TheFilter
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Moody: mood-based iTunes tagging and playlists
We've talked about automated iTunes playlist generators before, like MusicIP and The Filter, which purport to create playlists that reflect a certain mood or musical style, etc. In some ways similar, Moody also helps you generate playlists based on mood, however unlike those tools it does not analyze your music or tie into an online database. Instead it requires you to go through your iTunes library tagging your tracks according to mood along two axes: the vertical represents intensity and the horizontal represents happiness. Once your library is mood tagged (with the mood saved in the comments field of the ID3 tags), you can then define playlists (including Smart playlists) based on mood.The supposed advantage of this method is that your mood tags will be set by you, reflecting your own individual taste, etc. Thus a mood based playlist will more accurately reflect what you think of as intense or happy, etc. rather than some online database. Personally, I think this sounds like an interesting concept, but much like star ratings I don't know if I could get around to tagging enough tracks to make this worthwhile.Moody is a free download from Crayon Room (donations requested).[via Cool OSX Apps]
The Filter iTunes assistant available
We told you about a closed alpha of The Filter back in December, and now a beta is available for download. Basically, The Filter is a little program that interacts with iTunes automatically to create playlists based on your mood. The first time you run it, it analyzes your iTunes library, comparing your tracks to its online database of 4.5 million songs. Then you just select a few (it recommends 3) tracks in iTunes, and hit the 'F' in The Filter's window. It will then create a playlist drawing from your personal iTunes library based on those songs. For each song it will put up a nice translucent window with the album art and the All Music Guide entry on that artist. In addition, you can use The Filter to generate appropriate playlists for your iPod based on mood or activity (e.g. high tempo music for working out).The Filter FAQ says that "the music recommendation engine that is continually learning the listening tastes and choices of tens of thousands of music lovers. This huge collection of information is combined with your own likes and dislikes to create a personal understanding of what songs from your collection you will like to listen to and when." It sounds a lot like Pandora or last.fm but using your own music library. I haven't used it enough to decide if it's accurate, but I think this might be nice alternative to using the randomly generated Party Shuffle. One thing that is unclear to me, however, is their business model since it does not seem to be advertising supported.The Filter for Mac is in beta right now and available as a free download. [Via theappleblog]
Peter Gabriel wants to be your DJ
As if he wasn't already busy, what with being the music legend and all... Peter Gabriel's playlist construction kit The Filter, already available free for iTunes for Windows, is now entering 2.0 alpha test for Mac users. The Filter automatically loads your iPod with custom, mood-relevant playlists and explores your music collection for those gems gathering dust in the corners.Registration for the alpha test is by invitation for now, so you can either send an email from the download page or go straight to the alpha registration and wait to hear back. May I suggest queuing up Plays Live while you wait?Thanks, Shaun!
