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Slacker
File:Slackerradio logo.jpg
File:Slacker screen.jpg
Type of site
Internet radio
Available inEnglish Only
OwnerSlacker, Inc.
URLhttp://www.slacker.com/
CommercialYes
RegistrationOptional (Limited Plays), Free

Slacker is a US only interactive Internet radio service. It allows users to create their own customized music stations starting with either Slacker's presets or a list of one or more artists. Slacker offers many traditional genre, specialty, and artist stations pre-programmed by professional DJs while also letting users build entire stations of specific artists. Slacker users can continue to evolve any of these stations by rating favorite songs and banning artists or songs. Stations can also be fine tuned to play older or newer music, more hits or more eclectic music. In January 2008, Slacker reported that the service had over 2 million songs, organized into over 100 professionally programmed stations, 10,000 artist stations, and an unlimited number of personally created stations [1].

Users can also create their own customizable radio stations and share them with anyone. The Slacker radio service is available to all Flash-enabled web browsers, and is also available in a downloadable application for computers running Windows XP SP2 or higher [2] .

Slacker offers the experience "to go" with a portable device, the Slacker Portable Player [3] The Player refreshes users' customized Slacker channels over available Wi-Fi connections (WEP and WPA wireless security supported) and stores those stations in the device library so that users do not need to be connected to WiFi to listen to Slacker [4].

History

Slacker was founded in 2004.[3]

March 15, 2007 - Slacker, Inc. is launched. [5] The company is headed by Dennis Mudd, CEO. [6] Mr. Mudd is the former CEO of MusicMatch, which was purchased by Yahoo Music and is now known as LAUNCHcast. Other notable executives include the president Jim Cady, former CEO of Rio, and vice president of marketing Jonathan Sasse, former president of iriver America.

September 20, 2007 - Slacker finalizes its deals with 4 Major labels; SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT, EMI, Universal, and Warner. Slacker also announced deals with thousands of Indie labels including Beggars Group, Matador Records, IRIS, Ubiquity and Sanctuary Group as well as indie aggregators IODA, IRIS, and The Orchard, which gives listeners access to millions of songs. [7]

November 15, 2007 - Slacker begins taking pre-orders for their portable music players, to be shipped January 31, 2008 [8]. The first generation players are available in 3 capacities: 15 stations (2GB), 25 stations (4GB), and 40 stations (8GB). The portable players can be updated from a computer via USB or WiFi. [9]

January 9, 2008 - Slacker receives Laptop Magazine's Best of CES Portable Audio/Video Player Award for the not yet released Slacker Portable Player. [10].

January 31, 2008 - The Slacker Portable Radio Player begins shipping. [11]

April 2, 2008 - Slacker announces its partnership with Devicescape, allowing Slacker to integrate Devicescape Connect into its Portable Players. [12]

April 8, 2008 - Slacker announces agreements with top music publishers, including EMI Music Publishing, Sony/ATV Music Publishing, Universal Music Publishing Group and Warner/Chappell Music. The agreements, signed before the Slacker Portable Player launched, allow Portable Player users to listen to cached Internet radio stations and allow premium radio users to save songs for later playback. [13]

September 16, 2008 - Slacker announces the availability of the Slacker G2 Personal Radio Player, the next generation of the world’s only completely portable Personal Radio player. [14]

November 19, 2008 – Sony introduced Slacker Personal Radio as the latest Sony® BRAVIA® Internet Video Link content provider. Slacker’s library of CD-quality music across all genres and eras ensures that music lovers can enjoy radio stations on their BRAVIA HDTV ranging from music of the golden-era classics to today’s hottest hits. By simply linking their BRAVIA Internet Video Link to your online Slacker account, users can easily enjoy their own custom Slacker stations created online where they have fine-tuned categories to set artist, year, popularity and more. [15]

December 19, 2008 - Slacker announces the availability of Slacker Radio Plus. This service provides unlimited skips, unlimited request and no ads. This is essentially the Premium Service minus the ability to save songs to your Slacker Library. The cost of Slacker Radio Plus is $3.99/month (billed as $47.88 annually). [16]

January 8, 2009 – Slacker, Inc. announces the availability of the free Slacker Mobile application for BlackBerry® smartphones from Research In Motion (RIM). BlackBerry smartphone users* can now hear their favorite Slacker radio stations wherever they go, whether they are connected to a wireless network or not – a Slacker Mobile feature exclusive to BlackBerry smartphones. The application, which is compatible with BlackBerry® Device Software version 4.3 and higher is available as a free download by visiting Slacker.com from your BlackBerry smartphone. [17]

