I remember when Pandora was attempting to compute the "DNA" of a song (assorted classifications like key, tempo, style) and recommend music based on that. You could then get a "station" based on a single song, and fine-tune it by adding more or disliking songs as they came up.
The end result was underwhelming- it never really captured the characteristics that I actually liked about particular songs, and ended up being crappy or so narrowly tuned that it lacked enough variety to be interesting.
The concept is still around, but with less scientific sounding fluff and, I think, more relaxed parameters for recommendations.
>You could then get a "station" based on a single song
Apple Genius did something similar and it mostly worked not badly because it was drawing from songs in your collection already.
You're more likely to like songs in specific genres and time periods and songs that are popular generally. Once you get beyond that, it gets harder. And the situation is probably even harder with video unless you basically watch superhero films.
The last time I used it, I don't recall seeing the "DNA" nonsense, or being able to get a list of characteristics that they used to build a station around... It's possible that the interface simply changed and I didn't look hard enough for it though.
Pandora is based off of the "Music Genome Project" which was a massive effort that took tons of music efforts to make happen. Experts literally sat down and deconstructed individual songs by hand and gave them tags.
It's truly a historic achievement and it's almost sad how the massive effort mainly resulted in a private database that's primarily used for a failed Spotify competitor
I am 100% with you there. The things that could be done to advance the creation, understanding and appreciation of music from that work is staggering. It's sad that it's stuck in amber.
The end result was underwhelming- it never really captured the characteristics that I actually liked about particular songs, and ended up being crappy or so narrowly tuned that it lacked enough variety to be interesting.
The concept is still around, but with less scientific sounding fluff and, I think, more relaxed parameters for recommendations.