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Machine Learning and MP3s

Posted by Hemos on from the the-right-song-for-the-right-time dept.

dan moore writes "Students at Caltech and Harvard have developed a system that analyzes playlists and learns people's listening patterns. It then channels its knowledge into generating streams of music that the people themselves would like to listen to. Intuitive, accurate, and finally someone has done it. Check out the website to get one of the available plugins. Another interesting approach to digital music."

5 of 228 comments (clear)

  1. cool project... by matt4077 · · Score: 3, Funny

    from their download page:

    "Who wants Synapse?

    Listeners of the MP3. Students. Elevator operators. Makers of other media players. Programmers. Gangsters. Punks. Nerds. Really big nerds. Even ones from Yemen. Yeah, plenty of those. Competitors. Winners. People who exercise to Rocky music. Will Deringer. Audiophiles. Revolutionaries. Even Canadians. Quality people. Gastroenterologists. Bums. Lots of bums. Evil geniuses. Classics professors. Chinese people. Wine connoiseurs. Businessmen. Rabbis. Dew drinkers. Sherpas. Dictators. Professional servants. People with special powers. People who come through in the clutch. You. "

    I like them!

    --
    Fleur de Sel
    1. Re:cool project... by KDan · · Score: 4, Funny

      Hah, mate, you need to check out the "Why the Brain?" page:

      At some point in every man's life, he's bound to find himself in bed with a Chinese girl. It may happen suddenly, and you may not remember how it happened, but it will happen -- I guarantee that. When the time comes he needs to be ready. He needs his full arsenal at hand. And by this I mean music. Too many times has the playlist run short on soft acoustic guitar songs, quieting the room to an awkward silence and giving the Chinese girl a chance to reconsider what she's about to do. I've seen it happen, and it's not pretty.

      As a matter of fact, it's happened to me. And so we have spent the better part of the last six months of our lives making sure it doesn't happen to you. Because if it ever does, you won't be able to say "Why the hell doesn't my MP3 player just know what songs I want it to play?"

      We've got you covered. Use the Brain.

      Very "Dead Poet's society"-ish... "the ultimate purpose of all communication is... to seduce women!" :-)

      Daniel

      --
      Carpe Diem
    2. Re:cool project... by maxmg · · Score: 4, Funny

      Do I understand this correctly:

      Geek is about to score, music runs out,
      girl reconsiders. Geek then starts programming
      project to make him COOLER???

      It's a sad sad world...

      --
      I asked for a refund - and got my monkey back.
  2. I had a vaguely similar idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    I remember whenever that joyous time of the month would roll around, my ex-girlfriend would start listening to a lot more typically "chick" songs, right before she actually started menstruating.

    I started working on a similar Winamp plugin to kind of give me a heads up, but then I figured I'd just see the used tampons in the trash...

  3. No - he's focused by chriso11 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Perhaps we could parcel out the grammer/spelling nazi functions into focused solutions.
    Somebody has obviously already taken then/than (which is a known high runner) as their special calling.

    So, if you always wanted to be a spelling/grammer nazi, but didn't have time to police ALL of Slashdot, get involved in the new paradigm: focused spelling/grammer nazi activism!

    Act fast before the cool ones are taken:

    * there/their
    * to/too/two
    * you/your/you're
    and the ever popular:
    * it/its/it's

    Hurry! Some other spelling/grammer nazi may take your choice!

    --
    No, I don't trust in god. He'll have to pay up front, like everybody else.