January 14, 2009 - Slacker, Inc. announces the availability of the free Slacker Mobile application for iPhone, iPhone 3G and iPod touch at the Apple iTunes App Store. The free application is available immediately by visiting www.Slacker.com from your iPhone. [18]

January 22, 2009 - Slacker, Inc. releases new features and visual enhancements to their web interface at Slacker.com. Additions include a streamlined visual interface with one-click access to artist bios and album reviews, new station creation options, as well as a “Buy Now” feature to purchase favorite tracks. [19]

Web Player Features

The free Slacker Basic Radio user account allows registered users to have free access to all of the features below.

Stations

Users who log onto Slacker can begin listening to music from more than 100 professionally programmed and 10,000 artist-specific stations.[1] When a user inputs the name of a specific band or artist Slacker will instantly create a station based on that musician along with similar artists. This feature allows users to discover new artists similar to the ones they already like.[2] Users can also create their own stations by inputting artists they want and letting Slacker and Slacker's professional DJs fill out the rest of the station with similar songs and artists. If a user adds 15 or more artists into a selected personal station, Slacker will not add additional artists and only songs from the specifically chosen bands will play on that station. All of the genre, artist and user created station are completely customizable.

Customizing Stations

Users can customize both Slacker's preprogrammed artist and genre stations and their own with Slacker's "Fine Tuning" options.[8] There are four Fine Tune options that let users influence Slacker to play more songs that they'd like to hear, these options include:

  • Artist Discovery: If a user wants to explore music beyond the artists they've chosen, they can use this option to expand the variety of artists played on their station
  • Popularity: A user can influence their radio station to play more hits or more fringe songs by adjusting the Popularity option
  • Favorites: This option lets users decide how often they want their favorite songs to play
  • Year: Users can use the Year option to choose between hearing more newer songs or more classic tracks

Ban and Favorite

When a user is listening to a station and a song appears that they don't like, they can press the 'ban' button on the Web Player. If a user bans a song it will never be played for them again on that particular station. Users also have the option of banning an artist from a single station. If a user hears a song that they love and want to hear more often, they can press the 'heart' button and it will be marked by Slacker as a favorite. The station will play that song more often. The more a user utilizes the heart and ban options, the more Slacker can define that individual's musical tastes to their stations.[4]

Subscription Users

In addition to its free, ad-supported service, Slacker offers two levels of subscription services.

-Slacker Radio Plus subscribers have unlimited skips, no advertisements, and the ability to turn off DJ’s on stations. This is available as a 12-month subscription for $47.88 (which works out to $3.99 per month)

-Slacker Radio Premium includes everything in Slacker Radio Plus, but also adds the ability to save songs to their music library online and on the Slacker Portable Player. Songs stored in the library can be played an unlimited number of times at will. There are three different payment options for the Slacker Premium Radio: 3 months for $29.97, 6 months for $49.99, and 12 months for $89.99.

Software Player

Slacker offers a downloadable version of its web-based player to its Windows XP + SP2 and Vista users. The Slacker Software Player supports AAC Pro v2 music compression technology for slower broadband connections, allowing users with a slow broadband connection to listen to CD quality streaming without buffering delays.

The Slacker Software Player can be expanded to fill a user's entire PC screen or minimized to "mini-mode". The Software Player can display hi-res album art as large as a monitor, Artists biographies and album reviews can also be maximized for easier viewing. [20]

Users can also use the Software Player can to manage and listen to their own personal MP3s in the player's library. Premium Radio subscribers' favorite Slacker songs are also stored in the library and can be mixed with a user's personal songs. All of the songs and playlists created with the Software Player can be sent to the Slacker Portable Player over WiFi or USB.[21]

On September 18th 2008 it was officially announced through the Slacker forums that the software player has been discontinued and that no further development will be taking place.[22]

Slacker Portable Radio Player

Slacker G2 Personal Radio Player

The Slacker G2 Portable Player doing a station update

On September 16th, 2008 Slacker released a new portable player called Slacker G2. When located in a WiFi hot spot or connected to a PC, Slacker’s radio delivery network offers the ability to download and refresh selected songs on the device and turn them into "personalized radio stations." The players do not have to be connected to WiFi for playback. The Slacker G2 ships with earphones, a USB cable, power adapter, carrying case with removable sport clip and a quick start guide.

