Ideas: Lock for creating new stations on Alexa & Google

[m_alvare5]

Hi everyone.  I'm super annoyed with Alexa creating a new station everytime it misunderstands what we requested.  It creates dozens of new stations every week and adds it to My Collection.  We need a way to prevent this behavior.  Maybe a lock mechanism where you need a three digit pin number to create a new station, that way Alexa or the kids won't create stations I don't want.

Moderator Edit: Changing title for clarity

[Dkarn29]

On my already large list of things to complete every week, I've now had to add "Clear Pandora stations that shouldn't be there."

Please help us!

[Pruzer]

I agree, there should be no automatic station creation w/o at least a "Would you like me to create that station for you?" prompt.  My kids are smart enough to say no to those at least and try again to be understood.  There already is a create station command so there should be no automatic creation.  Plus, how about a bulk selection of stations to be deleted option in the pandora app.  Having to click station, click delete, click ok etc for all these unwanted stations is miserable.

[prudencearcadia]

Hello!

Yes, please if this could be addressed that would be fantastic. Alexa created three (3!!) doppelganger stations of the same station we've loved on Pandora since 2011. It would infuriate us when we try to listen to what we think is a beloved station only to have it go nuts with the wrong genre of music. I logged in here to see three stations with the same name! Thank you so much!

[Never]

When I link Pandora to my car, and all the radio stations are video game related... At least removing the stations is easy.... Or not. It's a huge PITA.

[IdahoJoe]

Copied a bunch of my post from another thread so I don't have to re-type this all... 

"Are there any plans in the works for Pandora to fix this issue with the added stations by Alexa?  Drives me crazy... I've got 5 kids and they constantly listen to music. Imagine the mess my Pandora account is constantly in when I've had them all looking for songs all day every day... I finally had to quit using Pandora because I'm tired of wading through hundreds of random "junk" stations every time I log in. 

Evidently no one working for Pandora has the combo of Amazon Alexas and kids at home? I assume if they did, they would realize that's it's a huge disaster for their service.  If I search a random song, I don't want/need a random station to be added to my account.

I'm wondering if there's any upside to this feature of adding unrequested random stations?  Does it benefit Pandora somehow to have people adding them? Does it benefit any of the customers? Just curious... If not, it seems like it would be near the top of their "requested features" fix list, but evidently no one really cares about the issue because it's been going on for several years... 

For now my answer has been Spotify... sorry Pandora! 

Sorry for the long message... Just seems like this issue keeps popping it's head out in the forums, etc. but no one at Pandora is really taking it seriously at all... 

Thanks for listening! 

[jaukland]

Literally deleting hundreds of kids stations right now.

[robross0606]

I have also had Alexa create a station with the EXACT same name as an existing one.  This is pretty intolerable.  It flat out **ahem**.  There should absolutely be an option to NOT allow it to create stations.  In fact, this should be the default behavior.  It should at least ASK you before creating something.  I asked for "Summer Radio" and it created a station called "SoMo Radio" which proceeded to play gangster rap with for my kids.  This is AWFUL.  I've been a Pandora subscriber for a long long time and I'm considering hanging up my membership because they've clearly stopped caring about their customers.

[Amanuensis]

Agreed.  This is absolutely awful.

[tahlor]

I think there is still some value in creating a station from whatever random song you say. But as others have said, songs shouted at Alexa by my whimsical children should not create a litany of stations that dominate my carefully curated collection.

I would propose adding a "temporary" station list, i.e. a queue that keeps the last ~10 stations spontaneously created outside of the Pandora ecosystem. The user then has to take some explicit action to immortalize the station in their collection (this could be a command to Alexa "Please save this Pandora station" or an option in the Pandora site/app). If no explicit save command is issued, the station gets bumped off the end of the queue as new stations are created. This way you can still create stations, up vote songs, see your track history etc. in the short term if you want to, without grossly contaminating your collection.

[robross0606]

Why not have Alexa simply ask:

Would you like to create a Pandora station for 'blah blah blah'

Then you can say "yes" or "no" to proceed.  At least you would know it was happening.  I've had Pandora create multiple stations with the same dang name.