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Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

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Re: Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

#181

Post by captainmuon »

SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #21

Shazam is the closest thing we have to witchcraft. I'm sure plenty of HNers will chime in with "well acktually..." type comments about how they could write it in their basement in a weekend, but to do what it does, as quickly as it does, on the ridiculously enormous library of music that it does is really something special.

After I learned how it roughly works, it seems no longer like witchcraft, but it is still impressive.

The remaining thing I don't understand now is how the heck they managed to negotiate the license for all the songs they have in the database. A friend of mine had a major website for lyrics, and he got some legal trouble from the record companies. When he tried to buy a license to display the lyrics, after some back and forth, they basically said they're not interested in licensing. This was in the early 2000s before streaming took off. Since that time I have the impression that often legal and social problems are much harder to solve than technological ones.

Re: Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

#182

Post by iamben »

bluetidepro wrote: post #8

Shazam is the one app that has been around since about the birth of the iPhone that honestly still blows my mind in it's capabilities. The fact it can so quickly figure out any song in so many environments is incredible. Call me simple, but I use it almost daily, and it is accurate close to 98% of the time. I absolutely love Shazam's iOS app, and they have done a great job keeping up with UI/UX treads for it over the…

Birth of the iPhone?! I remember using Shazam on my dumbphone driving home from university. That must have been 2002/3. Blew my mind. Pretty incredible really. Good for them!

Re: Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

#183

Post by nielsbot »

kryogen1c wrote: post #167
alex_duf wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's assuming there's an infinite supply of jobs. When you're in financial difficulty - say your 0 hour contract doesn't bring enough money to pay the bills - you'll take whatever terms and conditions Uber is giving to you. Because you need to fulfill your basic needs. I don't think that many Uber drivers are doing it by choice, they just don't talk about it to avoid bumming clients and getting a poor rating. I'd l…

> That's assuming there's an infinite supply of jobs. Not only did I not assume that, the exact opposite is true. Uber _just_ created all of their jobs; they didn't used to exist. Everyone started working there because they wanted to. It's valuable to them to spend their time driving. It's not like Uber forced closed other companies at a 1:1 ratio and force hired their workers for less. These are all voluntary transa…

If you're desperate you will "volunteer" to do certain things you don't want to do. That can be exploited.

Depends if it's a sellers' or buyers' market.

Re: Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

#185

Post by Dolores12 »

bluetidepro wrote: post #8

Shazam is the one app that has been around since about the birth of the iPhone that honestly still blows my mind in it's capabilities. The fact it can so quickly figure out any song in so many environments is incredible. Call me simple, but I use it almost daily, and it is accurate close to 98% of the time. I absolutely love Shazam's iOS app, and they have done a great job keeping up with UI/UX treads for it over the…

shazam algo have been reverse engineered. nothing stops someone to create another shazam in case apple screw it.

Re: Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

#186

Post by mrguyorama »

icebraining wrote: post #89
mcphage wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and without internet That's really sweet—I wonder how much storage that requires? I would have expected it to require a lot, but if it's on a phone, then maybe not that much?

The database holds fingerprints for ~17000 songs and takes 53MBs: https://www.xda-developers.com/google-pixel-2-now-playing-so...

They should allow you to download databases based on things like genre. The 64gb Pixel could hold a very very large amount

Re: Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

#187

Post by olalonde »

afterburner wrote: post #139
kryogen1c wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand this logic generally and in this case it makes even less sense. 10 years ago, Uber literally didn't exist. How, in any way, is Uber forcefully underpaying it's employees/contractors? People flocked to drive for Uber; where is the oppression here? This is the same "Walmart doesn't pay its workers and destroys local businesses argument". People work there, and people shop there. Walmart didn't make a…

In a completely free market, corporations are free to distort economic and labour policy so that poor unemployed people are desperate to get any job they can, regardless of how poorly it pays. This is why minimum wage and other laws exist. See also: race to the bottom.

> This is why minimum wage and other laws exist.

This is not a settled question in economics. The idea that minimum wage laws help the poor is at the very least debatable.

Re: Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

#188

Post by sorenjan »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #175
watty wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't mean to take away from Shazam (because I too was amazed when I first used it) but the Pixel phones have Shazam-like ability built in which uses minimal battery and without internet... and it's constantly running any time music plays. Not really "magic" how it works but still pretty amazing that I can pull the phone out of my pocket any time I hear a song I like and immediately see the band/title.

Google used to have song identification via voice search and a widget on all Android phones since Lollipop. Then they killed it for no reason other than to screw over existing users. Widget is still there in Nougat but doesn't do anything.

They recently updated the music search. It's integrated in their assistant, and they have a widget for direct access.

https://ai.googleblog.com/2018/09/googles-next-generation-mu...

Re: Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

#189

Post by aaaaaaaaaab »

mcphage wrote: post #109
vemv wrote: post #105

Although Shazam is a black box to us consumers, I'm pretty sure its recognition quality dropped drastically in the last 2 years.

> I'm pretty sure its recognition quality dropped drastically in the last 2 years What happened 2 years ago that you think affected its recognition quality?

Mumble rap became popular.

Re: Apple has completed its acquisition of Shazam

#190

Post by vlozko »

colordrops wrote: post #42
denzil_correa wrote: post #2

> The app will soon offer its experience ad-free for all users so everyone can enjoy the best of Shazam without interruption. Probably, one of the best results from this acquisition.

You can bet they will kill integration with Spotify though. And maybe no more Android support. I'll take ads over that.

Apple does make an Apple Music app for Android. That alone is a reason they'd want to keep it around on Android.
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