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New Phone Service Promises to ID Songs

Posted by samzenpus on from the name-that-tune dept.

Coolnat2004 writes "Ever get a song stuck in your head, but you missed the DJ announcement of the song name? That's the idea powering a new cell phone-based service called 411-SONG. Just call 866-411-SONG, and hold your phone up to the speaker. 15 seconds later the call ends and the information on your song is displayed on your phone's screen. This comes at a price, though. 99 cents for your first 5 songs, and then 99 cents a song after that. However, nbc4.com reports that a subscription model may be coming soon. Wouldn't this technology be great for fixing up all those ID3 tags?"

28 of 354 comments (clear)

  1. Uh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So... now it costs as much to figure out what a song is as to buy it? No thanks.

    1. Re:Uh by commodoresloat · · Score: 5, Funny

      Nope; that's just normal slashdot user conversation. You must be new here.

    2. Re:Uh by ag0ny · · Score: 3, Funny

      So... now it costs as much to figure out what a song is as to buy it?

      How could you buy it if you knew what song it was?

      --
      My site
    3. Re:Uh by ag0ny · · Score: 4, Funny

      Ooops...

      How could you buy it if you didn't know what song it was?

      (Note to self: first coffee, then Slashdot)

      --
      My site
    4. Re:Uh by AstroDrabb · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Hmm. Most major online music "stores" out in the wild allow you to do a very cool thing called search. So if you knew even a small part of the lyrics, you should be OK. Also, most of the major online music stores are taking a hint from Amazon. They are looking at your past purchases and recommending content. IMO, Amazon, has been on-the-money. Every book that Amazon has recommended to me, has been somthing I have wanted and as such, have purchased.

      --
      If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land,
      it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. -James Madison
    5. Re:Uh by rluberti · · Score: 3, Insightful

      for me is already crazy to see people pay for ring tones.....same people will probably use that service... I guess after knowing the music name...the same service will try to seel you the ring tone...

    6. Re:Uh by QuaZar666 · · Score: 3, Funny

      Thats better than the books that I get recommended. Amazon.com thinks I'm a lesbian and recommends oral sex books.

    7. Re:Uh by dukeisgod · · Score: 3, Funny

      Amazon couldn't be further off the mark for it's suggestions to me. I've bought some school books on amazon before, and it constantly recommends similar books. They must think I read that shit for my health.

    8. Re:Uh by lunakyoshi · · Score: 5, Funny

      I am a lesbian, and amazon recommends "The All-American Male's Guide to Getting More Pussy."

      --
      Meep.
  2. UK has Shazam Already by dan_polt · · Score: 5, Informative

    This type of service been available in the uk for a few years now with shazam, it works reasonably well for currently popular songs, fairs a bit oddly with some older stuff though.

    I have actually used it for mp3 tagging too :)

    1. Re:UK has Shazam Already by Mwongozi · · Score: 3, Informative

      I've found it to be quite accurate even with old/obscure stuff.

      The web site is really horrible, but you don't need to use it. Just dial 2580 (UK networks only) and hold the phone up to the music for 30 seconds.

    2. Re:UK has Shazam Already by pete6677 · · Score: 5, Funny

      Yep, its pretty accurate. I called them up, farted into the phone, and it gave the name of some Backstreet Boys song.

    3. Re:UK has Shazam Already by pete6677 · · Score: 3, Funny

      Wow, I didn't realize there were Backdoor Boys fans on Slashdot with mod points tonight. I must have struck a nerve.

  3. Been there, done that .... by Paul+Lamere · · Score: 5, Informative

    Wouldn't this technology be great for fixing up all those ID3 tags? MusicBrainz

    1. Re:Been there, done that .... by Nasarius · · Score: 3, Interesting
      No. MusicBrainz uses fingerprinting of the waveform (a kind of one-way hash, so it doesn't store the actual music). I find the track length on ripped songs usually varies by a few seconds anyway, so the exact length is really only useful in identifying the original CDs, which MusicBrainz can also do.

      In my experience, it works fairly well and only gets confused when the same recording has been released on multiple albums ("best of", remasters, etc).

      --
      LOAD "SIG",8,1
  4. Well by pHatidic · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Wouldn't this technology be great for fixing up all those ID3 tags?

    Well with google you can already do this for free. However, the catch is that you need good enough pitch to know what the notes are. But if you can get them (or close enough), then you can type them in to get the song.

    1. Re:Well by dnixon112 · · Score: 5, Funny

      Thanks for the idea!

      Sincerely,
      Google

    2. Re:Well by Dominic_Mazzoni · · Score: 3, Informative

      People have been working on this problem for a long time. Check out papers published at ISMIR (International Symposium/Conference on Music Information Retrieval) for the academic work. The algorithms and technology are there, no question - the problem is the business model and the licensing. It seems simple, until you try to talk to record executives who don't want to license you access to their music catalog. It seems counterintuitive, since in theory it would make them more money, but they apparently don't see it that way.

      Also, while it's technically feasible, it does get significantly more difficult computationally when you want to search an entire library of songs.

      Here's an example of a free site that has the technology implemented, just without the database of popular songs (it works great for classical melodies).

      Not trying to discourage you - the point being, either go into this because you think the tech is cool but don't expect to make money, or if your goal is to get rich, become a business major and be prepared to spend all of your time meeting with VC execs and recording industry leaders, rather than building cool tech.

