Google Acquires Curated Music Service Songza 45
mpicpp (3454017) writes with news that Google is expanding its online music services through acquisition. From the article: Songza focuses on playlists curated by music experts that are designed for specific activities or occasions and then suggested to specific listeners based on seven points of context: day of week, time of day, the device used being used, weather, location, what the particular listener has done before with the service considering those previous five points, and then what all other Songza listeners have done before given the first five context points.
What? (Score:1)
Re:What? (Score:4, Informative)
From the article, it's apparently an online radio service, similar to Pandora or Spotify, except instead of using machine-based algorithms to determine what you might like, it uses lists made by "music experts" based on criteria you give it. I hadn't heard of it before the article, but I might take a look when I get home from work.
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That kid in the back of the class with his headphones on.
Re:What? (Score:5, Funny)
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I'd imagine it's one of those people on any given popular music torrent site that do things like make absurdly large vinyl rips (I've seen vinyl rips in FLAC where each track is upwards of 350MB) using specific hardware that no one's ever heard of and complain about CDs because they were pressed using the Japanese method instead of the German one.
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> (I've seen vinyl rips in FLAC where each track is upwards of 350MB)
That's a stretch.
192Khz * 24-bit = 576KB/s = ~35MB/min
350MB would be 10 minutes long uncompressed
That's for one track, not stereo. It would actually be about 69.12 MB/min or 4.14 GB/hr uncompressed, so, using conservative estimates, 3.105GB/hr FLAC.
Most people are wise enough not to bother with 192KHz, although some could argue for 96KHz, which still puts you at about half of the figures I stated above for a stereo track. 350MB is a 35 minute album done in 44.1KHz/16 bit at uncompressed or likely 44.1KHz and 24 bit done in FLAC or with really good FLAC compression, 48 KHz/24 bit.
This brings up a quic
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The big reason would be that my mp3 player (I don't have a smartphone and my tablet has been declared 'too big for the gym") can't play FLAC files of that size. My tablet can, and my PC can, but the mp3 player just isn't strong enough to handle it. Really, it's only a problem because I don't have a smartphone.
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I actually gave it a try at lunch on my tablet. The home screen on the site told me that it was Wednesday afternoon and gave me five suggestions, the first of which was essentially a "Top 40" list. I'm not into Top 40, so I tried the second one, which was I think "Energetic Songs". It gave me I think five playlist suggestions, two of which were "Twerk at Work" and some other thing related to twerking. The others were pop dance songs.
I wound up trying "Popular Indie", and getting a Jay Z song (apparently A-l
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I'll add, of the three: Pandora, Spotify and Songza, only Songza is [easily] available in Canada.
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From the article, it's apparently an online radio service, similar to Pandora or Spotify, except for the fact that it works in Canada.
There, FIFW. Google had better not break the one service we can reliably use up here without jumping through proxy hoops, or a bunch of us'll be pissed. I'm preparing the maple syrup cannons, just in case, eh?
Re:What? (Score:5, Informative)
What is Songza?
I don't know how popular it is as a browser-based service, but it's a very popular mobile app. Particularly when linked through home media systems, it allows a user to very quickly jump to a playlist based on a desired genre, activity, or mood.
Activities examples:
BBQ
Breaking Up
Driving in the Left Lane
Gaming
Getting High
Making Out
Unwinding after work
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A soon to be ruined music system which will be augmented to give Google more of your data, extend their advertising business, and be one more step into the evolution of Google as the evil empire it's been trying to become for years now.
Whatever it is, the fact that Google is buying it means it will be pretty much destroyed as it is now.
And, they'll be updating the EULA/ToS to make sure they own your data in perpetuity and anything evil and asshole-ish their lawyers can think of.
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What qualifies someone as a music expert?
Amount of cardigans owned.
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I had never heard of it. Sounds like a good service. I would start using it except now that google has bought it surely it'll be gone in 2 years.
Yes like YouTube, Android where are they?
Nothing new (Score:3)
We're Google: Give us every detail of your life for a song.
Change the name, Google! (Score:1)
'Google Songza' is certainly catchier than 'Google Play Music All Access'.
Location is a factor too? (Score:3)
I dumped all other music providers about a year ago and now use Songza, particularly since it's mostly ad-free (and easy to download the streams). However, I've noticed that Songza's suggestions also seem to be location-based: when I'm at home in the sticks, I see a lot of country music suggestions, but when I'm in my office in the city, I mostly see rap and R&B suggestions.
Bah. (Score:2)