Yes, Ohigo. It’s a derivative of the spanish word for “I hear” – Oigo. (We changed it to make it harder to say and spell.)
Ohigo.com is also the name we gave our research and development site. That is where we built the foundation of the site that is to become NewTunes.com.
The central premise of the site is that you can type in a song that you like, and our search engine will serve up songs that sound like the one you typed – making it a more reliable way to find independent music.
The search relies on algorithms, artificial intelligence and you. As you listen to samples of the songs our engine found, you can adjust their ranking according to how similar they are to the original request. If you think a song doesn’t match at all, you can delete it. Our engine stores and applies this new data and weights it against what others have said about the results.
The other way that you can be involved in the process is by playing our contest. If you go to the site now – ohigo.com – the site will start you right in on our contest. The contest plays 30 second clips of songs and asks you to select (or guess) the mood, tempo, genre, etc. Your answer is compared to the predetermined answer, and you either get a correct answer (upon which you can build a streak) or an incorrect answer.
At present, there are cash payouts based on the length of your streak. As we evolve to NewTunes, you will be able to build discounts on music downloads and other services and products.
Most music sites rely on a “those who purchased this, also purchased that” model. We think that this search method is more reliable and will turn up songs that are closer to what you like. It should also turn up even more obscure choices than the recommendation by purchase model. And for hardcore music fans who like to be the first to hear of something – people like me – that is worth something.
As I write this, we’re building out the site that will become NewTunes.com. We like what we’ve got so far, and we hope you will, too. We’d also like to involve you in the site, just to make sure we get it right. So please stay tuned… and in contact.
I can always be reached at jon@ohigo.com.
Until next time…
