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Slacker launches mobile radio app for iPhone

Slacker Inc. has launched a free mobile radio application for the iPhone and iPod touch.

The Slacker application is available at the iTunes App Store and by visiting http://www.slacker.com on an iPhone. Apple's iPhone and iPod touch users nationwide can now have a personalized listening and music discovery experience that lets anyone listen to more than 100 Slacker stations, 10,000-plus artist stations and a nearly unlimited number of the listener's own custom-created stations.

"The iPhone is a natural destination for the Slacker Radio experience and is part of our overall strategy to deliver Slacker Radio to all of the places that people listen to music today, from the office and home PCs to the living room and nightstand," said Jonathan Sasse, senior vice presdient of marketing for Slacker, San Diego.

"Our current listener base has a median age of 34 and splits almost evenly across gender," he said. "We find that customers who find the most value in the Slacker experience are busy music lovers looking for an easy -- yet powerful -- personal music offering."

For the first time, iPhone and iPod touch owners can take advantage of Slacker's music discovery features such as artist biographies and album reviews, station fine-tuning, "peek ahead" song previews and custom artist stations.

In addition to marking songs as favorites, listeners can also ban songs and artists to create custom radio stations on their iPhone.

The Slacker music service lets listeners access personal radio stations using their iPhone or iPod touch to hear their favorite music without having to manage playlists, research new artists or transfer music from their home computer.

The Slacker Mobile application works with the free Slacker Basic Radio service, along with Slacker Radio Plus and Slacker Premium Radio subscription offerings.

The Slacker iPhone app will be ad-supported.

"The ad experience on the iPhone will be similar to that of our Web player at Slacker.com," Mr. Sasse said. "Audio ads will be presented to listeners at a rate of about 30-60 seconds per hour of listening time.

"The iPhone application release is still in the earliest stages, but you can expect to hear a comparable sampling of ads from the Slacker online service as the iPhone in the immediate future," he said.

Slacker Personal Radio is available on the Web at http://www.slacker.com, Slacker Personal Radio Players, Logitech Squeezebox and Transporter network music players, Research In Motion's BlackBerry smartphones, Sony Bravia Internet Video Link and now on the iPhone and iPod touch.

Slacker is engaging in various marketing efforts to spread the word about its platform.

"We expect many of the existing listener base to also listen via the iPhone application and will actively market to our existing audience on how to get the application on their iPhone or iPod touch," Mr. Sasse said.

"We also utilize search-based advertising and partner activities to drive awareness of the application in addition to broad stroke media coverage," he said.