If Netflix has taught us anything, it’s that streaming media is a door that swings both ways.
Netflix is a remarkable solution to getting stonewalled at Queen Video when DVDs are out of stock, and, at $7.99 per month it’s cheaper than a trip to many Toronto coffee shops.
But Netflix has limited titles – “limited” being a very kind way to describe the problem. Quality also depends on the speed of your internet connection, and there are hiccups no matter what.
Still, the movie streaming service accounts for the largest downstream traffic in North America. Despite the shortcomings, there’s an appetite for streaming media.
Streaming music may yet have similar problems. It’s only now that the major players – Google, Apple and Amazon, for starters – are getting into the field. (Google Music is in beta, iCloud is Apple’s rumoured storage/streaming service, and Amazon Cloud Player is open only to Americans.)
Until the heavy hitters come to the plate, here’s a survey of what’s out there right now.
Rdio (rdio.com)
Rdio is said to be the most formidable challenger to iTunes. It’s all-you-can-stream. Plus sync music to your phone and, if you need, buy MP3s for the Apple-like price of 99 cents. Great functionality on the mobile and desktop apps. It doubles as a social network, too, if you care about that.
Mobile: Impressively so. Yes.
Cost: $4.99/month for web-only access, $9.99 if you want mobile.
Grooveshark (grooveshark.com)
Grooveshark has been around since 2007 and has the humongous catalogue and traffic to prove it 60 million songs streamed per month. Probably the easiest way to play music, create playlists and share songs on the web.
Mobile: This is the hole in the service. It’s currently in a cat fight with Apple and Google, so there’s no iPhone or Android access. For what it’s worth, it’s available on Nokias and BlackBerries.
Cost: Free, though there’s a subscription service that gets you a desktop client and (some) mobile access.
mSpot (mspot.com)
This takes your existing media and puts it into a cloud. So you can play your iTunes off any computer or phone anywhere. It won’t change the world, but it eliminates the problem of transporting music between iTunes libraries. But with mSpot, unlike the others, you have to own the music in the first place. (There’s also a mobile movie rental service here.)
Mobile: Yup, and an amazing Google Chrome app.
Cost: 5 gigs free, then $3.99/month for 40 gigs.
There are, of course, all kinds of other music streaming sites elsewhere – like Spotify, a revolutionary company in Europe with more than 100 million users, and MOG, another slick U.S.-only site that serves up songs for free.
But with Google and others lacing up, there’s very obviously going to be a longer sprint toward cloud-based music streaming. Best to wait till the dust settles before placing bets on any of these.
joshuae@nowtoronto.com
