Q. What happened to iTunes Radio? I tried to play one of my stations and it wants me to sign up for Apple Music.
A. Apple discontinued the free ad-supported iTunes Radio stations last month and moved most of the channels behind the door of its subscription-based Apple Music service. The company informed its customers of the change by email in mid-January. Subscribers to the company’s iTunes Match service also lost free access to the majority of the streaming iTunes Radio stations. Apple’s Beats 1 Radio stream is still available free, as are some stations like NPR and BBC World Service.
As
you have noticed, trying to play one of your old radio stations in the
iTunes program or iOS Music app brings an unsubtle invitation to sign up
for Apple Music, which costs
about $10 a month for an individual subscription or $15 for the family
plan after the free three-month trail period ends. In addition to
regaining access to the now-renamed “Apple Music radio stations,” a
subscription also lets you stream the millions of tracks in Apple’s song
library on your computers and mobile devices.
If
you would rather not sign up, you can still find free ad-supported
streaming music services for desktop and mobile playback, like iHeartRadio, Pandora, Slacker Radio and TuneIn. And SoundCloud, a site that hosts original audio content, recently announced a Stations feature for its mobile apps that lets you create your own stations based on a specific audio track, search term or stream.
Free Internet-based radio has not entirely left Apple’s iTunes 12 program for Windows and OS X, either. In the upper-left corner of the iTunes window, click the broadcast-tower icon (or click the icon showing three dots and select Internet Radio) to hear streaming stations from BBC Radio 3, Radionomy and others.
Personal Tech invites questions about computer-based technology to techtip@nytimes.com. This column will answer questions of general interest, but letters cannot be answered individually.
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/10/technology/personaltech/finding-a-replacement-for-free-itunes-radio.html?emc=edit_ct_20160211&nl=personaltech&nlid=32663937
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/10/technology/personaltech/finding-a-replacement-for-free-itunes-radio.html?emc=edit_ct_20160211&nl=personaltech&nlid=32663937
