Pandora Vs. Slacker, Round One
Written Jan. 12, 2009 by Tom Webster in Internet Radio + Technology with 4 Comments
I was in the mood for a little Prog Rock over the weekend, so I dialed up Pandora to build a station around Yes. I did not list any songs on purpose, in order to keep it broad and see what the Pandoramator would come up with. Here was the first hour it gave me:
- Long Distance Runaround - Yes
- Spirit of Radio - Rush
- Welcome To The Machine - Pink Floyd
- The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway - Genesis
- Circus of Heaven - Yes
- In Your Eyes - Peter Gabriel (tried to skip, couldn't)
- Survival - Yes
- Sheep - Pink Floyd
- Strawberry Fields Forever - Beatles
- Turn It On Again - Genesis
So, a pretty good mix--I wanted to skip "In Your Eyes," but had used up the number of skips allowed by Pandora's license and had to suffer through. Still, it was mostly true to my (largely unstated) desire to hear a little prog rock. "Circus of Heaven" is not my favorite Yes song by any stretch, but Strawberry Fields actually sounded pretty cool in this mix.
On a lark, I tried the same exercise with Slacker Premium Radio (which, apples to oranges, does allow unlimited skipping of unwanted tracks,) once again only providing the group (Yes) and letting the computer do the rest. Here was Slacker's Prog Rock offering:
- It/Watcher of the Skies - Genesis
- Glad - Traffic
- Memory Lain, Hugh/Headloss - Caravan
- Sheep - Pink Floyd
- Question - Moody Blues
- From the Beginning - ELP
- Teacher - Jethro Tull
- Save Some Time For Thee - Family
- Script For A Jester's Tear - Marillion
- Owner of a Loney Heart - Yes
While the lone Yes track Slacker delivered was a bit of a clunker (or, at least, not quite the 'prog rock' I was hoping for,) I found this hour to be fascinating--some familiar songs from familiar artists (the ELP, Jethro Tull and Moody Blues tracks), some lost classics ("Glad"), a brilliantly welcome live version of "It/Watcher of the Skies" and a very, very deep track from Caravan. Certainly, 20 songs is too small a sample size, so I'll repeat this exercise a few times this week before drawing any broader conclusions. For slaking my questionable jones for Prog Rock yesterday, however, I found the Slacker hour a bit more interesting and varied, and certainly a bit more on point--albeit a good deal less familiar than the Pandora offering.
In fairness, I could have tweaked either playlist slightly by deleting songs, adding artists and so on to give the Pandora and Slacker algorithms a bit more of a clue to the mood I was in. Slacker guessed a bit more correctly what I wanted to hear, but with only one group as input, I'll chalk that up to a random walk for now. Still, the key to mass acceptance and adoption of services like Pandora and Slacker will be how they work "out of the box" with little, if any, input by mainstream listeners. With that criteria in mind, the Pandora offering was far and away more compelling, featuring more tracks by my core artist, more hit singles, and more familiarity in general.
So, that said, what has your experience been with both services? Let's have a face-off here in the comments! Post your sample hours (10 tracks) from each along with your "liner notes" and make your case! I can't wait to see what you come up with.
Reader Comments
Your 2¢, in chronological order — add your comment below.
Hey Tom.
I can't answer your question fully as I just discovered Slacker a week or two ago. So far, I've only used its prebuilt stations which are pretty outstanding.
I've been on Pandora for a number of years now and am a big fan. It's interesting to hear it walk down a path until you tell it that you don't like the direction it's heading. It's like a puppy checking out how far it can go before you call it back.
I have noticed that if you listen to the same Pandora station for a few hours, you start to hear the same songs repeated (not in the same order). I'd think that they'd have enough material to work with where that wouldn't happen, but it does.
Hi Tom:
Interesting drag race results. I've used both products and I am now a die hard Slacker fan. I respect Pandora's success but my experience was a limited playlist for my genre and it seemed that no matter what artist I started with, an hour later Meatloaf "Bat Out of Hell" would play.
My starting artists at different times were Little Feat, Grateful Dead, Billy Cobham and Neil Young. Pandora's playlist for these artists often brought up the same 3 or 4 songs and I got burned out quickly. I found Last.fm had more depth, especially with the jazz fusion.
Now as it relates to Slacker, I'm curious what your options settings were since this can greatly affect the mix of artists. Where Pandora brought up the more recognized songs in your test, Slacker went way deeper. The Options settings are unique from what I've seen from other stream providers and I think this is what will also really set Slacker apart from their competition.
For me that means a lot more variety and a welcome surprise to hearing a song I really did forget about.
Personally, I've created my own custom playlist on Slacker and do not allow for any new artists to be suggested, only songs from the ones I've selected.
I also just added the app to my Blackberry and it's great. I consider myself to be very particular and hard to satisfy but since I can customize my playlist only with artists I select, then further tweak with the Options, and make it portable, the only thing left is a connection to my car which I have to believe is only a matter of time.
Here's my playlist:
http://www.slacker.com/?sid=stations/9406213/1226009478
Enjoy!
Roger
I have used both services for many hours. My wife has as well. She likes both services a great deal, and we both enjoy them over last.fm or any other internet streaming radio service we have sampled.
Between the two we find Pandora's interface easier and quicker to use. She hands down enjoys Pandora but aside from the slicker interface I enjoy Slacker. It provides more station tweeking options and less repeats which is great. Even still I like Pandora more because it did NOT have audio ads like Slacker does. However, since Pandora is adding audio ads similar to Slacker it makes it a much closer battle. They both have iPhone Applications now as well. Ultimately I think Slacker with the $3 a month fee is probably the best option of any internet radio, with Pandora as the closest second.
Does anyone know if Slacker has a "quick mix" option like Pandora, whereby all of your stations are mixed together? Thanks