I don’t know about you, but I love Control Center in iOS 7. I don’t know how I managed without it before (or why it took Apple so long to introduce it). And I’d love to see a similar feature brought to the Mac that would allow me to control my music, adjust the brightness of my display, and toggle things like Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
Fortunately, we don’t have to wait for Apple to create it, because it’s already here, thanks to Controls+ for Mac.
Samsung has today unveiled Shape M7, a $400 wireless speaker that hopes to compete with the Sonos. It connects to your smartphone, tablet, or computer via Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, or NFC, and there’s a handy companion app that makes setup easy on Android and iOS devices.
You know what’s great about Spotify and Rdio? The fact that they both exist, and that they’re both great services. Why? Competition. It’s hard to think of two other arch rivals which are adding great new features to their services so quickly.
Today it’s the turn of Rdio, which has slipped recommendations into its music-streaming service, taking the pressure off you to pick a song for yourself.
Before Apple is able to officially unveil its free new iTunes Radio feature, popular music-streaming service Rdio has revealed that it has struck a deal with Cumulus Media and plans to bring a free version of its service to the market.
The new deal will give Rdio users access to Cumulus’ 525 radio stations which will strip out localized traffic and weather details as well as be used to create playlists and other programs based on the stations and their syndicated shows, explains the New York Times:
Spotify announced today that it is launching a new way to streaming music to connected speakers around the house with its new “Spotify Connect” feature that is coming to a line-up of Spotify-supported speakers.
The new AirPlay-like feature allows you to walk into your house and seamlessly switch from listening to your playlist on your iPhone to playing music on your living room speakers. You current listening session is synced up to the cloud so you can switch faster without stopping the flow of music.
Unlike AirPlay though, Spotify Connect will cost you some money as the feature will only be available soon to Premium subscribers. Third-party OEMs are expect to roll out Connect supported speakers later this year.
Here’s a promo video on how Connect works:
Apple’s iTunes Radio service doesn’t launch in the U.S. for a few more weeks, but Rdio’s been pumping some awesome updates into its iOS app to get ready. The latest Rdio update for iOS today added the much needed Station Tuning that’s been available on desktop since the launch of You FM earlier this month.
The Rdio 2.3.1 update also comes with a redesigned view for Collection that features a new album art view. Some UI tweaks and bug fixes were also tossed in for good measure along with improved search.
Here are the full notes:
Rdio announced this morning that it is launching a new personalized radio station feature to take on Pandora and iTunes Radio. The new radio station feature, dubbed You FM, combines users’ listening history with track voting, Facebook likes, Twitter follows and more to give each user an individualized experience.
Users can tune stations towards familiar or adventurous sounds or pivot it based on your favorite tracks. The new stations feature is available now on the App Store, Google Play and the web.
Here are the other features Rdio added:
Rdio has updated its family subscription plans to allow up to five people to enjoy its music streaming service at once. The family plans aim to prevent sibling squabbles over just one Rdio account, and they’re cheaper than buying separate subscriptions for everyone in the home.
Sony Music Unlimited for iPhone has been updated to offer offline playback and high quality 320 Kbps music streaming. These features were first introduced to the Android version of the app back in January, so it’s nice to finally see them on iOS with the version 1.3 update.
Rdio has released an update to its iOS app that brings a feature called “Song Stations.” Like Apple’s recently announced iTunes Radio, you can now create a streaming radio station based on an individual song in the Rdio app. You get unlimited skips, but no ability to vote or down-vote a track to refine the station.
Song Stations are created by tapping and holding on any song in Rdio. Another nice addition is a feature called “AutoPlay.” When a playlist, album, or station has ended, Rdio can start automatically playing similar music based on what you were listening to already.
Rdio costs $10 per month for unlimited streaming on mobile and the web. You can grab today’s update in the App Store.
Source: App Store
Image: MacStories
Rdio, the Pepsi to Spotify’s Coke, just got an update to it’s Mac app today. For those of you following along on iOS, the changes will be familiar, complete with big and “beautiful” album art and a neat new “upcoming” view.
