Tucson Town Hall

by on March 16, 2010

IMG_0551.jpgBack from the desert…

Had a great gathering with Arizonians last Sunday at the Rialto Theatre in downtown Tucson.

As always, the get togethers in smaller towns have a certain special character. About 150 braved driving rain and howling wind to make it out. Tons of tons of questions – it seemed we could have gone on into the night, but I didn’t want to make people miss the Oscars !

Lots of talk about the playlist methodology – especially about variety/repetition, an issue we’re really focused on. It’s clear that some stations on Pandora have become too narrow, and we need to figure that out.

A number of folks also asked about the prospect for an open API, to allow individual developers to start building on the platform. We’re not there yet, but it’s certainly food for thought.

It was also great to meet a handful of folks from the local radio station – clearly looking to find ways to help evolve broadcast radio onto the web. One Dj in attendance asked about access to local ‘thumb’ information so he could use it to help build relevant playlists for his audience. Interesting.

Met a couple grad students working on some interesting pattern matching stuff too.

Thanks again to everyone for coming out. It was a pleasure meeting all of you…

Next up is Seattle on Wednesday this week. 7pm at the Public Library. Should be fun – St. Patrick’s Day!

Tim (Founder)

Comments

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  1. Sam
    April 03, 2010 at 10:03pm
    Well, that's like a tour. Pandora's really fun! A lot of people will enjoy this
    Reply
  2. Alex Jackson
    April 04, 2010 at 5:20pm
    Thanks for sharing your experience!
    Reply
  3. Mike Paul
    April 07, 2010 at 12:47pm
    Hi Tim, I love to see that you are out and getting feedback from the people that use this service everyday. It would be great to have someway to post music in my blogs. I look forward to future updates. Michael The Peoples Program
    Reply
  4. lee garza
    April 07, 2010 at 6:55pm
    Just started listening to Pandora and it's great! I'm a retired (1991) Air Force MSgt and listening to the old hits brings back lots of great memories of great places and times. and friends. Best of luck and keep it up.
    Reply
  5. Overseas Property
    April 08, 2010 at 9:34am
    Bring back old memorize is the most beautiful moment we can listen with. The music of the past past days were so meaningful. That's why I really want to go and be a part of the event held by pandora. Overseas Property Buy Property Overseas
    Reply
  6. Fermin Martinez
    April 20, 2010 at 2:27pm
    how and where can i get a radio to listen to pandora at home
    Reply
  7. Michael
    June 27, 2010 at 12:12pm
    Tim, Thank you for Pandora. I did not attend the Tucson event, but I would like to air a concern. When I first started listening to Pandora, I created a "The Replacements" channel. All was good. The music selected was of the same era and generation of The Replacements, give or take 10 years of their activity as a band. With in the last month, the channel has not gone into deeper cuts of the artist, artists of the era, or place (Minneapolis). Instead their has been many post-pop punk bands added which have little to do with the sound or content of "The Replacements" music genre. I would more expect Prince, because he was from Minneapolis, than "boys like girls". Most of these post pop-punk bands could be Paul Westerberberg's children, conceived when he decided to go solo. I understand that the music genome algorithm is being used to see which music is similar. It seems there may be a process breakdown, where a song was originally compared with a Replacements tune and it matched. But where it may have gone "haywire" is the individual comparing all of the post pop punk music, compared the one tune that qualified against "The Replacements" music with the new Post-Pop-punk music, ie., all tunes are not being compared against the original, but being compared against a tune that was not the Replacements, but compared well with them. It would be better to use "The Replacements", "best" or most requested song as a baseline for song comparison. Over time artist have an peaks and valleys in their creativity and change direction as they grow. For example, Green Day fits the channel, the two bands were active within 10 years of each other, content is similar and it seems " the Replacements" some how influenced "Green Day". It seems 'Green Day' influenced "Boys like girls", but were in no way influenced by the Replacements music, philosophy or stage demeanor. Was n't there a Clash song " White Man in Hammersmith Palais" which has a lyric: " the punk rockers in UK, they won't notice anyway, They're all too busy fighting, For a good place under the lighting....." This lyric correctly describes the attitudes of the post-pop-punk groups that are being associated with 'the Replacements" , who in there videos would stand-around and be filmed standing around while there music was being played over it. The music video was part of their record deal, but jumping around or playing for the video was not. I could make many more comparisons between post-pop-punk and the first wave of punk artists, but I feel I have made my point. Please re-assess your process of associating artists, the algorithm my be right, but the human component maybe be messing it up with good intentions. Pandora is a great service and a refreshing alternative to corporatized radio play lists. Keep up the good work, thanks for reading my email. Regards, Michael
    Reply
  8. Susan
    August 30, 2011 at 10:52am
    I have a question and after surveying your site help outlines cannot find the answer: I created a Joshua Bell station, yet I never hear anything played by Joshua Bell. Am I just unaware when he is on? I only occasionally check titles, but listen all day....AND LOVE IT.
    Reply

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