    3. Re:Well by eddeye · · Score: 3, Informative

      Wouldn't this technology be great for fixing up all those ID3 tags?

      Well with google you can already do this for free.

      I'll do you one better: musicbrainz recognizes songs by music fingerprint. The API is rough around the edges but it works pretty well. I cobbled together a python script to tag my 1300 mp3s and it identified all but a handful correctly. I'll throw a copy up on this page later for anyone who's interested.

      --
      Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on lunch.
  5. AT&T already did this by Logic+Bomb · · Score: 4, Informative

    AT&T Wireless did this a year ago. See http://www.mobilemag.com/content/100/340/C2723/ for a typical summary

  6. Old Hat by civman2 · · Score: 3, Informative
    I believe that ATT Wireless has been offering a service like this for over a year. The only difference is that their service is only a three digit number and you don't need to pay out of the nose for it.

    "The new "#ID" music service is provided by San Francisco-based Musicphone in cooperation UK-based Shazam Entertainment, which operates a propriety recognition database of more than one million recorded songs. AT&T Wireless customers can trial the music recognition service at no charge beyond standard airtime charges when they first dial "#ID." Afterwards, the service costs $.99 cents, plus standard airtime charges, each time they use it." -mobilemag.com


    unless this is a year old news story...
  7. XM Radio by taped2thedesk · · Score: 4, Insightful

    For $13 a month, I'll just stick to XM Radio... it shows me the title and artist of the song I'm listening to. It can even record that info so that I can go back to it later and buy the song or album when I get home. Sure, it won't identify arbitrary music (just the song currently playing on the tuned station), but it seems like the only time I try to figure out the name of a song is when I'm listening to it on the radio.

  8. Service for slashdot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I am waiting for the service that allows you to hold your camera phone up to your computer screen and it tells you if the slashdot article is a dupe. (which this one is)

  9. Only for popular songs. Bah-Humbug! by SeaFox · · Score: 4, Insightful

    While a service like this is truly incredible, as people from the UK (who have had it for a few years) have pointed out, these services usually only work on "popular" songs. Songs that probably get played twenty times a day on U.S. top-40 radio, with oppertunities to find out the name quite often.

    The branches of music this would be most useful for (Indie Rock, Electronic, Jazz and Classical) are unfortunately the ones the system will rarely recognize.

  10. a couple of things.... by yagu · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A couple of things: (I actually had been thinking about this service the other day -- I had seen it demo'ed on TV quite a while ago. I thought it was interesting and had just been wondering what had happened to the concept. I never missed it, just thought it was interesting, for a couple of reasons:

    • I tried to think how many times I've encountered just that need to identify a song -- turns out, at least for me, not that many. I do have a good ear and memory for music, but I can only think of once or twice in my life where I really felt the NEED to have this kind of service. I wouldn't pay anything for it regardless.
    • Do we really need yet another distraction from driving? While I can sympathize with most cellphone users it becomes almost (almost!) a necessary evil to occasionally talk on a cellphone while driving (though I do think it a bit over used and abused and probably has contributed to an accident or two), I cringe at the thought of people fumbling for their phone not only to dial up and "use" this service, but to do it under the auspices of a deadline, i.e., before the song ends on the radio. I think this just asks for trouble!
    • How accurate can this really be? The demo I saw was impressive, but for the songs I need ID'ed, they are much more obscure and the stats and performance of the demo I saw (let me emphasize I'm not totally positive it was one and the same as referenced here, but how many of these can there be?) the accuracy was good for most, but fell a bit for the less mainstream stuff -- which is the stuff I need ID's for.
    • How good is it for: Jazz; Classical; ID'ing specific rendition of a song (cover vs. original recording)?

    Bottom line for me -- I don't need it.... Sometimes I feel like we're turning into a world that's a microwave oven with 100 power level settings! And just how many power level settings do we really need to live healthy, productive, and fulfilling lives?

  11. as usual, America is late by dascritch · · Score: 3, Informative

    This service exists since 2001 in France, branded under the name of "Yacast" http://yacast.fr/fr/index.html> ("service de pige musicale"). You can get a sms with the complete disc references, a ringtone, or sms news about the band.

    Why does Slashdot put this kind of retro newsfor USA but is rejecting geek news from Europe ? (ECS 50th Eurovision)

    --
    (Sorry my bad French) Je fais parler les Guignols de l'Info. Le pied, quoi.
    1. Re:as usual, America is late by commanderfoxtrot · · Score: 4, Informative

      This sounds rather like MusicBrainz software.

      Yes, this sort of service has been around in the UK and France for several years now.

      Giles.

      --
      http://blog.grcm.net/
  12. MusiBrainz, indeed by ari_j · · Score: 3, Informative

    MusicBrainz did a good job for me. I imported all my mp3s into iTunes on my new PowerBook, and then used iEatBrainz (a MusicBrainz front-end that interfaces directly to iTunes to find songs to tag and to tag them in place) to put tags on just over 1,100 untagged mp3s. It missed only about 90 of them, including both incorrect tags and failure to find a tag at all.

    MusicBrainz needs better moderation - some inconsistencies did arise (such as capitalization; e.g., "acoustic" vs. "Acoustic" and the capitalization of short words and articles in song titles - "A Day In The Life" vs. "A Day in the Life" and other versions) - but overall it did a fine job. It even corrected me as to certain artists' names.