Now before you start sending angry emails, don’t get me wrong. I love Pandora. I’ve been using it since the beginning, and have rode along through all it’s trials and tribulations. A music genome project? Awesome! There was a time when my hard drive with all my music on it was out of commission, and with my stations on Pandora, it felt like I was listening to my own library, almost creepily at times!
I’ve had a MySpace account for a while. A good, long while. In all of those years, I have never once been solicited by a band or musician I actually liked. But alas, after all that time, a miracle has indeed occurred! Ladies & gentlemen, I preset to you Sacramento’s own Agent Ribbons (minus the newest addition, violinist/cellist Naomi):
Software makers Chocomoko has pushed their stylish LastFM companion app SweetFM into open source waters, and you can find the free download here on Google Code.
LastFM allows you to keep track of what you listen to in iTunes online, adding a social aspect to your musical tastes. Once logged in, you can see your own top artists, songs, and albums over different time periods, and find other music like it via recommendations, friends, or “neighbors”. SweetFM provides a desktop interface to all this magic, allowing you to stream music and save the songs you like to iTunes in listenable, but albeit 128kbps quality. Perfect for tucking away those tracks you’d like to buy later through iTunes!
As a student of propaganda, I’m always interested in the pageantry that goes in to things like debates, especially when it comes to the Town Hall format. Every single person in the room has been screened, so even though they might be able to ask whatever questions they want, the questions they will be asking are already known. Six million questions were submitted by normal people around the country, but who decides which questions will be read? What will Tom Brokaw ask? Only time shall tell…
I was getting ready to watch a fantastic episode of MTV’s “Pimp My Ride” when I saw a commercial for something that looked much more interesting! I hopped over to mtvengineroom.com and watched two episodes, or, webisodes, of this new web series from MTV U and HP (I didn’t know they still made things other than free printers).
