3 ms·

I started a facebook group yesterday to discuss all aspects of Bubblegeneration/Umair Haque, FYI: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5842972550 http://www.f

I started a facebook group yesterday to discuss all aspects of Bubblegeneration/Umair Haque, FYI: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5842972550 http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5842972550 Obviously, the game is in reducing search costs. The REAL issue I see here for all these "music recommendation" startups is that they still are nowhere near competing with quality human DJ/knowledge. There are thousands of music supervisors, party Dj's, and just general record nerds whose recommendations/playlists CRUSH last.fm, et al. Somebody needs to build the Digg of music, moderated by people with real music knowledge. That's the moneymaker. All this implicit listening information is garbage.

steffon 19y ago
But would the Digg of music be enough? iJigg, which is something like that, launcher earlier this year. http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/01/18/jigg-that-music/ http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/01/18/jigg-that-music/. Although it doesn't seem to have moderaters with real music knowledge. But even if it did, that wouldn't be enough to make results relevant for everyone because the criteria for relevance is an individuals concept of "good". Sure moderators might know what is "good" for certain audiences, but if results are organized in a digg-esque fashion, it becomes a top-ten list, meaning that no matter how good your moderators are, they can't generate recommendations that will be "good" for individuals (and the strategy to appeal to the largerst number of individuals is to appeal to the lowest common denominator, which one could argue radio already does well.)
- colortone 19y ago
  well, my proxy of "digg for music" is only a jumping off point. It would have to be organized differently. That iJigg thing is garbage, for now I would strongly recommend reading Scott Karp's pitch for Publishing 2, a "journalist-powered news aggregator": http://blog.publish2.com/2007/08/14/introducing-publish2-networked-news/ http://blog.publish2.com/2007/08/14/introducing-publish2-net... The key with these communities is seeding them with, OMG, domain-specific talent. I can imagine a social platform where various DJ's, music supervisors, musicians, etc, could be the curators of long long long playlists [organized by mood, genre, style, time period, lyrics, whatever] that are tagged with a bunch of metadata [enabling them to be recombined easily]. Non-curators can suggest tracks and gain authority by having them added to curated uberplaylists. Or something like that ;-) The key is knowing your ass from a hole in the ground about music...really. Not just thinking you have good taste...that's how all the media execs (that all tech people hate) got into this mess in the first place. Anyways, I'm already on this, if anyone is interested further you can contact me ;-)
  - steffon 19y ago
    I don't think that it is entirely accurate to equate news delivery with music delivery, nor do I think the lessons from journalists are entirely relevant when it comes to building a social platform for music playlists. Cultural objects (e.g. music,art,fashion,film,literature etc.) are substantively different than news articles. The news is largely valued for its accuracy, timeliness, and topical relevance to a reader. Music and other cultural objects are valued for their enjoyment, which is contingent on individual personal preferences. I'm skeptical of a platform that would use domain-specific talent to create playlists for what comes down to individual personal preference. Domain specific talent makes much more sense regarding news where the relevance can be easily determined because it is largely topical, whereas the relevance for music is based on personal preference, which can't be determined through domain specific talent. I'm also not convinced that more meta-tagging is the answer either. If I tag a song with a mood, genre, style, etc., it will help a user find that song based on those new categories. But in the end, finding new songs based on categories isn't that helpful because what matters is finding songs based on individual personal preferences. For example, I might know I want an energetic, intense, electro-rock ballad, but defining that domain doesn't guarantee I will like the results. People rarely like all the songs on an album, and as far as domains go, albums are very tightly defined domains. Likewise, using Uber-Dj's as domains don't seem to be the best answer. After all, their playlists are based off of their preferences, and, regardless of how much they "know" about music, unless their preferences are like mine, their list will not help much.
    - colortone 19y ago
      You're being pretty dogmatic about what music is... You may be right that, in some respects, "cultural objects are substantively different than news articles", but not in ways that are germane to this argument: "The news is largely valued for its accuracy, timeliness, and topical relevance to a reader. Music and other cultural objects are valued for their enjoyment, which is contingent on individual personal preferences." I addressed this in an earlier response..."personal enjoyment" of music is inexorable from "timeliness" and "relevance." I get more "personal enjoyment" from John Zorn than anyone else, but I don't wanna hear it when I'm making out with my girl, or at a club. Think about the success of mood/circumstance specific mix CD's like "Ibiza Club" or "Ellington for Lovers"... Musical preferences have a lot more to them than "people like you also like"... Also, with all the choice available, it's easy to overestimate people's desire to even HAVE choice. Finally, I am imagining a more sophisticated metadata model that is not just about creating categories for things. I don't really have the details on that, though ;-)
- colortone 19y ago
  oh yeah, another point is that the giant uberplaylist aggregator thing doesn't need the actual music, just links to where to get it... the problem for peeps is not ACCESSING the music, or SAMPLING the music, it's finding tracks that are good... FOR A PARTICULAR SITUATION music choices are circumstance-driven, completely

