Gnod - how AI got smart about taste

For those of you who, like me, sometimes flip through the A-K rack at your local record store and feel lost and overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of music out there, Artificial Intelligence has finally come through.

Gnod is a project of Mark Gibney, of Hamburg, German. Gibney calls it "a search-engine to find things you don't know about." Gnoosic, a platform that runs on Gnod, allows you to enter 3 of your favorites bands or artists helps you choose music that it thinks you will like (Gnoosic sounds kind of like music... get it?).

When I first tried it out, I entered The Format, The Decemberists, and Brand New as three of my favorite bands. The first band that Gnoosic chose for me was Mae. I clicked "I like it!" Then, it went through four or five bands that I didn't know and two that I did, and when I finished, I was given a list of bands that Gnoosic thought I would get a kick out of. Also included were links to the artists' eBay and Amazon pages where I could purchase their music.

I followed Her Space Holiday, the one-man, electronic indie band that Gnoosic chose for me, back to their Amazon page and listened to some samples. By George, Gnoosic knew me better than I know myself! I loved it! They're reminiscent of Postal Service with more edginess. I bought "The Young Machines," an album that was released in 2003 and am loving it so far.

After you test out Gnoosic you can go to Gnod's music-map, a visual representation of Gnoosic's "taste intelligence."