How to Get Started With Pandora

Intro: How to Get Started With Pandora

This guide will teach you how to use Pandora to listen to music without an account, with an account, and with an upgraded Pandora One Account. It also discusses some important features of Pandora. 

STEP 1: Open a Browser

Open an internet web browser such as Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, or Mozilla Firefox.

Type http://www.pandora.com/ into the url bar. There may be a URL search preview white box that appears in the center of your screen to offer suggested websites.

STEP 2: Ensure New Pandora User

Click on the Pandora logo at the top left of the browser window, nothing should happen unless you already have an account.

Verify you are not logged in to any account or that no previous Pandora stations exist on this computer. If so, delete these selections or look at the white text box at the top left corner of the screen.

STEP 3: Creating the First Station (Free Without Account)

Click on the white oval text box that says “Enter an artist, genre, or composer to create a station.”

Type an artist, genre, or composer in this section. A box with entry suggestions will appear below the text box as you are typing.

STEP 4:

Select a station from the suggestions or press Enter. Pandora will now create the station and play songs pertinent to this entry. This station will appear in the menu bar on the left side of the screen (as shown for the “Today’s Hits” Station).

STEP 5: Creating Stations After the First Station

Find the icon at the top left of the screen. Click the white text box and type an artist, genre, or composer to create another station.

STEP 6: Using Buttons at the Top of the Screen

STEP 7: Sorting and Shuffling Stations

STEP 8: Using Pandora With a Free Account

Click on “Register” in the upper right hand corner. 

STEP 9: Creating a Free Account

Fill out your email, password, birth year, postal/zip code, and gender.

Check the box that begins with “I have read, understood, and agree to...”

Check the boxes “Remember me and keep me signed in” and “Send me personalized recommendations and tips” if you prefer.

Click “Register."

STEP 10: Congratulations Registration Box

Leave the box checked on the screen that pops up if you would like others to view your Pandora profile page, otherwise uncheck it. Your profile page is just a webpage that contains information about your musical preferences, your bio, and comments from other listeners.

Click “Continue” in the lower right hand corner.

STEP 11:

A commercial advertisement window may pop up on the screen. Click “No Thanks” in the lower right hand corner, unless you want to check out the offer from one of Pandora’s advertisers.

You now have a free account.

STEP 12: Pandora One Upgrade

The subscription to Pandora One, allows you to listen to ad free music with fewer interruptions, higher quality sound, the option to use a desktop Pandora application or icon on your desktop, and a personalized “skin” or background screen for the main Pandora homepage.

Click “Upgrade” in the upper right hand corner for a Pandora One subscription upgrade.

STEP 13: Pandora One Subscription Selection

Select whether you would like a one year subscription, a one month subscription, or a twenty four hour trial and click “Upgrade Now”.

STEP 14: Pandora One Subscription

Type in your credit card number, security code, expiration date, the name on the card, and your billing zip code in the blank spaces provided.

Select whether you would like the $3.99 monthly subscription or the $36.00 one year subscription by clicking on the blue arrow in the subscription box and selecting your preference. Notice the box on your right tells you what the final price will be with the additional tax.

Check the box next to the paragraph that begins, “I have read and agree to the Pandora One…”

Click the “Pay Now” button to create your paid account. You will now be taken to the main Pandora homepage.

STEP 15: Congratulations

Congratulations! You now understand how to use Pandora. Welcome to your new, personalized experience of the Music Genome Project, known as Pandora.

Comments

[karenr233]

I have a tablet. How do you delete an entire playlist? How do you delete an individual track from a playlist?

[Lanyiawestmoreland]

Hey

[engl313spotify]

I agree with the commentary about the screenshots, but I still found this to be very helpful. I am looking forward to listening to Pandora at work now that I know how to use it.
-Stephanie ENGL 313

[shortysaxton]

(From Sarah Saxton Eng 313)
Instructions are very specific and detailed which helps the user to get through the steps with out getting lost. My only suggestion is to have some more general screen shots instead of so many zoomed in ones to sort of give the user a more clear base of operation.

[kgreyslak]

(Keenan from ENGL313)
Great job! I didn't know it was possible to listen to Pandora without first getting an account, so that's good to know. Aside from a few of the same criticisms, such as the amount of steps and the recycling of a few screenshots, I thought these instructions were really good. The only other thing to note was a grammar mistake on step 8, but that's it. Nice instructables :)

[prajguru]

Thanks for your feedback Keenan. Many of the changes from the previous comments have been integrated for the revisions. The typo from step 8 has also been corrected.

[DropboxInstall]

Jenna Kozub engl313

These instructions were very well developed. I especially liked how you edited in the text-boxes to show what each button did on the web page.

A few things to note, the instructions were very long and got a little repetitive with the same pictures. At one point I thought the page wasn't loading but then realized that the instructons underneath the picture were different. Maybe get rid of the picture, or label the step a different name. Other than that, very easy, well explained steps, thanks!

[prajguru]

Thanks for your suggestions Jenna. Steps with the same image have been condensed into one step for the revised version.

[DropboxInstall]

(This is Michael Carolin responding for ENGL 313)

Nice instructions! Here are my suggestions/criticisms. They are pretty picky/insignificant, but that's because your instructable is mostly problem-free:

1) On step 2, the "white text box" you refer to is actually a URL search preview that Chrome/Firefox incorporate into their omnibar. "Text box" is a slightly vague, so I suggest you be more specific AND/OR use a paint program to annotate the picture and circle the url preview in red.

2) For step 3: unless the user is in a full-screen mode, it will not be on the top left of their "screen", it will be on the top left of their browser window.

3) For steps 9 & 10, you probably don't need to actually write anything below the picture since the picture explains everything. Instead, I would take the blurbs you already wrote under the pictures and place them in the step titles (which are currently empty).

4) You refer to pictures as "below", when they are actually above the text.

[prajguru]

Thanks for your suggestions Michael. Many of them are integrated into the revised version. The "below" in reference to the pictures was because the pictures appeared below the text in the pdf version. Thank you for pointing out that the images are above the text in the web version. This has been updated as well.

[Awesome-aniac]

Great job with the screenshots, but 27 steps is too many.

Steps 1 & 2 can be combined.
Steps 3 & 4 can be omitted.
Steps 12-15 can be combined.
Step 18 has an irrelevant image.
Step 19 can be omitted.
Steps 23-26 can be combined.

Title could be "How to get started with Pandora."

Good job with grammar and spelling.

[prajguru]

Thank you for your suggestions. Many of them are now incorporated in the revisions above.