Last summer, Google acquired popular music streaming service Songza, which launched back in 2007. Fast forward to today, the founders of Songza have announced the service will shut down, as its features have been ported over to Google Play Music, where the service will live on only in spirit.
The following letter was sent to subscribers (via Venture Beat), while a video was also released as well:
Thanks to Google Play Music (and our kick-ass team, which continues to grow faster than a Twista verse), we’ve been able to bring what you love about Songza to a new audience of music fans in the United States, Great Britain, Canada, Ireland, Brazil, Japan, Germany, France, Norway, Sweden, Australia, New Zealand and Austria (*wipes brow*) — with even more countries coming soon.
It’s now time for us to focus on building a single, cohesive product. So as of January 31, 2016, Songza will become Google Play Music, and you will no longer be able to access Songza.com or the Songza mobile apps. HEY! There’s no crying! Are you crying? There’s no crying in music streaming! Moving to Google Play Music is free, and your favorite playlists can come with you! Pinky swear. Soon, when you visit Songza, you’ll be greeted with a prompt that will let you bring all of your Songza listening history and favorite playlists over to Google Play Music — so please make sure to do that! Using all of Songza’s features in Google Play Music is 100% free and doesn’t require a credit card, you just need to accept our new Terms of Service and Google’s Privacy Policy (if you haven’t already).
Also announced today is the launch of free Google Play Music Radio in Canada, supported by ads, similar to the version launched back in the U.S. this June. This option allows customers to listen to music supported by ads, instead of paying the $9.99 CAD per month fee, which allows unlimited access to over 35 million songs, offline playback, unlimited skips and 50,000 cloud song storage.
If you can live with ads, free streaming music is widely available in Canada through apps such as Spotify, Songza (before it shuts down in Jan. 2016) and now Google Play Music.
