Pandora

[Kuat]

So, how many of you have visited the music genome project? It's been decent for me. Nothing ground breaking, but it's expanded my horizons a slight bit.

The basic premise is that you start your playlist with a song (for example, I used "keep yourself alive" by Queen), which Pandora then tries to match up with a similar song (in my case, "running with the devil" by Van Halen - a nay in my case). You then give a "yay" or "nay" to each song, refining your specific niche taste. So my list has pretty much generated a bunch of Van Halen songs, with Hendrix, Queen, Iron Maiden, and The Buisness thrown in. Keep in mind this is based on the initial song. I'm sure if I chose "Lighthouse in your soul", it would never (or take a great while) wind up at this point. I don't know if the project crosses genres (like from pop to rap), but we'll see.

One thing is for sure, I never realized how much I liked Van Halen ("Unchained" is awesome).

[The Dankness]

Heh, Val showed this to me a few weeks ago. One thing I can say for sure, is that entering in Dragonforce produces a list of music that is PERFECT for playing vertical shooters to.

[Inaaca]

Yeah, Shane showed this to me a while back. Good stuff for a quick source of music, or to find stuff you haven't heard.

[Muramasa]

I'll put in Chopin and see what I get.


Then I'll put in Freddie Kruger and see what I get.

[Dragoondachemist]

I think that this site is absolutely genius. I use it to find the songs I have heard and forgot about and get to hear new music that is perfect to my style. If you have not tried it you must.

The funny thing is the more people use Pandora the more that companies compile data on what people like to hear and what they should be suggested to listen to.

In my E-commerce class I have been learning about how many businesses trade information. When you buy something on amazon, they keep your mailing info and give it to a mail Coop database. If someone needs to sell you something they will then send you something to your track record. No matter what you do things are becoming more and more like the Minority Report and companies start knowing about your sales information. On top of that the US government now has a program that watches what you, and I mean all of you on what you do on the internet. Truly they is no ananimty on the internet with certain groups.

[Muramasa]

Heh, you know, I was just thinking about how to use the info acquired from pandora to make a quick buck.

[You probably can't touch this.]

I used that. Until I realized that they limit the times you can skip. I am a picky listener so hellz na. I prefer last.fm

[Captain Galaxy]

I don't really like that program, it shows you similar music, but not GOOD similar music. Plus, it keeps telling me to lay off the minor key tonality.

[You probably can't touch this.]

Pandora just tells me of bands I already like, or are completely dissimilar to the particular things I like of the original band or artist.

[You probably can't touch this.]

Pandora just asked me to register, it can eat a BONE popsicle now.


oh yes, and popsicles....


HA-HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

[Inaaca]

Apr 22, 2008 21:23:04 GMT -8 You probably can't touch this. said:

I used that. Until I realized that they limit the times you can skip. I am a picky listener so hellz na. I prefer last.fm

Instead of skipping, rate it down. It automatically moves to the next song when you do so. The rate down would help narrow down your preference anyways.

[Inaaca]

Apr 22, 2008 22:13:43 GMT -8 Captain Galaxy said:

I don't really like that program, it shows you similar music, but not GOOD similar music. Plus, it keeps telling me to lay off the minor key tonality.

That's what the rate ups and downs are for, so you can let Pandora know whether or not you liked what it gave you.

[Captain Galaxy]

The thing is that it doesn't work that way, quality the way humans judge it isn't the way it can be programmed into software, it would have to be some uber expensive complex algorithmic program.

[You probably can't touch this.]

Apr 23, 2008 7:06:21 GMT -8 Inaaca said:

Apr 22, 2008 21:23:04 GMT -8 You probably can't touch this. said:

I used that. Until I realized that they limit the times you can skip. I am a picky listener so hellz na. I prefer last.fm

Instead of skipping, rate it down. It automatically moves to the next song when you do so. The rate down would help narrow down your preference anyways.

