Will Sing For Search! Try this Web 2.0 voice-based search app
Ok, I know this isn't exactly journalism. I recently found Midomi, a very Web 2.0 audio search engine.
And by audio, I mean you can literally hum a few bars of a song into it and it'll return likely results.
Why is this important? In another life I was a musician, classically trained in piano. I don't play anymore. I do have a great appreciation for music, but I have a horrible time remembering the names of songs. I used to hear something playing in the background or at a party and then would have to call my sister, a professional opera singer, hum a few bars and then beg for info as she berated me, American Idol-style.
So far, Midomi has found Alcohol (Barenaked Ladies) and Let Go (Frou Frou). I tried singing in some Japanese songs I know well but they didn't pop up.
Anyhow, as amused as I am by this gem I'm more excited about all of the voice-based search possibilities this implies:
Reporters might play back part of a press conference tape to get the material they missed...
Copy editors could use voice-based search as a means to check stories before they're published...
Imagine this:
A reporter could be doing a phoner interview with a source about a very complicated medical subject. While she's sitting at her desk, she's running a voice-based search app in the background on her desktop. As she mentions breast cancer, the voice-based search engine pulls up a picture of cancer cell mitosis from the National Institutes of Health as well as some recent data on the cancer rates in America... all without her having to type a thing.
So very, very exciting! Even if it only means in the interim that my sister won't make fun of me anymore...