About Pandora

Pandora is an automated music recommendation and Internet radio service created by the Music Genome Project. Users enter a song or artist that they enjoy, and the service responds by playing selections that are musically similar. Users provide feedback on approval or disapproval of individual songs, which Pandora takes into account for future selections.

How do I use it?

A station is set by specifying an artist or song, or a combination of multiple items of any kind in a single station. Listeners can tune into pre-made genre stations and other users' stations. Each track played can be responded to with favorable or unfavorable buttons, which determine if it should be played, and how much should similarly classified songs be played in the station. A second negative response to the same artist will ban that artist from the selected station unless the user has marked the artist positively on another occasion. No response is applicable to musical attributes or to albums.

Limitations

• Pandora serves users in the United States. Initially this was enforced lightly, by requiring a US ZIP code at registration but since May 3, 2007, Pandora has blocked foreign IP address.
• 40 hours of free listening per month. Unlimited for the rest of the month for $0.99. The Vista player does not affect the listening limit.
• Rewind or repeat is not possible.
• Play of a single artist is limited. Pandora provides similar music, not a play-on-demand service.
• Such things as genre stations and info about the song cannot be accessed from the mini player and the Vista player.