Why does Pandora have this habit of repeating the same songs on nearly every single station you create?

[DodgerGirl]

I am a huge fan of Pandora and listen to it every morning and I have noticed this habit that Pandora has that I wish they would quit doing? When you create a station of an artist such as Billy Joel or Paul McCartney you rarely hear any Billy Joel or Paul McCartney songs and you listen to artists like Elton John or Andy Gibb and in my eyes Pandora should play the artist that's on the station. I noticed this when you create a station of an artist like Stevie Nicks or Tom Petty and instead of Stevie Nicks or Tom Petty you cycle through Pat Benatar and REO Speedwagon before Stevie Nicks or Tom Petty is heard and this habit is annoying on Pandora. But if you create the Disney station you actually hear Disney songs from films but the other stations repeat the same songs over and over. And another habit Pandora does is double play the same songs and you'll notice this when you create a station of artists like Linda Ronstadt and you hear the same Billy Joel songs and the same Anne Murray songs before Linda Ronstadt plays and I can't figure out why Pandora does this? Another thing Pandora has that's annoying is a skip limit and when you try to skip more songs it tells you that your skips have run out and what Pandora should do is offer unlimited skips and not just offer them in Pandora Plus. I don't know how Pandora is popular but they should improve themselves to attract more listeners to them

 

[slo]

Yes yes and yes - I totally notice this too
Repeating the same commercials all the time is annoying too.

I understand about limiting the skips, because they want you to pay up and pay for their service. I often wonder if the song repeats would be the same if you pay . I guess I’ll never know, because I’ll never pay.

 

[AgentMama]

I was dedicated to Pandora for years and finally switched to Spotify. So far I like it better.

 

[Nayan]

SiriusXM owns Pandora (they bought it in 2019) and it's no longer what it used to be and has lost subscribers in the process. If you want your own playlist that plays what you actually want then go to Spotify, Tidal, Apple Music or Deezer.

 

[Shanna-like-Banana]

Because the more time you like or thumbs up a song, it will play it more on any station you listen to. Thumbs down a song if you don't want to hear it again and not use one of your skips.

 

[DodgerGirl]

What I think Pandora is trying to do is trying to play the most popular songs by the artist that get a lot of airplay all the time. And I also think they don't have a huge music library of artists and bands. Because I notice if you create a Garth Brooks station or a Randy Travis station or even a Hank Williams station or a Tammy Wynette station all you'll hear is Conway Twitty Willie Nelson or Johnny Cash before Tammy Wynette or Hank Williams songs are heard and with Randy Travis and Garth Brooks stations you cycle through Toby Keith Clint Black Carrie Underwood and George Strait before Garth Brooks and Randy Travis songs are heard and why Pandora does this I'll never know? But if you put an actor's station such as Jeremy Renner's station you hear all of Jeremy Renner's songs but other actors like Bruce Willis you hear about three Bruce Willis songs and that's all. And also when you create a song station on Pandora you NEVER hear the song that's on the station and you cycle through other songs. But the only station as I mentioned that Pandora does not rarely play other movie songs is the Disney Station and it plays all the Disney movie songs and they do a wonderful job of it. But I can't figure why people expect to pay the high price for Pandora when they experience the same problem I have with it. But I never knew Sirius XM bought Pandora and that's interesting to know

 

[DodgerGirl]

When I listened to Pandora's Christmas music I noticed the same thing as with the non-Christmas stations and the same Christmas songs play and double play all the time and I don't know how Pandora has a expansive library of Christmas albums when they play and double play the same Christmas songs on every Christmas music station you create on Pandora. But if you have a Frank Sinatra Christmas station you actually hear Frank Sinatra Christmas songs but if you have an Elvis Presley Christmas station you hear two Elvis Christmas songs and then you cycle through Andy Williams Paul McCartney The Beach Boys and Mariah Carey before you hear Elvis Presley again. And I cannot believe that when it's the holidays Pandora should at least play the artist's Christmas songs on the Christmas station you create. I think Pandora wants to be as big as Apple Music and they want to try anything to compete with other music apps such as offering free trials of Pandora Plus and they think these ideas will make them successful

 

[Dan Murphy]

I think that when listening to any specific genre of music you will hear repeats often. I listen to Sirius/XM and on every station there are often repeats of the same songs over the days.

 

[Nayan]

Pandora only has 1 million tracks across all genres, while Apple Music has over 100 million and Spotify has 20 million, so you are not going to get the variety that you're looking for, nor will you get all of an artists full library of songs.

And no, Pandora will never be as big as Apple Music. In fact it is ranked dead last among all streaming music services. The only thing they have going for them is a free version.

 

[Genie+]

Algorithms love a good echo chamber

Hey you bought alot of socks recently - so we thought you might be interested in 20 dozen more!

You just bought a new car? Must mean you are ready to buy a new car - take a look at every current offer on the planet!

 

[sarahann77]

Pandora is expecting you to like/dislike. On the stations I created if I start to hear someone that's really from another of the stations, I dislike it when it's played on the not appropriate list. I've seen if I dislike enough in a row they'll go back to playing the songs of the base artist. Spotify does this too but their base is to give artists like the other.

 

[cabanafrau]

You can make adjustments in the Spotify settings to keep most of their algorithm monkeys from running amuck. I can't remember what it is off the top of my head, but my daughter helped me out with that when I wound up with some unwanted songs showing up on playlists I created.

Apple Music is dead to me since they foisted the U2 album on us years ago and did not allow users to remove it, yet took it upon themselves to make adjustments to versions of songs I had purchased -- from Apple music no less.

The convenience of streaming music has many positives, but I miss the control of owning physical media in many respects.

 

[Cogswel_Cogs]

Back in the days, somehow no matter what music style I listened to Pandora would think that I liked music of this one artist Jack Johnson.
I am not sure if he wrote an album with all types of genres(which would have been brilliant), or he was related to the founder of Pandora. But it was so bad I switched to spotify as quick as I could.
As a self publisher of books I longed to figure out how he did it. Cause the music was awful.