I think everybody who came of age in the 90s has a deep distrust of top 40 radio. It was no good, and together we made "Alternative" a genre (by which I mean it quickly became as corporate and exploitative as other pop music).
As a result, I feel kind of guilty for my addiction to The Hype Machine, particularly when explaining it to people who use Pandora or other personalized recommendation engines ("So it learns what blogs you like?" "No, it just uses all the blogs.")
So why is it that I enjoy listening to the Hype Machine's popular feed more than any Pandora channel that I've ever been able to carefully fine-tune?
It's barely worth mentioning with online music: the songs are chosen by the wisdom of the crowds, not a corporate tastemaker.
But this isn't enough- the charts are full of songs I wouldn't want to listen to.
Much more important is the way these songs are selected; it's not that people are just listening to the tracks, it's that they're discussing and commenting on them.
In today's attention economy, the time and effort to author a post and link to an mp3 indicates a level of interest that's valuable to me as a fellow consumer.
Obviously this is very prone to astroturfing and gaming, but for as long as it remains authentic, it's great.
If I have any kind of strong reaction to a song (enjoyment, curiosity, disbelief, etc), I can go right to the people who propelled it onto the popular page, and find out what's up with it.
This replaces the DJ in a very pleasing way- when I want some backstory, I've got it easily.
Finally, the live performances and Internet memes that show up in the feed are a great way to know what's going on in the musical world. If an artist dies, releases a new album, breaks up, etc, people will post about it and include new or old tracks.
Often these "breaking" popular songs and viral audio creations appear in the form of multiple remixes, and I certainly hope that someday soon Jamglue's logs will be full of the Hype Machine spidering all the incoming links.
Maybe I'm just making excuses for my laziness, but I honestly think
the Hype Machine represents how a Top 40 can really be enjoyable these
days. They're doing a great job, and I'm grateful for the easy and
great experience.
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