Rdio just updated its music streaming app for iOS today to version 2.2. The new update includes a new ‘Find People’ feature that makes it easier for users to find their friends as well as providing recommendations of other artists to follow.
Also included in the update are some UI improvements, most noticeably to the menu on the left side of the app. The app comes with a new Labels feature too that lets you search for a record label to find top albums and artists.
Here are the full release notes:
OK, so maybe not a huge surprise, but Google is said to launch a paid, subscription-based music service, like Rdio or Spotify, as soon as this week at the Google I/O conference, reports the Wall Street Journal.
According to “people familiar with the matter,” says the WSJ, the announcement of the new service could happen as soon as tomorrow, when Google hosts it’s annual I/O developer conference. The WSJ says that Google has previewed new music initiatives at I/O in the past, so it might just announce the streaming service there, as well.
Twitter Music is launching on iPhone and the web today, and you no longer have to be a star to enjoy it. After a short period of testing with select music artists and celebrities, the music discovery service will be made available to everyone later on today.
Remember how word came down the pipeline the other day that Spotify wanted to start a video streaming service? Guess who just beat them to the punch? That’s right, Rdio — the better of the subscription music streaming services in the United States — and their new service is called, coincidentally enough, Vdio.
Last year, Twitter acquired a small music discovery service called We Are Hunted. The site was shut down, and now Twitter might be ready to use it in a big way.
A new report claims that Twitter will launch its own music discovery app for iOS called Twitter Music. If things go well, we might even get the app as soon as this month.
Rdio has today updated its iOS app to introduce new album and playlist views to the iPhone, and to make a number of improvements to the app’s user interface. You can now enjoy large album art, see what your friends have been listening to, and more.
Google is preparing to take on companies like Spotify and Rdio with a new YouTube music streaming service, according to sources in the record industry, who have been speaking to Fortune. The service, which is expected to launch later this year, could be available for free, but there will be subscription options for those who don’t like to see advertisements.
It was only yesterday that we found out that music streaming apps like Spotify and Rdio are helping kill music piracy, as the music industry reported that global revenue rose in 2012 for the first time in 13 years.
Well, according to a different report that crunched some serious numbers, Apple’s iTunes Store played a big part in the music industry’s growth, by accounting for 60 percent of global digital music revenues.
Want to hear a good argument for the possibility of Apple launching an iRadio service? According to a couple ofnew report, 2012 is the first time since 1999 that piracy is down, and the music industry has actually grown. And music streaming services like Rdio and Spotify can take all the credit.
Rdio — for my money, the best à la carte streaming music subscription service out there — just released a nice update to their iOS app, making it easier (and prettier) than ever to interact with your music.
If you’re one of those people who still uses Pandora, you’re missing out on some really great music apps that have a deeper catalogs of music. Yes, Spotify and Rdio are pretty much the frontrunners in the streaming music scene, but Slacker Radio just got a brand new look that makes it worthy to be oogled at.
The biggest problems with Spotify and Rdio is that most people (like me) are lazy and don’t want to be forced to comb through 11 million songs to find an artist to listen to for the next 42 minutes. Slacker Radio wants to step in and take that pain away by offering 250 DJ curated stations so you can just kick back and enjoy the music without thinking about what to play next.
If you’ve got your music stored in the cloud, then streaming it to your iPhone might be difficult. Depending on which service you use, you may need to find a third-party app — one that actually works well, and is designed specifically for music playback. AudioBox is exactly that.
Compatible with a whole host of cloud-based storage services — including Google Drive, SkyDrive, Box, and Dropbox — AudioBox ensures that you can take your entire music library with you on your iPhone.
It’s David Bowie’s 66th birthday today, and he’s celebrating the occasion by making his new album available to pre-order. The Next Day is Bowie’s first record in ten years, and those who pre-order it through iTunes will get a bonus track early. You can download your copy today.
The latest evolution of Spotify was revealed today at a press event in New York City that showed off Spotify’s new browser app, music discovery features, social additions and more.
Spotify users will now be able to get the same experience they’ve become accustomed to with the desktop client via a new web-based player. The new web-player will allow users to search and play music, create playlist, and use other new features Spotify unveiled today that will help people find newer, better, cooler music.
