................................. To leave Commie, hyper to http://commie.oy.com/commie_leaving.html ................................. Hmm, anyone tried this ? http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2001/04/06/personalization/index.html I log on to Napster and discover that there are 708,372 songs currently available for download. Simultaneously, using the Bearshare client for Gnutella, I have access to another 80,000 files. At MP3.com, 750,000 songs by more than 100,000 bands await my perusal. Meanwhile, Listen.com lists 900,000 songs and at EMusic I can purchase any of 165,000 different tunes. So much to choose from -- isn't the Net great? But there's a problem: I don't know what I want, or rather, I want something that I don't know. Something new, something fresh, something that hasn't already been pummeled into my ears by Sony or AOL Time Warner or MTV. I want someone to tell me, in effect, "Try this, you'll like it." I want expert, personal treatment that will cut through all the chaff and guide me directly to the gems. Most of all, I want the Net to deliver on its promise to break the chains that hold us in thrall to the major record labels -- I want it to expose me to new, unheard-of bands. Ever since a little outfit called IUMA got started back even before the Web broke big, I've been hearing about how the Net will cut out the middleman and usher in an era where the little guy has a chance. But until now, I've been waiting in vain. And so have all those obscure garage bands hoping that the Web will give them a leg up. Big stars still rule the roost, with only a few exceptions. Despite the advice of a staff of informed critics, Listen.com's top downloads are Madonna, Eminem and Britney Spears. And although a few savvily marketed indie bands have broken through, MP3.com's top 40 downloads are still riddled with pop acts like Madonna, Eric Clapton and Faith Hill. The Net may have made available more music than ever before, but fans still aren't listening to a lot of new tunes. Back in 1996, an MIT Media Lab-backed company called Firefly thought it had figured out a solution to the problem, and launched the personalized music recommendation system "BigNote." Using a technology known as "collaborative filtering," BigNote was supposed to suggest new bands you might enjoy based on the ratings of other users with similar tastes. It was a neat concept and it spawned a frenzy of competitors. For years, "personalization" was a buzz word to rival all others. But unfortunately for new music fans, Firefly just didn't work very well. Like so many other buzz words of the late '90s, personalization tantalized but never arrived. Fast forward to 2001. Another company has emerged from MIT: Media Unbound. Like Firefly, Media Unbound is offering a personalized recommendation system that will suggest bands you might enjoy, based on ones that you already like. Unlike Firefly, Media Unbound does what it promises to do: introduce new, obscure bands you'll actually like. And Media Unbound isn't alone -- there's also Mubu.com, which offers a similar service; and MoodLogic,, which takes a more search-engine approach. Similarly, the music-discovery search engine Gigabeat was purchased by Napster two weeks ago.
