Say Bye To Pandora’s 40-Hour Free Cap?

Streaming content is one of the most popular activities online today, and when it comes to the point, Pandora is at the top of the list. Much like its competitors, Pandora has free and premium services. And, naturally, the free service has some limitations. With Pandora, it is a well known fact that it limits free mobile users to 40 hours per month.

While that seem a lot to some people, if you live a life that’s constantly filled with music, 40 hours is nothing. But, if you haven’t been living under a rock in the past week, you might have heard that Pandora is lifting the 40-hour free cap starting September.

Hoorays all around, but have you ever thought why?

If you read the plethora of opinions online, one of the most common ideas is that Pandora’s afraid of its users. True or not, the theory is bolstered by the fact that the cap has resulted in the decrease of overall listening hours – and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out why.

TechCrunch reports that CFO Mike Herring stated two factors. One, the cap was a “blunt tool” to lower costs, and now they have other techniques to do that. Two, usage dropped 10 percent when the mobile cap was set in place. (What was I just saying in the previous paragraph?)

So, in less than a week, Pandora users will be treated to unlimited hours of free listening, but it’s not all sugar and spice. There is an additional limitation on song skips. That is, a cap on 12 song skips within 24 hours.

That’s not as bad as one would think. Unless you are so impatient that you just can’t sit through one “unlikeable” song.

Are you a Pandora user? How does this development affect you?

[Image via Exact Target]