Yahoo! Music

Yahoo Music
Type of site
 Online music, Media player
Available in Multilingual
Owner Oath Inc.
Website yahoo.com/music
Commercial Yes
Registration Optional (required for most)
Current status Active

Yahoo! Music, owned by Yahoo!, was the provider of a variety of music services, including Internet radio, music videos, news, artist information, and original programming. Previously, users with Yahoo! accounts could gain access to hundreds of thousands of songs sorted by artist, album, song and genre.

History

Yahoo Music began as "LAUNCH", a website and magazine produced by LAUNCH Media which Yahoo acquired for US$12 million in 2001.[1] LAUNCH was later rebranded as "Yahoo Music", then simply "Y! Music" in February 2005. LAUNCH's LAUNCHcast Internet radio and music video offerings were integrated into Yahoo's site along with artist profiles containing an extensive selection of music and biographical information.

Yahoo Music was the number one online music site in terms of audience reach and total time spent in March 2007.

As of June 2008, Yahoo Music's old website is inactive and redirecting to the new website at new.music.yahoo.co.[2]

Sometime in early 2013, Yahoo Music has deleted its entire database of artists, and their albums & songs as well as the users' ratings. However, music videos continue to be accessible.

In late 2015, all of Yahoo! Music's previous URLs ('music.yahoo.com' and 'new.music.yahoo.com') have been redirected to its new URL (www.yahoo.com/music).

As of September 2018, Yahoo! Music's site has been consolidated into Yahoo! Entertainment's site and all Yahoo! Music's URLs redirect to Yahoo! Entertainment with its own "Music" section.

Products

Yahoo Music offered a variety of products, including:

  • Artist profiles, music videos and lyrics
  • Live Sets – Exclusive video concerts from A-list artists
  • Official Grammy Awards coverage
  • Pepsi Smash on Yahoo Music – Exclusive video interviews, performances, and reality segments
  • Play – music identifier
  • Who's Next – Listeners vote on emerging artists
  • Yahoo! Music Jukebox
  • Yahoo! Music Radio (formerly LAUNCHcast) (Content provided by iHeartRadio) and LAUNCHcast Plus Internet radio (No Longer offered beginning Feb. 2009)
  • Yahoo! Music Unlimited subscription streaming and download service

Key dates

Previous Yahoo! Music logo used until 2013.

In 2001, Yahoo purchased LAUNCH Media, makers of the LAUNCHcast Internet radio service. On September 14, 2004, Yahoo purchased Musicmatch, Inc., makers of the Musicmatch Jukebox software. As of Musicmatch 10.1, Yahoo has rebranded Musicmatch Jukebox as Yahoo Music Musicmatch Jukebox, and integrated it with the Yahoo Music Engine store. The main difference is the branding and physical program. In 2005, Yahoo Music became the first major online music service to provide a $5 per month unlimited download service similar to the Open Music Model, albeit with digital rights management, called Yahoo Music Unlimited. In 2008, Yahoo announced that Yahoo Music Unlimited will be merged into Rhapsody.[3] This merge was completed with the shutdown of Yahoo Music Unlimited on September 30, 2008.

In 2011, Yahoo Music became the main CBS Radio player, with AOL Radio switching to Barakadas.

Lyrics

Yahoo Music provides officially licensed lyrics.

Previous limits on internet radio services

Under LAUNCHcast for regular/free accounts

  • Listeners were limited to Low/Medium audio quality ("Standard" since late 2007).
  • On pre-programmed stations, listeners were allowed 5 skips an hour.
  • Overall, listeners were allowed so many songs per listening month.

Under CBS Radio

  • Local stations were limited to affiliates within CBS Radio/Radio.com's platform.
  • No direct customization, although rating songs influenced the songs played.
  • Songs cannot be banned entirely, although a one-star rating will have it played very rarely.

Under iHeartRadio

  • Local stations were limited to affiliates within iHeartRadio's platform.
  • Customization is limited to favorite artist or song. However, it can be built using the Thumbs Up/Down rating tool.
  • No play-on-demand, playback, rewind, or fast-forward.
  • Commercial interruptions every hour or half-hour on live stations.
  • A maximum of six skips per hour per customized station. Refreshing or reloading the player, as well as changing the station, will use a skip.
  • Banner ads, which cannot be blocked.
  • There was no premium service to remove skip limits or ads.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Yahoo thinks entertainment with Launch buy. News.com.com. Retrieved on 2012-03-27.
  2. ↑ "Yahoo Music". yahoo.com.
  3. ↑ Rhapsody Takes Over Yahoo's On-Demand Music. Informationweek.com (February 5, 2008). Retrieved on 2012-03-27.
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