Rdio
I recently subscribed to Rdio. What an amazing new(ish) music service.
For NZD 13.90 a month - less than the price of one album on iTunes - I can pretty much listen to anything. I don’t have to own it and everything is streamed in excellent quality (256 kbps MP3 files) to my MacBook, my iPad and my iPhone. I can even download albums and songs to my mobile devices to enjoy offline or on-the-go.
The software is great, too. Signing up, setting up, navigating, discovering, listening, using - everything is top notch. I regularly catch myself listening to music on Rdio, although it’s in my iTunes library and I wouldn’t have to stream it. It’s just more convenient.
What I particularly like is the “Queue”, to which I can constantly add new albums to and don’t have to worry that it stops playing.
Of course, there are things that could be better. My biggest complaint is the unavailability of quite a few albums due to licensing restrictions. Although I very rarely find an album they don’t have in their catalogue at all, sometimes albums are just not available in New Zealand at this point. I really hope that gets better over time.
Other features I would like to see are the ability to rate/like/favorite songs as well as Airplay support for the Mac Desktop app.
But all in all, Rdio is amazing value for money. And for me, it makes discovering and listening to music fun again without having to ponder on what albums I am going to spend money on next.
