Curation: The programming buzzword for 2014 which drives acquisitions

by Brad Hill

Google’s acquisition of Songza is widely regarded as a buy-in of Songza’s unique “Concierge” delivery of personalized music, based on each user’s activity and mood combined with other data signals. The backbone of Songza programming is assembled by a team of 60 music specialists, and their work is supplemented by a Big Data-fed algorithm which refines the output based on the listener’s history of song votes and song skips.

Songza’s formula, and those of other music services, which determine what a listener hears, all fall under the broad term “curation.” All music services that provide some degree of interactivity deploy a curation strategy. The underpinning of that strategy is subject to trend and vogue. How has music curation evolved, and what is the trend this year which is driving acquisitions?
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Google acquires Songza

After a few weeks of speculation, Google has acquired Internet radio platform Songza. Financial details have not been disclosed.
Google’s announcement says that no immediate changes will happen to Songza, but “Over the coming months, we’ll explore ways to bring what you love about Songza to Google Play Music. We’ll also look for opportunities to bring their great work to the music experience on YouTube and other Google products.” Continue Reading