The Echo Nest has issued a challenge to music identification services like Shazam and Soundhound with the launch of Echoprint, an open-source music fingerprint service that will let any developer create comparable apps.
To create this free music ID technology, music intelligence company the Echo Nest partnered with 7digital, giving developers access to 13 million songs. That catalog is expected to grow as more partners are added.
According to the Echo Nest, EchoPrint, as an open-source offering, will improve in functionality the more developers and app users play with it. The Echo Nest’s partners have already been using EchoPrint for 18 months, so it’s not coming out of the gate untested.
The Echo Nest also partnered with the open music encyclopedia MusicBrainz, to make more music-resolving apps Echoprint-aware in the near future.
EchoPrint could be a big game-changer in the music ID sphere. Shazam and Soundhound are constantly innovating — Shazam just scored $32 million in funding and is now investing in “Shazamable” television shows and ads, and Soundhound just released another voice-activated app called Hound — but now more players will be entering the ring.
How do you think this tech will affect the music ID realm?
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Bliz
More About: 7digital, Echo Nest, echoprint, mobile apps, music, MusicBrainz, shazam
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