On Rdio
Zach Waugh •
I’ve been using Rdio for about a month now, and so far I love it. It’s as if I actually bought every album I’ve thought about buying on impulse. It’s totally replaced Pandora for me as what I listen to all day at work. I still like owning music though, so I’ve also been using it as a way to “try before I buy”. When a new album is released, say like the new Bon Iver album, I can listen to it immediately, and the albums I like, or artists I want to support, I’ll still buy the album. Win for artists and consumers. There is just two changes I wish they would make.
Unlimited Rdio stations
Right now, if you want to listen to a Rdio station, either your own collection, or a Pandora-like mix based on a particular artist, it’ll only play a max of 100 songs. That’s just not enough, I need somewhere approaching infiniti. Here’s a mockup of what I wish the Rdio station drop-down looked like:
Mobile streaming
The biggest issue with Rdio is that it’s $4.99 for streaming from the web, but $9.99 to stream from a mobile device and listen songs offline. I totally understand paying more to cache songs offline, but it makes absolutely no sense to have to pay double to stream Rdio on my iPhone while I’m in the kitchen. What does it matter if the bytes are streamed to my desktop or my iPhone/iPad. Feels like some cell phone carrier thinking to me.
Fix these two issues, and Rdio is the best deal around.
Update: Rdio sent me a reply on twitter with some helpful advice for the infinite station issue. While you’re listening to a station, just turn on repeat. I assumed that would repeat the same batch of songs, but apparently it’ll refresh. Still feels a bit clunky, but it works. One down, one to go…
