Flagg the Wanderer
Mourning Algernon
So I reconnected with an old friend of mine from college recently, and yesterday he introduced me to a guy who had a pretty neat trick. This guy would take a random sampling from your playlist, and a request for a smaller sample from a subset. From that he would tell you within a Five-year window when you were born, and at least one or two other categories that you might fit into.
Conceptually, at its simplest level, it seems pretty straightforward. Songs come out in certain years, at different points in your life you'll appreciate the songs more or less. My tastes are pretty eclectic, so I thought I could trip him up a bit. I did muddy the waters some but I was still pretty impressed at what I got back.
I put my playlist on shuffle and gave him the first 25 songs that popped up. I'm dictating this from the road, so I don't have the list accessible, but I can give you some details here and there further down. After he looked this over, he requested a random sampling of 15 songs where the band started with G.
This is what I got back:
Born: 1974 to 1978 - I was born in 77.
Gender: male – moderately confident.
Geography: From (or identifies with) Boston area/New England – educated guess.
Education: college or better - Moderately confident.
Family: has at least one older sibling, likely significantly older - Confident guess.
Activities and personality: likely in a band and/or drama - very passionate, particularly as a teenager. Idealistic, but with a very aggressive streak.
Pretty cool stuff, mostly on target.
Conceptually, at its simplest level, it seems pretty straightforward. Songs come out in certain years, at different points in your life you'll appreciate the songs more or less. My tastes are pretty eclectic, so I thought I could trip him up a bit. I did muddy the waters some but I was still pretty impressed at what I got back.
I put my playlist on shuffle and gave him the first 25 songs that popped up. I'm dictating this from the road, so I don't have the list accessible, but I can give you some details here and there further down. After he looked this over, he requested a random sampling of 15 songs where the band started with G.
This is what I got back:
Born: 1974 to 1978 - I was born in 77.
Gender: male – moderately confident.
Geography: From (or identifies with) Boston area/New England – educated guess.
Education: college or better - Moderately confident.
Family: has at least one older sibling, likely significantly older - Confident guess.
Activities and personality: likely in a band and/or drama - very passionate, particularly as a teenager. Idealistic, but with a very aggressive streak.
Pretty cool stuff, mostly on target.