Slashdot Mirror
Bill Gates' Plan To Destroy Music, Note By Note
theodp writes "Remember Mr. Microphone? If you thought music couldn't get worse, think again. Perhaps with the help of R&D tax credits, Microsoft Research has spawned Songsmith, software that automatically creates a tinny, childish background track for your singing. And as bad as the pseudo-infomercial was, the use of the product in the wild is likely to be even scarier, as evidenced by these Songsmith'ed remakes of music by The Beatles, The Police, and The Notorious B.I.G.."
This is what I think music would sound like without drugs. (NSFW, but WTF, it's Sunday...)
"I bless every day that I continue to live, for every day is pure profit."
This is supposed to be a news site. Is there any purpose to this article other than blatant Microsoft bashing?
There seems to be a lot of flaming here for how the songs sucked etc. , but...
1. Goodness of music is a subjective issue. There may be people who actually like the sound, or the ease of karaoke-ing through it. Kids, perhaps who can be thrilled at the substantial quality of their renditions.
2. I suspect a lot of people are complaining about the examples there because they are comparing it to the originals. Think about how new songs or tunes can be arranged by budding composers using this. Songsmith might offer a lot more customisability making it an important tool.
We should try to look at the bright side once in a while.
Essentia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem.
Its running Vista under Bootcamp.
Just saying...
Techncially, Microsoft is not in the hardware business for laptops so its not such a big faux pas and might even be their silly attempt to play nice with Apple, or to show that they aren't threatened by it.
Essentia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem.
more likely the production company hired to make the commercial had an old Macbook for a prop and thought it looked better than any other notebook they had.
Note that I specifically decided not to post this as AC so hopefully I won't be flagged as a troll...
But I think this is actually really cool.
Is it going to make any musical masterpieces? Probably not.
Does it sound like a fun little toy to mess with? Yes, yes it does.
Incidentally, I've never heard Sergeant Pepper before (yeah yeah, go ahead and -1 me for cultural illiteracy), and I thought the music worked rather well with the lyrics, even if it didn't sound particularly interesting.
Bill Gates has not been actively involved with day-to-day Microsoft decision for at least a year. He is now involved with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. This foundation has relatively little to do with music, although a number of musicians do work with the foundation.
The equivalent to ./ stories like this would be to refer to Apple as "Steve Jobs made music 30% more expensive" (do the math).
And besides the headline was a serious troll.
Just listen to those demos, they're freaking amazing (not that I liked any of them, but just looking at the queues and matchings of everything, this is impressive beyond words). Specifically (and unsurprisingly) the rap song at the end was the clear winner, sounding eerily well-matched to the vocals. (Disclaimer: perhaps I'm impressed because I'm intimately familiar with the first two while I don't know the third song's original intended sound, but I do expect something with less acoustic range/complexity is easier to adapt.)
This gets negative vibe because it comes from our favorite enemy (at least while we transfer our hate to somebody more worthy of it these days), but I think this could be the start of something great, even if it means we have to listen to some crap on the way. Isn't that the big benefit to Creative Commons? Isn't that why we eat up Lessig's remix argument?
This is a good first step. Sad that it's not Free Software, as the next step is incorporating remix and a larger (user-submitted) library of base music to the system (see the intro video on the microsoft.com article link), and perhaps the step after that is in getting the system to automatically figure out things like tempo and an optimized list of suggested music stylings.
To Microsoft (if you're actually reading this) or perhaps otherwise those who wish to re-implement the idea: even as a closed-source solution, if you create a system that would allow (advanced) users to create their own base music, you will start a music revolution.
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
Where has this hate for the X-box come from? Isn't the X-box the #2 selling console? (#3 being Sony's Playstation 3??) Isn't Sony also losing billions of dollars on their hardware sales? And take it from someone who had one of those PS2s whose faulty lasers died right after the warranty expired, they aren't the first company to make a product that wasn't 100% bulletproof! Now, I don't have an X-box 360, nor do I want one. That being said, where is all this hate coming from?
