| Saturday, December 31, 2005 |
| Best in Music - Pandora |
Thanks to Leslie Walker for the article
If Internet dating sites can match people by trying to compute the elements of attraction, why can't songs be matched with people in the same way?
That's the idea behind Pandora, a new Web service that tries to match music you like with other tunes that share the same qualities. Pandora Media, the company behind the service, has been selling music-discovery software for years to big retailers such as Best Buy. Its Pandora service is the company's first offering based on an unusual musical study it dubbed the Music Genome Project.
Over the past five years, a team of analysts studied songs played by more than 10,000 artists and attempted to classify their traits -- not just which instruments are played and what the rhythm is like, but the melodies, lyrics and hundreds of other variables. Much as genes shape humans, the analysts theorized that certain describable qualities shape music and therefore should govern our musical tastes.
As implemented in Pandora, this technology works like a personalized Internet radio station. The site creates a playlist for you after analyzing a particular artist or song that you say you like, then streams the music that it thinks matches your tastes. And it does a great job. |
posted by Brett Crockett @ 10:56 AM   |
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| Sunday, December 25, 2005 |
| Merry Christmas |
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| posted by Brett Crockett @ 1:00 AM |
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| Thursday, December 15, 2005 |
| The Blight of the Season |
I've finally got some time to think about the holidays,
so, in the true spirit of Christmas, I submit to you my wish list:
Macromedia Studio 8. This little package will keep me busy. After all, idle hands are the devil's Texas hold 'em.
Petzl Grigri. It looks like they stopped selling the Grigri at REI...but I still like it.
The Nixon Rotologue. So I'll never be late to work again. And the watch is partly biodegradable.
15" PowerBook. Think of it as an investment instead of a toy. But wait until they're powered by Intel. And run on flash memory. And have LED instead of LCD.
Yes, I'm going for the "something blue" motif. Next year, we'll do "something borrowed." I know what you're thinking...none of this is possible, and that's ok. I believe in Christmas miracles. And I still love hot cocoa. And orange juice. But not together. Oh, and the ink on my printer is running low, so an HP94 and 97 should do the trick. Or, anouther route would be a new HP Designjet 5500 large format printer. Either way, i'm easy to please. Merry Christmas. |
| posted by Brett Crockett @ 8:00 AM |
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| Tuesday, December 13, 2005 |
| Portfolio |
All my ads had been created, so I didn't expect the process of assembling them into one book to take me until 5:30am. And I didn't expect all the orange juice I was drinking all morning to give me o.j. poisoning. But it did. I think I have orange juice sledge building up in my lungs.
My problem with the portfolio is that I had to resize all of my ads- there's got to be an easier way than with that dumb tool in InDesign. Or maybe I just need to learn how to use it better. Anyway, what was probably even more difficult was trying to figure out how to sandwich content between two covers in a spiral-bound type book and make sure everything is facing the right way...at 5 in the am. But I finally figured it all out after 11 straight hours. It was complete and I got to sleep 2 hours before submitting it. |
| posted by Brett Crockett @ 11:30 AM |
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| Friday, December 09, 2005 |
| Ogden: The Next Great Ski Town? |
There's a town...a city that used to be the city in Utah. Now, its a seemingly neglected industrial city that's become known as Utah's crime center. But lately they've been puting a lot of effort into becoming the next big destination in skiing.
Ogden was apparently a cool place a long time ago. It was the filming location of: downtown Everwood, Drive Me Crazy, Con Air, The Sandlot, Three O'Clock High (mostly at Ogden High School), and Fletch.
But that's not all- it was also the birthplace of The Osmonds, John Moses Browning, J. Willard Marriott, and of course Bill Allred of X96. Despite that impressive resume though, the town seems to have died over the years. Bill is the only person I've heard mention it still exists, and I'm suprised even he remembers it.
Then, today a friend at work gave me a skiing magazine and I flopped open to an article I'm amazed I'd heard noting about until now.
Already companies including Descente, Scott, and Goode have moved their headquarters or established offices in Ogden in anticipation of what some believe will be the next big thing. The plan is to build a $50 million gondola from the Ogden floor to "Malan's Basin," a non-existant (as of now) 1,400 acre ski resort that "falls off the northwest-facing expert glades and ridges of Mount Ogden."
Sound crazy? Possibly, but in 2004, Descente bet their company on it by moving to Ogden in anticipation. Maybe the crazy thing is that it seems nobody in Utah has even heard of these plans--despite the fact Matthew Godfrey, Ogden's mayor, has been talking about the projected 2007 opening date, saying "the potential is unprecedented."
Look out Jackson Hole. |
| posted by Brett Crockett @ 2:00 AM |
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