Google Play Music: All Access subscription goes live.

Streaming the presentation from Google I|O 2013, you could tell that most people weren't that wowed by the announcement of Google Play Music's newest feature: Paid subscription for streaming music content, called "All Access".  The reason?  It costs $9.99 ($7.99 if you sign up before June 30) a month.

So what do you get for that $9.99?

• You have unlimited access to a catalog of millions of songs, to listen to
• You can create your own radio station based off a song or artist
• You have unlimited skips on your radio stations
• You get recommendations for songs, based on your listening preferences

In other words, it's similarly priced to the other streaming subscription music services, such as Slacker, Spotify, and Pandora (okay, Pandora's paid sub is cheaper, but it's also limited).  There is one glaring exception, of course: Those other services have a "free" level that allows you to listen to those millions of songs in their catalog, with restrictions, and Google doesn't have that.

Not having a free (limited) service to access millions of songs via Google Play Music seems unfortunate.  How you compete with Last.FM or internet radio without a free level of streaming service, is beyond me.  After all, free radio stations are just an app away, on your smart phone, tablet or desktop.