Before Spotify, Deezer, Google Music and other music streaming services that are available today, Pandora was live online and offering all of the options related, with music on streaming and ordered by many genres and including thousands of artists and albums, as it still is today. However, due to its groundbreaking approach the online service of Pandora is one of a kind music service at present time.
Pandora and the Music Genome Project
Pandora is a music streaming service like any other in the world, since is based on the Music Genome Project created by the developers of the platform, meaning that music is analyzed, perceived and offered as it was the human genome, considering every little part of the music critical in terms of harmony, melody, composition, rhythm, lyrics, arrangements and more.
All of these music features are considered like the “gene” of the songs as analogy of the human genome and its conformation. With this approach, users are able to set song playlists with music that is quite similar with the help of their characteristics or “genome” as some sort of speak, being an algorithm that works automatically and recommends songs that are alike to those the user listens before.
When the user is enjoying the platform their account acts as a “radio station” and with a selected song the service create an automatized playlist with several tunes, which are obviously similar in terms of rhythm, harmony, melody and lyrics. Nonetheless, the interest of the Music Genome Project is not only to provide similar recommendations in songs, but to capture the essence of music at its very core and provide new experiences through it.
Unfortunately, Pandora as a service is only available in the United States, Australia and New Zealand, probably due to issues with patents of their proprietary Music Genome Project technology.