8 ms·

I used DSP to recognize the commercials in the radio broadcast on my stereo receiver and turn down the volume automatically ("adblock for the radio broadcast").

by t0mek 8y ago

I used DSP to recognize the commercials in the radio broadcast on my stereo receiver and turn down the volume automatically ("adblock for the radio broadcast"). I described it here: http://blog.rekawek.eu/2016/02/24/radio-adblock/ http://blog.rekawek.eu/2016/02/24/radio-adblock/

spuz 8y ago
That is genius.
minhazm423 8y ago
im getting an error
- t0mek 8y ago
  Sorry, I had some DNS issues. It should be fine now.
  - stevekemp 8y ago
    Obligatory plug: I automated handling DNS updates via simple "git pushes" - Lets you revert from bad changes, and gives you a good history of changes over time - https://dns-api.com/ https://dns-api.com/
sgroppino 8y ago
This for TV would be great!
- dest 8y ago
  Check this: https://github.com/erikkaashoek/Comskip https://github.com/erikkaashoek/Comskip It seems the tuning of the algorithm is complex though. There's a dedicated forum for it: http://www.kaashoek.com/comskip/viewforum.php?f=2&sid=effa4bb8775950b74f1bf6c03d3f265a http://www.kaashoek.com/comskip/viewforum.php?f=2&sid=effa4b...
- burkemw3 8y ago
  MythTV has commercial skip: https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Commercial_detection https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Commercial_detection
dest 8y ago
Great work! I have been working for a while on a similar adblock, but that does not need jingles to detect ads. I'm on my way to open source it. A radio player with adblocking included is available at https://www.adblockradio.com https://www.adblockradio.com
- MaxikCZ 8y ago
  Would be great to have ability to add custom stations. Would it work too?
  - dest 8y ago
    I think so. Are you thinking about a station in particular? Not promising anything, because each station requires time to tune and money for computational resources.
amelius 8y ago
> The commercial block starts and finishes with a jingle, so the potential software should recognize these specific sounds and turn off the volume between them. I suppose that many stations don't have such markers though.
- t0mek 8y ago
  Indeed. I see two options here. First is to analyze the other signal features of the commercials (eg. increased volume), although it may be tricky. The other option is a crowd-sourced solution - pretty much as for the browser adblock - where users can mark samples recognized as ads. Since the publishers often buy campaigns for many stations in the same country or state, it may be a shared database. On the other hand, the described project only scratches my own itch. I wouldn't try to productise an app that takes away the main source of income for the radio stations.
  - amelius 8y ago
    > I see two options here. Yes, or perhaps a combination of techniques. E.g. shared database to train an ML system to detect ads. Of course, the downside is that the ad industry will then tweak the ads until they pass the ML test. > I wouldn't try to productise an app that takes away the main source of income for the radio stations. I wouldn't think of it as taking away a source of income, but rather as forcing them to find a source that doesn't bother their customers so much. Ad blockers seem to be getting more accepted.
    - dest 8y ago
      Do you have an idea how could such a database of copyrighted material be shared? (Asking for a friend...)
      - t0mek 8y ago
        I think that it'd be enough to store some kind of fingerprints (eg. selected frequency components after performing the FFT), not the whole samples.
timmywiff 8y ago
I once made a radio adblocker for streams hosted on http://radioplayer.co.uk/ http://radioplayer.co.uk/ to be run in a terminal. There is also code to increase/decrease the volume on a Mac. It's not perfect but was a fun little project. For some reason, the data and audio are out of sync but once calibrated it works quite well. https://bitbucket.org/timwiffen89/radio_adblocker/src/master/ https://bitbucket.org/timwiffen89/radio_adblocker/src/master...
mikec3010 8y ago
This Is great. I wanted to do something similar with a TV. Mic detects commercial signature and sends mute command via IR interface. I'm just an idea man though who never followed through.
askvictor 8y ago
I would like something like this, but to cut out all non-music (i.e. talking, interviews, etc). Would tensorflow be able to be trained to detect just speech vs music? It would obviously fail if there is speech with background music, but that isn't too common outside of Jamaica (and reggae stations/shows)

by t0mek 8y ago

spuz 8y ago

That is genius.