Except those that I want to skip aren't songs/bands that I don't like, just ones I've heard before. Usually a lot before.

[Dragoondachemist]

Apr 23, 2008 7:45:32 GMT -8 Captain Galaxy said:

The thing is that it doesn't work that way, quality the way humans judge it isn't the way it can be programmed into software, it would have to be some uber expensive complex algorithmic program.

The thing is is does not have to be some algorithmic program, Pandora just uses data from other users and narrows down what you may want and it thinks you want to hear. So many people have used Pandora and so much data has been gathered that it is rather easy. It person x likes y they also like w, so by transitive property if person z is similar to x so if they like y then they may (operative word) like w.

[Kuat]

Apr 23, 2008 7:45:32 GMT -8 Captain Galaxy said:

The thing is that it doesn't work that way, quality the way humans judge it isn't the way it can be programmed into software, it would have to be some uber expensive complex algorithmic program.

I'm gonna cite a favorite study of mine, the "Korean Melodies" one, to use as an argument of sorts:

A study by Johnson, Kim, and Risse (1985) made use of the "mere exposure" effect on preferences (Zajonc, 1968): repeated exposure to an object tends to increase judgments of likability, even if there is no substantive information presented that would support such attitudinal change. Johnson et al. exposed Korsakoff syndrome patients (who are amnesic as a result of damage to diencephalic structures) and controls to unfamiliar Korean melodies. Some melodies were played only once during the study phase, while others were played five or ten times. Later, the subjects were played these melodies, and other Korean melodies that were entirely new, and asked to indicate which they preferred. As expected from the mere exposure effect, both Korsakoff patients and controls preferred old over new melodies, although there was no effect of the number of exposures given to the old tunes. However, the patients showed greatly impaired levels of recognition, compared to the controls. Thus, exposure affected the amnesic patients' preference judgments, and index of emotional response to the melodies, even though the patients showed impaired memory for the exposure trials.

You have to look at the algorithm that Pandora uses:

A given song is represented by a vector containing approximately 150 genes. Each gene corresponds to a characteristic of the music, for example, gender of lead vocalist, level of distortion on the electric guitar, type of background vocals, etc. Rock and pop songs have 150 genes, rap songs have 350, and jazz songs have approximately 400. Other genres of music, such as world and classical, have 300-500 genes. The system depends on a sufficient number of genes to render useful results. Each gene is assigned a number between 1 and 5, and fractional values are allowed but are limited to half integers.[1] (The term genome is borrowed from genetics.)

Given the vector of one or more songs, a list of other similar songs is constructed using a distance function.

To create a song's genome, it is analyzed by a musician in a process that takes 20 to 30 minutes per song. Ten percent of songs are analyzed by more than one technician to ensure conformity with the standards, i.e., reliability.

First, as you can see, it is a rather complex process (breaking up a song into various qualities I can imagine to be painstaking), as you had suggested. Second, it's based in a proven fact: people like what they are familiar with. Pandora finds out what you are "familiar with" (implicitly stated because it is you that chooses the initial song), and then generates a list that matches what exactly you liked about that song. The song you choose has 150 qualities, and it narrows down via your choices which of those qualities are important to you. You, as a living thinking machine, have already generated a list of qualities you prefer, and thus presented the result of your own "algorithm" to Pandora. It's fairly failsafe and straight forward way to result in songs that you like.

This, as Patrick had demonstrated, is also its downfall: you get more of the same, not offering something wildly different that you also might enjoy.

[Dragoondachemist]

It goes way beyond what I perceived.

[Dragoondachemist]

So talking about music. Know anyone who is really into just listening to something different

[The Dankness]

Apr 23, 2008 15:00:16 GMT -8 Dragoondachemist said:

So talking about music. Know anyone who is really into just listening to something different

PATRICK. PATRICK. PATRICK.

[You probably can't touch this.]

I've seen that video way before it was on college humor W_-V