Features

  • Portable design
  • Integrated Slacker Radio
  • Connectionless playback
  • Slacker personal radio stations automatically refresh over Wi-Fi or USB
  • Over 100 stations
  • Free Slacker Basic Radio and Slacker Premium Radio
  • 2.4” color screen (Resolution: 320x240 TFT) displays artist profiles, album reviews and cover art
  • One-hand operation
  • Favorite and Ban buttons enable personalization
  • EQ and Volume Normalization options
  • Capacities: 4GB & 8GB
  • Accessory connector
  • Compatible with existing digital music formats (MP3, WMA and ACC)
  • Up to 15 hours of battery life

Devicescape Connect

Devicescape Connect is a feature that was added to the Slacker Portable Players to allow users to access WiFi-hotspots that would normally require a web-based login, something that the Slacker Portable could not previously access because of its lack of a web-based browser. Increased WiFi access allows Slacker users to refresh their stations at more locations. [23]

Slacker G1 Personal Radio Player

On March 15, 2007 Slacker announced the development of the Slacker Portable Player (the G1), allowing U.S. consumers to listen to Slacker Radio stations on a digital audio device. On January 31, 2008 the Slacker Portable Player began shipping. The Slacker Portable automatically connects to Slacker's music library over WiFi when in wireless range, or over USB when attached to an Internet connected PC. Instead of live streaming of songs, the Slacker Portable fills itself up with a user's personalized music choices each time the Player is refreshed [2]. Entire new stations can be added to Slacker Portable from any PC or Mac with an Internet connection. Because the Player caches its songs users can listen to their stations whether or not they are within WiFi-range. The device is rated at a battery life of 15 hours, but real world tests reveal it to only allow up to 9 hours of usage.

Features

  • Artist Information: The Slacker Portable features the same album art, artist biographies and reviews that are available online displayed on the player's 4-inch color screen.
  • Customization: Users can use the "heart" and "ban" buttons on the Portable Player to customize their music preferences on-the-go just as with the web-based service.
  • Capacities: The player comes in 3 capacities - 2GB, 4GB and 8GB. These respectively store 15, 25 and 40 stations.
  • MP3 Player: Users can load from 500MB up to 4GB of personal MP3s on the player and listen to them whenever they want

MySpace Widget

On August 29, 2007 Slacker released its first social networking MySpace "widget". The MySpace player is a single station Flash player which looks very similar to their full blown web player. The widget has volume, play, pause, skip and album art. Being a flash object this player can be embedded just about anywhere and not just on MySpace. [24]

Last.fm Audioscrobbler Hack

The Slacker application has an unofficial hack available from LastSlacker that tracks the songs played on the Slacker player and reports them to Last.fm. Essentially this enables the Last.fm Audioscrobbler in Slacker. Users with both a Slacker and a Last.fm account can build a library of cataloged songs in Last.fm profile that reflect both services.

Similar services

References

  1. ^ a b CES 08: Slacker Portable arrives this month
  2. ^ a b c Slacker Portable Internet Radio Player Review
  3. ^ a b Internet Radio Races To Break Free of the PC
  4. ^ a b Slacker Portable Player
  5. ^ Slacker Introduces Personalized Radio Everywhere-Free Beta Service Unveiled Today
  6. ^ Slacker's CEO isn't one
  7. ^ Slacker Music Service Signs Deals with All Major Labels, Thousands of Indies
  8. ^ a b Slacker Personal Radio - Portable Devices, Music Players
  9. ^ Slacker Music Service Launches Portable Player
  10. ^ Best of CES 2008
  11. ^ Slacker Portable Ships Tomorrow. What's Next?
  12. ^ Slacker and Devicescape Partner to Simplify and Expand Wi-Fi Access for the Slacker Portable Radio Player
  13. ^ Slacker Announces Major Publishing Agreements
  14. ^ Review: Slacker G2 Personal Radio Player
  15. ^ Sony adds Slacker to BRAVIA Internet Video Link
  16. ^ Slacker introduces new cheaper premium plan
  17. ^ CES 2009: Slacker Available for BlackBerry Smartphones!
  18. ^ Slacker’s iPhone Music App Gives Pandora a Run For Its Money
  19. ^ Slacker Revamps Site
  20. ^ Slacker Software Player Demonstration
  21. ^ Slacker Software Player Download
  22. ^ Slacker Software Player Discontinued
  23. ^ Slacker Portable gets Devicescape WiFi manager
  24. ^ Slacker launches MySpace Widget

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