minhazm423 8y ago

im getting an error

t0mek 8y ago
Sorry, I had some DNS issues. It should be fine now.
- stevekemp 8y ago
  Obligatory plug: I automated handling DNS updates via simple "git pushes" - Lets you revert from bad changes, and gives you a good history of changes over time - https://dns-api.com/ https://dns-api.com/

sgroppino 8y ago

This for TV would be great!

dest 8y ago
Check this: https://github.com/erikkaashoek/Comskip https://github.com/erikkaashoek/Comskip It seems the tuning of the algorithm is complex though. There's a dedicated forum for it: http://www.kaashoek.com/comskip/viewforum.php?f=2&sid=effa4bb8775950b74f1bf6c03d3f265a http://www.kaashoek.com/comskip/viewforum.php?f=2&sid=effa4b...
burkemw3 8y ago
MythTV has commercial skip: https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Commercial_detection https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Commercial_detection

dest 8y ago

Great work! I have been working for a while on a similar adblock, but that does not need jingles to detect ads. I'm on my way to open source it. A radio player with adblocking included is available at https://www.adblockradio.com https://www.adblockradio.com

MaxikCZ 8y ago
Would be great to have ability to add custom stations. Would it work too?
- dest 8y ago
  I think so. Are you thinking about a station in particular? Not promising anything, because each station requires time to tune and money for computational resources.

amelius 8y ago

> The commercial block starts and finishes with a jingle, so the potential software should recognize these specific sounds and turn off the volume between them. I suppose that many stations don't have such markers though.

t0mek 8y ago
Indeed. I see two options here. First is to analyze the other signal features of the commercials (eg. increased volume), although it may be tricky. The other option is a crowd-sourced solution - pretty much as for the browser adblock - where users can mark samples recognized as ads. Since the publishers often buy campaigns for many stations in the same country or state, it may be a shared database. On the other hand, the described project only scratches my own itch. I wouldn't try to productise an app that takes away the main source of income for the radio stations.
- amelius 8y ago
  > I see two options here. Yes, or perhaps a combination of techniques. E.g. shared database to train an ML system to detect ads. Of course, the downside is that the ad industry will then tweak the ads until they pass the ML test. > I wouldn't try to productise an app that takes away the main source of income for the radio stations. I wouldn't think of it as taking away a source of income, but rather as forcing them to find a source that doesn't bother their customers so much. Ad blockers seem to be getting more accepted.
  - dest 8y ago
    Do you have an idea how could such a database of copyrighted material be shared? (Asking for a friend...)
    - t0mek 8y ago
      I think that it'd be enough to store some kind of fingerprints (eg. selected frequency components after performing the FFT), not the whole samples.

timmywiff 8y ago

I once made a radio adblocker for streams hosted on http://radioplayer.co.uk/ http://radioplayer.co.uk/ to be run in a terminal. There is also code to increase/decrease the volume on a Mac. It's not perfect but was a fun little project. For some reason, the data and audio are out of sync but once calibrated it works quite well. https://bitbucket.org/timwiffen89/radio_adblocker/src/master/ https://bitbucket.org/timwiffen89/radio_adblocker/src/master...

mikec3010 8y ago

This Is great. I wanted to do something similar with a TV. Mic detects commercial signature and sends mute command via IR interface. I'm just an idea man though who never followed through.

askvictor 8y ago

I would like something like this, but to cut out all non-music (i.e. talking, interviews, etc). Would tensorflow be able to be trained to detect just speech vs music? It would obviously fail if there is speech with background music, but that isn't too common outside of Jamaica (and reggae stations/shows)