Slacker launches on-demand music service

Slacker, the online radio service, is launching its long-awaited premium on-demand music service on Tuesday that lets subscribers listen to any of the 8 million songs in its catalog for about $10 a month.

The service, which competes with similar offerings from Rhapsody, Rdio, and MOG, is available on most iPhones, iPads, BlackBerries and smart phones that use the Android operating system. To entice folks to try out the new service, Slacker is giving away a limited number of subscriptions to those who visit its Facebook page.

Slacker's push into the on-demand business make the field potentially more competitive for Spotify, a popular European online music service that has been trying for over a year to get the necessary licenses from music labels and publishers to launch its service in the U.S., the world's biggest music market.

Slacker, which launched at South By Southwest in March 2007, has an established base of listeners. More than 5 million people tune into Slacker's online radio stations a month, compared to Pandora's 50 million. The vast majority of Pandora's users don't pay to listen.

A sizable chunk of Slacker's users, more than 300,000, currently pay $3.99 for an enhanced, advertising-free version of its service, called Radio Plus.

With Slacker Premium, the company is hoping some of those users will further upgrade their service to be able to listen to any song they want, whenever they want and as often as they want instead of having to wait until the song comes back into rotation. Slacker Premium also lets subscribers cache hundreds of songs on their devices so they can listen to them, even when they don't have a Web connection.

But Slacker isn't just going after Pandora, which earlier this year announced its plan to begin selling shares in company on Wall Street later this year. It's also aiming at traditional radio stations, such as those operated by Clear Channel Communications, said Jonathan Sasse, senior vice president of marketing at Slacker, based in San Diego.

"If you look at where broadcast radio is going, it looks like they're trying to become what online radio used to be,"  Sasse said. "What we're trying to become is what broadcast radio used to be, which is radio that's expertly programmed and tailored to you. It used to be that when I came to a new town, I'd find an awesome station with a local DJ that talks about the music in my city, the concerts in my city and play some new music. Radio done right can be really good. And broadcast radio is really missing out, because they've just turned into generic hit machines."

-- Alex Pham

 

Comments

[Marissa]

The link to FB is broken.

[Sarah Brooks]

The Slacker service is awesome - I usually use the Slacker app on my Blackberry, plug my phone into the auxiliary plug in my car, and boom! Good radio in the car! I enjoy their Indie Chill station (mellows me out in L.A. traffic) and their UK Indie station (I've learned about SO many new artists on there!)

[Mark Hay]

Tremendous service, whether the online version (either through web browser or their own player ap), on the Slacker portable (I have the old G1, actually like better than G2 because of larger screen for viewing the album graphics, artist bios, lyrics, etc.), or on my Blackberry. This new Premium makes it even better. I generally listen to my own custom stations, ever-expanding because of the outstanding discovery feature to bring you more of the genres you like. Only downside with this new offering is that, can't argue with the critics of this aspect, there are way too many songs that they don't have the licensing agreement in place (yet, hopefully) for on-demand.

[Mary Beth Garber]

I suggest you contact comScore Inc, an internet rating service, and Triton (formerly Ando) to compare your usage figures for both services. ISlacker's monthly reach is substantially less (start subtracting zeros). In terms of "used ever" (26 millions users since inception), let's put this in perspective: since its inception, local am/fm radio has been used by over a billion people in the U.S. alone. Most offensive is the self-aggrandizing, absolutely outrageous and innacurate quote that closes your story. Obviously, Mr. Sasse hasn't listened to local am/fm radio in either San Diego or Los Angeles, nor in much of the country. Over 93% of the people don't feel that way, since they listen to their local radio stations. A day doesn't go by that I don't hear someone call into a local radio station and begin by saying "I love you guys". Slacker, like satellite radio has a place -- a small one -- in audio, but local radio dominates.