Why I subscribed to Rdio within moments.
Spotify
I obtained Spotify as soon as it came out within the UK and have dabbled with subscriptions for parties, initially with the day pass and then when they removed that cancelling after a month.
I started using Spotify because;
- It was free.
- It was in the UK early.
The adverts where always annoying and all about POP music and the big ‘Artists’ as time went by the interface just seems to get fuller of stuff (read adverts) also annoying was plugins and social things that just get in your way and don’t seem to be about Music.
I however wanted to pay Musicians and knew that my days of purchasing CDs was over (I’ve imported them all to my Mac and have iTunes Match) and although I would occasionally buy new stuff from iTunes it did not satisfy me in regards to music discovery, 6music does a good job but a service like Spotify should be able to provide a tailored approach.
Also what bothered me about subscribing to Spotify was reading about the tiny payments artists get.
I was also not very keen on the way Spotify Merged your hard drive copied music into the ‘Library’ acting like iTunes, I would suspect I would be using a combination of Spotify and iTunes and I did not want that merge madness.
Rdio
Rdio is different it well feels about Music, it feels about real Artists / Musicians. Your music is called your Collection. The free version never has adverts. There are no adverts anywhere, the only promo things appear to be Rdio Sessions, which are Music Sessions, again about the Music.
And it’s just great to use.
It does not import in your iTunes library it just matches to its library which I really like, and updates you (via email) when new work by those artists becomes available in your collection. It scrobbles to last fm in the background no matter where you play from (web, desktop or mobile).
One big advantage is that is has an amazing web based interface no install needed, so I can be anywhere and get to my music collection, and when you use other devices or the dedicated desktop Apps they don’t automatically take over from each other, they start in remote mode first, meaning you can control your music from the web, app or device without interruption, if you do want to play on that device, one press / click and you can carry on from the same moment seamlessly on said device. It has a really simple way to Sync to mobile for offline playback. The apps are slick, and if you listen to one Record, unless you say so it stops at the end and does not automatically start playing any old stuff!
Rdio even has an Artist’s program which look interesting, I wonder if Tom Yorke (@tomyorke) likes that ?
Rdio just feels about Music and that’s why I subscribed shortly after signing up.
It’s free to sign up and you get a free amount of time each to listen to anything Rdio have via desktop web browser or app. I cannot recommend it enough if your into Music.