Pandora Internet Radio Competitors Beats Music and Spotify Hope to Take Down Free Music Provider, But Will They?
Pandora Internet Radio is the biggest online radio service out there. Just as Google became synonymous with web searches, it's almost becoming a habit to refer to refer to any online music service as Pandora. The services overwhelming popularity makes it hard for other services like Beats Music and Spotify to compete.
While it's easy to bemoan big players in the tech industry for their amazing success, Pandora is quite amazing. But that doesn't mean that Pandora is the de facto best service out there. So how do the other music services stack up to the current leader?
Beats Music looks like a good service, but it's new and it's subscription-based. It's also only available on AT&T devices. Spotify is popular, especially in Europe, but it's now owned by Facebook. Some people don't like the fact that Facebook controls even more of their personal data now. It's available in paid and free variants. And we can't leave out iTunes Radio. Anyone with an iTunes account can take the free-to-use service for a spin.
And last, but not least, Songza is another up-and-comer in the online radio space,
"The idea here is that we can get you to awesome music without you having to think," said Elias Roman.
Roman is only 28, according to The New York Times, yet he's the Chief Executive Officer of Songza and its biggest cheerleader. He wants everyone to switch to Songza. Fellow executive Peter Asbill also acknowledged how amazing Songza is when compared to any other competitor.
"If you're at work, filling in cells in a spreadsheet, and you're listening to the soundtrack to 'The Last of the Mohicans,' suddenly that changes everything," he said. "It feels awesome, fun and epic."
But while listing to Songza may be a 'fun' and 'epic' experience, it's important to reiterate that most online radio listeners are still pledging their allegiance to Pandora Radio instead. And Pandora's founder and CEO Tim Westergren wants to make that important factoid crystal clear.
"Our growth just keeps going unabated," Westergren remarked. "Nothing has impacted it: Spotify hasn't; iHeartRadio hasn't."
All this begs the question: do the other guys even have a chance?
What's your favorite way to listen to music on the go? Are you an old school CD-toting guy or girl? Or do you like to stream everything and everything over cellular and Wi-Fi? Let us know in the comments section below.