all, but I don't understand what entitles them to exist. We don't have a "right" to consume major label music.

jamesbritt 18y ago
"...should be able to set price caps on artwork owned by corporations" Because copyright protection is not a right, but a limited privilege granted by the United States Constitution and intended to "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts", not to make a sure $ for some corporation. Hence the idea of compulsory licensing, for example. If the cost of the license, though, is prohibitive, it has the same effect of refusing a license, which (one could argue) would interfere with the progress of science and useful arts.
- tptacek 18y ago
  The "limit" on copyright is duration. The market owns price. You haven't answered my question.
  - mrkurt 18y ago
    That's one of the limits, yeah. You also get things like "fair use". You're correct that price is not currently a restriction in every case, but there's a good case to be made for compulsory licensing (which is partially a price limit). Copyright law creates artificial monopolies. Market based pricing breaks down in the face of a monopoly. Given that we're dealing with state enabled monopolies, it seems reasonable that we should clamor for changes to the framework they operate under.
  - jamesbritt 18y ago
    "The "limit" on copyright is duration. The market owns price. You haven't answered my question." Yes, I did. See the other comments on compulsory licensing as being state-sanctioned price limit, if my own answer was not clear enough. Also, a reasonable counter-question is, what gives someone the right to prevent me from making a copy of a digital entity? Intellectual "property" is quite different from physical goods, and the fact that the Constitution has a special clause for copyright suggests that IP was not meant to be equated with, say, land or other material things. Perhaps copying is the real right, with government offering to restrict that right for a period of time so as to offer incentives to people to make their creations public.

mynameishere 18y ago

Traditional radio pays nothing in performance royalties ??? Like hell they don't. http://www.bmi.com/career/entry/C1519 http://www.bmi.com/career/entry/C1519 By the way, BMI employs a regular gestapo who go around hitting venues of all sizes for licenses. I'm being facetious, but it does suck when a little coffeeshop has to stop having open mic night because of it...

theantidote 18y ago
You aren't being that facetious. My father was a restaurant manager in the 70s and he had to catalogue every record he had, how many times each song was played, and then cut a check to the appropriate record companies to avoid getting sued by them. This wasn't a chain restaurant or anything either, just a small little one. They are really assholes about playing your own music, luckily you are allowed to play internet, terrestrial, and satellite radio for free (they have yet to impose a fee on that I guess) and Pandora counts as internet radio so it makes a great solution for businesses. Actually now that I think of it, Pandora should offer a business or premium plan. Because businesses have to display the name of the song/artist playing when they play the radio, Pandora should offer a simple, ad-free song title display that businesses can use when playing their songs. There's some revenue! Yay! Stay in existence please!

mattmaroon 18y ago

Seems silly to not just cut out the free service and start actually charging people.

tweety 18y ago

Although I can't access Pandora anymore (wrong continent!) it sucks to see how the greedy bastards are managing to squeeze out of existence yet another genuinely innovative service. I'm also afraid of the other US-based indie web radios going under, sort of bizarre as they're NOT even playing any major label content, yet the same deals through SoundExchange / Copyright board apply :-o Though keep in mind, US != world, and webcasters elsewhere can have fairer licensing deals so perhaps this will give a chance for innovation to flourish elsewhere (damn well hope so!)

adrianwaj 18y ago

They should do an independent artists and non-RIAA version. Now that they have people's musical taste profiles and an established user base, the next step is to profile many more said tracks.

tweety 18y ago
They totally should, BUT it seems SoundExchange STILL gets the money through something like lobbied-through by RIAA legislation of compulsory licensing even for non-label music (now that I'd call borderline criminal) http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/04/30/riaa-stamps-hard-on-independent-radio-stations http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/04/30/riaa-... http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/4/24/141326/870/429/327063 http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/4/24/141326/870/429/32706...
- adrianwaj 18y ago
  Sounds like SoundExchange are not only passing-off but should be subject to anti-trust laws. Other solution: Pandora opens-source its software and open-content its listener profiles to allow overseas based clones, and then find a different business model. Can MusicBrainz start sound-profiling tracks?
netcan 18y ago
That's actually an cool idea. I mean, if they can really pick your preferences effectively, you don't need 'stars' anymore.

kenver 18y ago

It seems that all the parties involved have something to lose and nothing to gain by Pandora shutting down. Surely it's in everyones interest to keep it going. If the royalties gained aren't as much right now does it really matter? Surely getting something is better than nothing at all. Pandora is arguably the best known service and keeping it going might offer further opportunities for everyone in the long term.

sabat 18y ago
The RIAA wants them gone. Period. They think they'll "win" when that happens.

Eliezer 18y ago

If you shut down, be sure to open-source the code so that it can be parallelized into a distributed Pandora that helps take down the RIAA forever.

deleted 18y ago

[deleted]

mediageek 18y ago

Its sad to hear this news. I guess the music industry is not acknowledging the fact that pandora is infact helping them make money.