
Ask HN: Review my startup, HipHopGoblin.com (Pandora + HypeM + Hip Hop) - zackattack
It's been impossible for me to find a job, as per this thread: [http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=754426]. ctb9 and I started emailing, and he encouraged me to work on a project, so I pursued one of my ideas and made a Hype Machine/Pandora tool for the newest songs in Hip Hop. It took me a week to build this prototype.<p>It is built in Flash/ActionScript, PHP, and MySQL. I use PHP to parse blogs and then download files, which took some engineering. It uses item-based collaborative-filtering techniques for music recommendation. Music storage is on Amazon S3.<p>I hope you like it.
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aditya
This is awesome. Currently background for a (hopefully regular) cooking
session.

1) Don't make it autoplay - "Press play to get started" is much, much, much
better

2) Ask me for artists I like and make recommendations

3) Ask me for friends that are also on hiphopgoblin and let me see (and play!)
their likes/dislikes

4) Make the player pop out and keep the music playing when I open top 50
somehow (new window?)

5) Can I get some visual feedback when I thumbs up something?

Absolutely love the low barrier to entry!

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ujjwalg
Seriously, this is awesome. I love it.

1) Autoplay in my dictionary is fine, it saves me time to figure out what to
do next. 2) and 3) +1 4) -1

Question: are you planning to monetize it? if so, how? what about copyright?

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ujjwalg
Another thing I really liked is I dont need to register and it will remember
my preferences, I am not sure how, though.

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sid
im sure if you clear out your cookies you will loose your preferences. If you
dont loose them then yes id be curious as to .. "how !"

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qeorge
I'll be that guy: this seems illegal. What's the plan there?

(I like the site a lot, and hope it lasts.)

~~~
ctb9
Most the songs featured are from mixtapes, implying they have been released
for free and the artists are encouraging fans to distribute and remix as they
please. Unfortunately, this also limits the 'obvious' monetization strategy of
affiliate linking to amazon.

EDIT: Long-term though, it will be tough to avoid scrutiny/prosecution while
building a profitable business. Follow the grooveshark model and pass the
liability onto the users?

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fatdog789
It's not enough that the mixtapes "imply" free release. You actually have to
get permission from the artists (and songwriter), or you're fucked. Statutory
damages are in the hundreds -- per song.

BTW, grooveshark's model was not to pass liability onto the users. It charges
premium subscriptions, and sells ads, and uses that money to pay the web-music
license to the music licensing corporation.

Monetization is possible, using Amazon affiliate links. Just be aware that if
you don't seek permission, you're liable for every penny you earn (regardless
of costs), plus the above mentioned statutory damages.

EDIT: note that for songs distributed by a major label, the artist may not own
the copyright, so you may have your work cut out for you. The easiest way to
avoid the hassle of getting individual permission for each song is to sign a
licensing agreement with the music licensing corporation. The most expensive
way to go would be to do nothing at all, since the record labels will go after
you if they think there's any money to be got.

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brk
This is awesome. Love it. Added a link to my precious bookmarks toolbar space.

Is it best voted of all listeners, or does it remember _my_ preferences? It
implies the latter, but wasn't sure.

Suggestion: find a way to detect excessive auto-tune use and auto downvote
those songs :)

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zackattack
I am honored that HHG found its way into your precious bookmarks toolbar space
:)

Right now it works with _your_ preferences, and tries to match you with songs
voted up by people with similar preferences.

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krisneuharth
This is great. A couple of things that come to mind. 1) It would be nice to
maybe have a replay option in case I really like the song. 2) It would be nice
to be able to go back also in case I accidentally hit next. 3) It would also
be cool to see where your crawler found the song, credit in the right places
never hurts.

~~~
zackattack
Sure, I can add in a replay feature. The thing is, I don't add in history for
songs that you skip. So if you skip a song, and then you hit "replay", it
won't be able to find that song. Is that okay? If it's not, I could always
adjust the architecture. But let me know.

As for credit, yep, I keep track of everything and want to make sure the UI
shines. But I'm working on an "advanced" version of the site, with more info.

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alaskamiller
Took me a bit of time to realize it's just one gigantic Flash app, I kept
trying to highlight the song name but couldn't. But I love love that I can
squeeze the Safari browser window to just 377 pixels wide and have everything
scale and still usable. Love it.

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zackattack
Thanks for the love, and I'm sending some back right your way.

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ljharb
I like it - but ABSOLUTELY turn off autoplay. Autoplay is the devil.

Don't force choices on users by playing audio for them - and if someone
doesn't know how to push "play" then they don't deserve to hear music.

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mahmud
Unreal! bookmarked, and sent it off in a blast to my old crew. Can you make it
so that I can share playlists with people? I wanna play the same song to
multiple people at the same time.

~~~
zackattack
Awesome. That feature will be in the works, along with top 50 and such. Be
sure to follow @hiphopgoblin on twitter for updates.

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dpcan
What if the hottest songs linked to Google searches so I can hit the artists'
sites and listen there or buy? Not sure if this is OK to do or not though.

~~~
zackattack
That's an excellent monetization idea. I'll try to keep a list of artists'
websites in the database. Ahh... lots to do.

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movix
It's great - how are you going to protect it? Any IP in there anywhere? I can
sense someone building www.classicrockgoblin.com as I type.

Nice work.

~~~
zackattack
Thank you very much. I'm not sure if there's any IP really; and while I would
love to build CRG.com, it's so much energy to just work on HHG. . . though
potential partners should surely contact me!

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movix
I'm really curious as to how you deal with licencing, PRS etc. I like your app
though, as a big Spotify user myself, I think you have a little niche going.

Big question for you - how you gonna monetise this? Not digging for trade
secrets of course :)

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jrnkntl
Great! Works like a charm.

Obvious way to monetize; link to Amazon or any other affiliate music store for
every track (and show a cover ;))

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zackattack
I'm glad it's workin' for ya.

Do you know which affiliate programs offer the best conversion rates, and
which make it easiest to sign up?

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physcab
Are you using Pandora to grab music recs? The recs are surprisingly good!

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zackattack
Thank you! I'm actually using item-based collaborative-filtering:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slope_One>

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p01nd3xt3r
This is dope dude... good work.

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zackattack
Thank you sir, thank you

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pj
very nice. volume selector would be nice.

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zackattack
In the works, I'll shoot off a tweet on @hiphopgoblin when it's ready.

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zackattack
Click Me <http://www.hiphopgoblin.com>

