Slacker Premium Radio today has officially launched. The Slacker Premium Radio service lets you skip an unlimited number of songs, as well as build a music library by saving songs that can be played anytime.
These saved songs can be played individually or as a part of a custom playlist. Saved radio songs are tied to your Premium Radio account and automatically sent to your Slacker Portable or Slacker Software libraries, where they can be played whenever they want.
"Slacker Premium Radio is for those who want even more control over their radio listening experience," said Dennis Mudd, CEO of Slacker (pictured above). "We're particularly excited by the save song feature in Premium Radio, which lets people build a library of their favorite music without having to work at it."
Of course, the Slacker Basic Radio is still free, but the Slacker Premium Radio is launching today for $7.50 per month with an annual subscription.
Here's the breakdown of features for Slacker Premium Radio:
- Ad-free personalized music
- Unlimited song skipping
- Save favorite songs to play whenever you choose or create custom playlists
- Log in from any PC or Mac to hear personalized stations in high quality
- Available on Slacker Web Player, Software Player and Slacker Portable Player
- Quickly rate favorites or ban songs/artists from any station
- Easily share stations with friends
- View artist profiles, album reviews, large cover art and visualizations
- Embed custom stations in personal blogs or favorite social networking sites
You can check out the details and sign up to the Premium Radio service here. One nice thing is that if you truly don't like the Premium service, you can cancel within 7 days and not be billed (so it's almost like a fully functioning free trial).
In addition to all this, there's now confirmation for what we heard about yesterday: the Slacker Portable is indeed available for pre-order now, with the product shipping out on or before December 13th. All the details you need about it are in this post.
Conceptually, I really like what the Slacker Portable is doing in terms of getting the content to you. Instead of depending on a constant signal (like we do with satellite radio), you pre-load all the content onto the Slacker Portable device and listen on-the-go. If you have the Basic Radio, you're limited to 6-skips per channel/per hour. But if you have the Slacker Premium Radio service, you have unlimited skips.
Think about it: in a time-shifted world of TiVo's and DVR's, is there really a difference between hearing an "encore" broadcast and hearing a "cached" version?
The only thing that "live" radio provides as an experience differentiator is lack of control - you can't skip ahead.
Now of course that doesn't apply to live sports, news, talk, etc - which is still what terrestrial radio and satellite radio bring to the table. But many satellite radio listeners catch rebroadcasts of their favorite talk shows, so they might as well be "cached replays" anyway (and in turn without the reception issues). And for folks who mostly listen to music, "time" isn't the issue... it's discovery.
See, one of my big problems with iPods is that no matter how big the storage space is, you still need to hear the song at least once. There's no discovery. There's no mystery. Yes, you have absolute control, but there's nothing new. Plus, there's a massive segment of the population who has absolutely no desire (or time) to pre-program all their playlists.
Slacker has solved that problem. You download a playlist of songs from your own custom-built stations, each matched to your personal tastes, and then listen to them at your leisure.
And since Slacker has worked out individual deals with all the major music labels (not to mention the indie labels), you're now "allowed to" save songs to the device without worry of the RIAA-cops coming after you. That's some pretty cool stuff.
...now if they could only find a way to get it into the car easily.
If your car has an aux input it can be plugged in as easily as an iPod.
Ryan, I assume you are being facetious with the car comment. You know there is a satellite car kit coming no???
This is yet another reason why the merger needs to be approved. What happens when the MLB and NFL sign with Slacker and let you stream games to the car or player? You are right, I watch my sports on my DVR because I don't have time to sit through the nonsense.
Talk about a scary reality, and a sign of the times:
LIVE CONTENT = CRIPPLED
move along folks, no competition with satrad to see here.
who's the happy guy in the picture?
"Slacker Premium Radio is for those who want even more control over their radio listening experience," said Dennis Mudd, CEO of Slacker (pictured above).
Don't people read anymore. It's the CEO in the picture, it's in the article.
Everyone just reads the headline and looks at the pretty pictures.
Reading is for dummies.
Not only is reading for dummies.
Learning is for QUEERS!
Lingerrr Longer.....
Doesn't the Slacker portable already exist only with more functionality and is called an Inno? This device, as far as I can tell, does nothing the Inno doesn't already do better and offers much less content. I'm sure XM/Sirius/FM are shaking in their boots at this "competition".
> Doesn't the Slacker portable already exist only with more functionality and is called an Inno?
You have no idea how this thing works, do you? I own an Inno that I bought at launch, and yet I want the Slacker portable. Why? Because it's monitoring what I like and don't like. Because I'll NEVER have to hear Boston or some other "over-played on FM" band again. You can create CUSTOM stations based on artists you like. How is that ANYTHING like an Inno?
The only thing (and it's a biggie) is no true live content. No morning shows, no baseball, nada. Even with a connected WiFi or sat kit it's only caching content based on your choices and not doing anything live. It could in theory stream internet stations, but not over the sat kit - only at work or home.
@pfreak:
You have no idea what you are talking about.
Since I can save songs to my inno and over time build up a library of the same music I would record with slacker how is that not the same thing? Oh, I can also put my own mp3's on the inno and receive live content. I guess I don't know what I'm talking about.
It's not the same. I was using Slacker (FM modulated) at work until our net connection got cut. I now have about 4 Gigs of MP3's and a few playlists on the computer. I have to mess with the playlist every morning and it ends up replaying alot of stuff. With Slacker it was playing favorites I bookmarked AND introducing new music based on my decisions - all by itself. Also if co-workers want to hear an artist I don't have they have to wait 'till we find a CD and rip it. With Slacker I could just add the artist and have access right away.
There are similarities with the Inno, but your gonna have to wait until you happen to hear something you like played to record it. With Slacker, you'll hear more stuff you like on ALL the stations because you're TELLING it what you like and don't like and it reacts to your choices constantly. Plus, you'll NEVER again switch to a channel to hear your favorite band and get the last 10 seconds of the song. It's always starting the song when you switch "channels".
This is exactly what disenfranchised XM fans are looking for--Great sound quality, deep playlists that are created by your taste, and no interference by FM hacks and their old ideas.
Slacker will replace XM as the service for real music lovers--who thought they were getting away from FM, and then woke up one day to mediocre, muddy sound quality and FM think galore.
I think that lacking a way to get Howard Stern on there, this will still pose no challenge to Sirius when they takeover XM. Mel isn't going to share him with Slacker, and without the KOAM, they have very little chance. I personally see absolutely no reason the switch, and think this will probably end up being a gigantic failure just like XM was once they didn't pick up Howard and we have watched the nosedive ensue ever since.
Get a f**king clue, and get off Howard will ya...... Isn't he retiring in a year or two? What then, no more radio, all technology dies? The world doesn't revolve around him, he and his idiotic worshipers think it does.
If he's so great, why didn't 20 million people sign up for Sirius?
@Anonymous Coward:
Grow up and stop playing favorites. I'm sick of this whole XM vs Sirius crap. Soon they will be one company. XM, Sirus, Slacker, each have their own specialties.
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