Tim Westergren

WSJ: Pandora to Generate $40 Million in Revenue This Year

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on September 3, 2009 - 8:46am.

New York - Streaming radio service Pandora is on track to generate $40 million in revenue this year, which is double what the company saw a year ago, founder Tim Westergren told The Wall Street Journal.

tags: Music | Pandora | Tim Westergren |

Pandora Comments on New Submission Requirement

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on July 1, 2009 - 9:27am.

San Francisco - Tim Westergren, founder and CEO of streaming music service Pandora, has responded to complaints about the company's new requirement that independent artists first list a CD for sale on Amazon before they are eligible for play on Pandora, Hypebot reports. Westergren chalked the move up to three reasons: "user experience, improving the metadata, and managing submissions." "We are huge believers in not discriminating against aspiring/emerging artists -- 70% of the 75,000 artists in our collection are not on a major label," Westergren told Hypebot. "All we're asking of artists is to make great music, and have it available for easy purchase for Pandora's audience."

tags: Indie | Pandora | Amazon.com | Tim Westergren |

DMW Vlog: Pandora's Tim Westergren on Monetization, iPhone App

Authored by Jay Baage on October 8, 2008 - 9:16am.

Los Angeles - Tim Westergren, founder of the popular Internet radio service Pandora, keynoted at DMW's Digital Music Forum West last week. In this interview, Westergren talks about Pandora's iPhone App having had a surprisingly positive effect on subscriber growth and clears up some of the confusion in the blogosphere resulting from a post on Distorted-Loop claiming that "iPhone accounts for almost half of Pandora’s 17 million members." What Westergren actually said is that the iPhone App has doubled Pandora's growth rate from 20,000 to 40,000+ new users each day. Currently, Pandora has about 1.5 million iPhone users. In the interview, he also explains why every new band or artist needs a "digital fifth Beatle" and why he listens more to music via iTunes than he listens to Pandora (!).

House Passes Webcaster Settlement Act; Senate Vote Expected

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on September 29, 2008 - 10:03am.

Washington - The U.S. House of Representatives unanimously passed the Webcaster Settlement Act on Saturday, which would allow webcasters and copyright holders to continue to negotiate royalty payments for streaming music online after Congress suspends its routine business after this week for the elections. A Senate vote on the measure is expected today or yet this week.

Pandora CEO: Royalty Rate Hike Could Force Shutdown

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on August 18, 2008 - 8:49am.

Oakland, Calif. - Streaming Web radio service Pandora, which claims about 1 million daily users, says that the recent doubling of royalty payments it must pay to copyright holders may soon force the company to turn off its streams, co-founder Tim Westergren told the Washington Post. "We're approaching a pull-the-plug kind of decision," said Westergren.

Pandora to Shutter U.K. Service; Royalties too High

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on January 9, 2008 - 11:52am.

Las Vegas - Pandora, a service that lets users create personalized Internet radio stations based on their preferences, plans to close its U.K. service next week in light of high music royalty payments.