Hasta La Gadget!

Headphone parties, or silent discos, seldom translate well to mobile devices — the likelihood that every listener has the same songs is rather slim. If Apple implements a newly granted patent, however, it could be easy to start those private gigs. The technique shares the tempo of a master track with other devices invited to a party; those gadgets automatically pick similarly paced tunes and sync their playback. Participants could be part of an ad hoc local network, but the approach would also work when people are miles apart. Apple even proposes a social networking element that lets aspiring DJs share avatars and other identifiers. While there’s no guarantees that the patent will reach shipping products, we wouldn’t be surprised to see iPhone owners grooving in unison at some point in the future.

Filed under: Cellphones, Portable Audio/Video, Mobile, Apple

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Source: USPTO

Pandora’s adding a sleep timer to its Android and iOS app update. The new feature (found in the options drawer) lets you shut off your stream after 15, 30 or 60 minutes, so your data plan and sweet tunes aren’t wasted on deaf ears. [Pandora]

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There’s nothing quite like a 180, and that’s what Pandora plans to pull as next month rolls in. The outfit’s 40-hour mobile listening limit, which was established back in February, will be history in September. The move was announced today by CFO Mike Herring, as he stated the following:

“When we introduced the 40 hour mobile listening limit, we were confident that our scale — over 7 percent of total radio listening and Pandora’s number one ranking in most major markets — would allow us to take this action without impacting our key monetization initiatives in driving the disruption of the radio advertising market and driving our mobile advertising leadership. As our results have shown, the continued strong growth in our advertising revenue allowed us to cover the increased royalty costs with dollars left over to invest back into the business. With these tools in hand, and insight into how they work, we are resetting our levers in September.

Notably, Pandora plans to eliminate the blanket 40-hour-per-month limit on free mobile listening effective September 1st. In the 6 months since we first implemented the free mobile listening limitation, we have gained critical insights into our user population that has given us greater control of our business. Because of these insights Pandora has implemented both other surgical levers to control content cost and new features that will allow for greater product usage.”

It’s not clear why the the reversal is being made — be it uproar from loyal users or something else entirely — but those who found themselves perturbed by such a notion will have plenty to celebrate in just a few days.

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Mobile

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Source: TechCrunch

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Vevo has signed a big deal with Samsung and Apple—and may make a big announcement about an arrival on new platforms this week.

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This September, Apple’s expected to flip the switch on iTunes Radio, the music service announced at WWDC in June. But how exactly will Cupertino fund its pricey new streaming venture? Ads, and lots of them — according to AdAge, Apple will serve up an audio advertisement every 15 minutes, while video ads will play every hour, and only at times that users are likely to be looking at the display, such as right after hitting play or jumping to a new song. McDonald’s, Nissan, Pepsi and Procter & Gamble are all on board as launch advertisers, with each deal bringing many millions of dollars in revenue. Only free users will have to deal with frequent disturbances, however. Users paying $25 per year for an iTunes Match subscription will have ad-free access to Radio, letting them stream tunes continuously without interruption.

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Internet, Apple

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Source: AdAge