steffon 19y ago

But would the Digg of music be enough? iJigg, which is something like that, launcher earlier this year. http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/01/18/jigg-that-music/ http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/01/18/jigg-that-music/. Although it doesn't seem to have moderaters with real music knowledge. But even if it did, that wouldn't be enough to make results relevant for everyone because the criteria for relevance is an individuals concept of "good". Sure moderators might know what is "good" for certain audiences, but if results are organized in a digg-esque fashion, it becomes a top-ten list, meaning that no matter how good your moderators are, they can't generate recommendations that will be "good" for individuals (and the strategy to appeal to the largerst number of individuals is to appeal to the lowest common denominator, which one could argue radio already does well.)

colortone 19y ago
well, my proxy of "digg for music" is only a jumping off point. It would have to be organized differently. That iJigg thing is garbage, for now I would strongly recommend reading Scott Karp's pitch for Publishing 2, a "journalist-powered news aggregator": http://blog.publish2.com/2007/08/14/introducing-publish2-networked-news/ http://blog.publish2.com/2007/08/14/introducing-publish2-net... The key with these communities is seeding them with, OMG, domain-specific talent. I can imagine a social platform where various DJ's, music supervisors, musicians, etc, could be the curators of long long long playlists [organized by mood, genre, style, time period, lyrics, whatever] that are tagged with a bunch of metadata [enabling them to be recombined easily]. Non-curators can suggest tracks and gain authority by having them added to curated uberplaylists. Or something like that ;-) The key is knowing your ass from a hole in the ground about music...really. Not just thinking you have good taste...that's how all the media execs (that all tech people hate) got into this mess in the first place. Anyways, I'm already on this, if anyone is interested further you can contact me ;-)
- steffon 19y ago
  I don't think that it is entirely accurate to equate news delivery with music delivery, nor do I think the lessons from journalists are entirely relevant when it comes to building a social platform for music playlists. Cultural objects (e.g. music,art,fashion,film,literature etc.) are substantively different than news articles. The news is largely valued for its accuracy, timeliness, and topical relevance to a reader. Music and other cultural objects are valued for their enjoyment, which is contingent on individual personal preferences. I'm skeptical of a platform that would use domain-specific talent to create playlists for what comes down to individual personal preference. Domain specific talent makes much more sense regarding news where the relevance can be easily determined because it is largely topical, whereas the relevance for music is based on personal preference, which can't be determined through domain specific talent. I'm also not convinced that more meta-tagging is the answer either. If I tag a song with a mood, genre, style, etc., it will help a user find that song based on those new categories. But in the end, finding new songs based on categories isn't that helpful because what matters is finding songs based on individual personal preferences. For example, I might know I want an energetic, intense, electro-rock ballad, but defining that domain doesn't guarantee I will like the results. People rarely like all the songs on an album, and as far as domains go, albums are very tightly defined domains. Likewise, using Uber-Dj's as domains don't seem to be the best answer. After all, their playlists are based off of their preferences, and, regardless of how much they "know" about music, unless their preferences are like mine, their list will not help much.
  - colortone 19y ago
    You're being pretty dogmatic about what music is... You may be right that, in some respects, "cultural objects are substantively different than news articles", but not in ways that are germane to this argument: "The news is largely valued for its accuracy, timeliness, and topical relevance to a reader. Music and other cultural objects are valued for their enjoyment, which is contingent on individual personal preferences." I addressed this in an earlier response..."personal enjoyment" of music is inexorable from "timeliness" and "relevance." I get more "personal enjoyment" from John Zorn than anyone else, but I don't wanna hear it when I'm making out with my girl, or at a club. Think about the success of mood/circumstance specific mix CD's like "Ibiza Club" or "Ellington for Lovers"... Musical preferences have a lot more to them than "people like you also like"... Also, with all the choice available, it's easy to overestimate people's desire to even HAVE choice. Finally, I am imagining a more sophisticated metadata model that is not just about creating categories for things. I don't really have the details on that, though ;-)
colortone 19y ago
oh yeah, another point is that the giant uberplaylist aggregator thing doesn't need the actual music, just links to where to get it... the problem for peeps is not ACCESSING the music, or SAMPLING the music, it's finding tracks that are good... FOR A PARTICULAR SITUATION music choices are circumstance-driven, completely