Pandora has traditionally batted back questions about rivalry from on-demand streaming music services by pointing to their very-different character. That’s not a defence that will work much longer though. Spotify revamped its personal radio feature last year, while its apps platform is fuelling Pandora-like services like SpotOn Radio. Now Rdio is planning its own personal radio bolt-on, with VP of product Malthe Sigurdsson telling GigaOm that “we need to get better at passive listening” and “become more like Pandora”, but with a bigger catalogue of music thanks to its existing on-demand licensing deals. Here’s a related quote, from producer and Beats co-founder Jimmy Iovine: “Right now, subscription music online is culturally inadequate. It needs feel. It needs culture. What Apple has in the downloading world is very, very good. But subscription has an enormous hole in it, and it’s not satisfying right now.” Are radio-like features one of the answers?
