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MusicSurf
Stages of Design
The stages of this project can be found at the pages:
Problem
Current music platforms like Spotify or Apple Music show music in a standard database style system and give recommendations through auto generated playlists. This means that users are not able to explore music freely and often only find new music due to auto generated playlists which they don’t have control over.
Our Solution
MusicSurf proposes using visualization to present a more natural experience when interacting with and listening to music. MusicSurf looks to create a dynamic interface for interacting with music libraries by visualizing key elements of songs such as mood, speed, and volume range that are important to users when selecting songs from their library. This platform will spatially organize songs to facilitate a browsing experience, as opposed to a searching experience that current apps provide. MusicSurf also proposes a novel way of playing music. Current music apps often play music from playlists or albums that are designed to be listened to either in order or randomly. MusicSurf on the other hand presents music in network with songs connected to each other by heuristics such as mood, speed, genre, and so forth, allowing users to explore music as they would explore a forest on foot. The user can either provide MusicSurf with heuristics that determine the path that MusicSurf takes or they can manually choose their desired path.
Users and Stakeholders
Music Label companies
- Have a vested interest in how music is being shared and how it is being distributed. A system like MusicSurf gives new opportunities to give exposure to their music, but also forces them to redefine how they advertise.
Artists
- MusicSurf looks to give exposure to a plethora of musical artists, that come from all kinds of musical backgrounds, and provides new opportunities to musicians to find new audiences even if they represent a niche market.
New music listeners
- MusicSurf gives people new to music in general or new to a certain genre the ability to explore what’s available and build their libraries
Vetern Music listeners
- Veteran music listeners who have developed a large music library will find that MusicSurf enables them to more easily navigate and organize their libraries