Red Ring of Death.
Yes, it's been fixed in newer consoles. But would you buy a product from a company that knew about the issue and continued to sell the product anyway?
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
It's a freaking toy for christ's sake. The sky is not falling.
I think its that to Microsoft its just another way to lock people into Windows.
The Xbox could be a refridgerator if Microsoft felt that would help lock-in Windows users.
Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
Yeah, I find it funny how badly the X-Boxes generate heat. I own a PS3 and run it (literally) for 2 weeks at a time, and the case is barely warm. No this is not idling, it actually runs FAH 24/7 when not being used for gaming or movies.
Not only does it run cooler, but it's the same size as the X-Box and the power brick is INSIDE the case! The power plug on the back is literally a standard computer power cable.
There is also the fact that they do not try to lock you out of anything (other than the GPU). With X-Box, you need to hack the HD in order to run any other software. With the PS3, you simply go into the system menu and select (install other OS).
You don't get it. This is how Microsoft will destroy the RIAA.
This isn't even version 1.0. It's maybe 0.5 (sounds open source, doesn't it.) Of course it sucks. Most new Microsoft products suck at version 1.0. By version 3.0, they rule the world.
Remember how US music law works. Anybody can parody anybody else for free (hence the legions of Elvis impersonators) and anybody can make a new recording of an old song by paying a fixed royalty limited by law. That royalty goes to composers and songwriters, not the RIAA. The maker and user of this program owe nothing to the RIAA.
That's the key to this. As this technology gets better, there will be programs that listen to the repertory of a musician or a singer and build vocal tract and style models. There will be programs that take in a song recording and extract the music, lyrics, and expression, reducing it to something like MIDI with more annotations. Then the synthesis program will put them together, perhaps producing a "cover recording" indistinguishable from the original, at least when heard in a car. Plus you can have fun running combining different songs and musicians.
At that point, musicianship has been automated. Microsoft can dictate terms to the RIAA.
Don't laugh. I'll bet that in a few years, most videogame soundtracks will come from something like this. Then commercial soundtracks. Actual musical recordings will take longer, because there's a heavy "branding" factor. But it will come.
There's a public demo up at Microsoft Research
MS Research does a lot of good research, and this is no exception. Stuff like this allows us (humanity) to explore what makes something musical, why we enjoy musing, and so on. This is all good stuff. The problem really is when research organizations are burdened with a requirement for projects to result in marketable products and revenue pull; that's when you get silly products like this. Clearly this would be best off open sourced and shared, it likely has no future as a proprietary product. I'm sure the researchers themselves would totally agree, they just can't openly express this sentiment for political reasons.
"But would you buy a product from a company that knew about the issue and continued to sell the product anyway?"
Yeah, I'm still looking for a car manufacturer that knows their cars won't break down after years of use too. They all know what how and hy things will break, and they do nothing to fix it. Bastards.
Try not to take me more seriously than I take myself.
They're really just toys. They won't "destroy music" any more than karaoke destroyed singing as an art or profession.
The way other Slashdot readers scream "Oh No No No No Oh God No!", I came up with some theories:
I think the technology/products are enablers - for children to start experiment with writing their own songs. It's not about the quality of songs, it's the jump-start of children's creativity.
Once children realize how easy it is to create music, they'll have a huge bonfire lit within them.
What do you think?
If you can find a car manufacturer which regularly replaces 4-6 power trains while the car is still under 3-year warranty, I'll buy you a shot.
Put identity in the browser.
If we get access to install any new operating system that we desire, and to use the PS3 for whatever reason we want, then how can that be bad?
If Sony is circumventing the tariffs by being "forced" into making the PS3 more open (and I use that term guardedly), then we still benefit a LOT more than by owning an Xbox360.
Composer - brain - heart + Computer = Songsmith
www.Migrainesoft.com - Computer giving you a headache? We can fix that!
It was a move to intercept the consoles' advance on the Windows gaming stronghold and make sure MS remains a player in the gaming platform market.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.