Pandora unblocked: New Zealand gets popular internet radio

Pandora was one of the first internet radio stations, using a "music genome" to recommend and play music that fits your profile. Until 2007, you could register at Pandora.com, even if you lived outside of its US-only area, by entering a US postcode – not surprisingly, 90210 was pretty commonly used.

But in 2007, Pandora began blocking any IP address which was not in the United States.

Now, however, Pandora is apparently unblocking access for those outside the US, even if you still can't register officially as a user.

Leigh Stark, of Gadgetguy in Australia, discovered that Pandora was unblocked for Australians last night.

We've tested access here in New Zealand, and can confirm that Pandora.com is available. If you head to the site, you can type in an artist, genre or song to create a "station" based around that. Pandora's service picks songs that are similar, based around your initial selection, but also allows you to skip songs that don't match your idea of what it should play – and learns from that.

While the Pandora apps on the iTunes store and Google Play store for Android are not available yet in local markets for Australia or New Zealand, they are usable if you can download or acquire them from another source.

Pandora may have unblocked the site in preparation for a launch here some time in the near future.

Via Gadgetguy