

Shazam for Mac - vsakos
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/shazam/id897118787

======
cseelus
Personally I would never allow any app to use my microphone all the time,
effectively being able to monitor a certain area around the device it is
running on all the time. This is gross.

This is all the more true for an app from a company that did transfer
sensitive user data to third parties in the past.[0]

In Germany, under certain circumstances, it is also illegal to make sound
recordings of persons without their knowledge.[1] This might be the case in
other jurisdictions too.

[0]
[http://www.google.com/translate?hl=en&ie=UTF8&sl=auto&tl=en&...](http://www.google.com/translate?hl=en&ie=UTF8&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.heise.de%2Fnewsticker%2Fmeldung%2FShazam-
meldet-Standort-heimlich-an-Werbenetzwerke-2111850.html)

[1| German Civil Law Code § 201 – Breach of confidentiality of the word:
[http://www.google.com/translate?hl=en&ie=UTF8&sl=auto&tl=en&...](http://www.google.com/translate?hl=en&ie=UTF8&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fdejure.org%2Fgesetze%2FStGB%2F201.html)

~~~
simonebrunozzi
When it goes to these things, I love Germany. I wish more countries were so
respectful of human rights.

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jwallaceparker
My first job was at a record store. The owners were an old man and his wife.

The old man was essentially Shazam personified. It was amazing. He could name
any song, composer and artist after listening to a few beats. Except he would
do it with old jazz artists and big band music.

Coincidentally the old man had huge ears. Enormous.

And when you'd ask him how he could remember all those songs, the wife would
chime in, "It's cause of his ears. The songs all stay in his ears. Bouncing
around."

The record store is long gone and the space is now occupied by a Cold Stone
Creamery.

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ShinyCyril
Whelp, that pretty much obsoletes my app
[http://audentifi.com](http://audentifi.com) :(

Time to evolve!

~~~
pations9
Can you tell us how you are doing this? Do you have an own database with which
you compare the music to ?

~~~
muzakthings
I've made my own audio fingerprinting software in Python under the MIT
license, check it out!

[https://github.com/worldveil/dejavu](https://github.com/worldveil/dejavu)

~~~
ShinyCyril
Great work and a really interesting read! Really nice performance too - for
reference Echonest advises samples be 30s or longer for optimum recognition.

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scrrr
Hm, so is this app running and listening in to the mic constantly? (Also:
Extra network traffic and cpu activity.)

~~~
unfamiliar
Yes, but there is an on/off switch which presumably stops this activity. The
energy impact in mavericks while "listening" is hovering around 2 on my
machine. For comparison, Safari is at 8.

~~~
coldtea
The difference is Safari is doing something immensily useful, whereas Shazam
is a gimmick.

That and, constant audio surveillance (even with "an option to turn it off")?
No thanks...

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philmcc
I wonder what the most common use case is for this? It's rare that I'm in
front of my computer, there's music, and I have no way of determining what it
is.

The mobile version makes -more- sense to me.

~~~
DanBC
People on laptops in coffee shops?

Students?

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muzakthings
Why fingerprint audio with Shazam when you can do it yourself?

I've made my own audio fingerprinting software in Python under the MIT
license, check it out!

[https://github.com/worldveil/dejavu](https://github.com/worldveil/dejavu)

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coob
Works well. Minor nitpick: needs a dark icon option. It's the only colour menu
bar extra I have.

~~~
k-mcgrady
With dark mode in Yosemite I've got a feeling devs will need to either do a
dark and light version of menu bar icons or go all color. Currently my menu
bar is useless in dark mode as I can't see any icons.

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Hates_
Wish it could pick up music from internal audio. Plenty of times I've wanted
to try detecting music in YouTube videos.

~~~
Udo
SoundFlower does this, it's open source. It contains a decent chunk of audio
routing features that are inexplicably missing from the core OS X.

For instance, you can route application audio out to a Soundflower channel and
use that as input for another app.

Edit: just checked, Soundflower rerouting works perfectly with the Shazam Mac
app, tried it out on a couple of YouTube songs, and it got it right on 47 out
of the current top 50. It's a shame that Shazam is still only useful for
mainstream stuff, when I tried it on some random metal, Goa, soundtracks, and
industrial... 0 out of 15.

~~~
dserodio
It's recently become really good at electronic music since they signed a deal
with Beatport: [http://news.beatport.com/blog/2013/02/06/beatport-x-
shazam-a...](http://news.beatport.com/blog/2013/02/06/beatport-x-shazam-
awesome/)

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circa
I've always liked Shazam but I like what
[http://www.soundhound.com/](http://www.soundhound.com/) did with their app
better.

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wingerlang
Anyone know what the timer is? Could it be a timer for usage per day? I can't
seem to find anything about paying them for it.

~~~
Udo
It's the countdown until the mic switches off again. You may not want to keep
the line open all the time, it may prevent your computer from going into power
saving mode (not sure), and Shazam probably doesn't want everyone to hit their
servers constantly either.

But if you switch it off and on again the timer starts anew, so it's not a
per-user limit.

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baby
Is there the equivalent for Windows?

~~~
boristhespider
Perhaps not quite the equivalent, but there is a "Modern UI Style" app:
[http://apps.microsoft.com/windows/en-
gb/app/shazam/5593d150-...](http://apps.microsoft.com/windows/en-
gb/app/shazam/5593d150-02c7-4714-ab8f-007d5d251688)

