byebye Pandora :(
Posted on | May 3, 2007 | 1 Comment
according to TechCrunch, music-recommendation service Pandora is closing down their doors to non-US visitors (as identified by IP-filtering) on thursday evening. this was somewhat conceivable as Pandora has been operating under a DCMA-agreement valid for US-listeneres only since they started in 2005. until today, querying nationality/zip-code at sign-up was the only way Pandora enforced this restriction.
right now the Pandora-Last.fm mashed-up stream I’m listening to is still working (funny enough, as the screenshot of the takedown-notice at TechCrunch highlights an Austrian IP-address)…
update: as of today, Pandora is down in europe: 
Dear Pandora Visitor,
We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for most listeners located outside of the U.S. We will continue to work diligently to realize the vision of a truly global Pandora, but for the time being we are required to restrict its use. We are very sad to have to do this, but there is no other alternative.
We believe that you are in Austria (your IP address appears to be 86.59.38.46). If you believe we have made a mistake, we apologize and ask that you please contact us at pandora-support@pandora.com
If you are a paid subscriber, please contact us at pandora-support@pandora.com and we will issue a pro-rated refund to the credit card you used to sign up. If you have been using Pandora, we will keep a record of your existing stations and bookmarked artists and songs, so that when we are able to launch in your country, they will be waiting for you.
We will be notifying listeners as licensing agreements are established in individual countries. If you would like to be notified by email when Pandora is available in your country, please enter your email address below. The pace of global licensing is hard to predict, but we have the ultimate goal of being able to offer our service everywhere.
We share your disappointment and greatly appreciate your understanding.
Sincerely,
Tim Westergren
Founder
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January 15th, 2008 @ 9:59 pm
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