Where do I find my music? Lots of places. New surprising sources, parts 16 and 17

I just published a vlog about surprising new sources of new music.  

In the vlog I reference this blog and the many blog posts I've published on the subject, so how many different sources of new music have I noticed up to now?

Where I find new music: Part 1 - the personal recommendation (Oct 2009)

Where I find new music: Part 2 - Blip.fm (Jan 2010)

Where I find new (old) music: Part 3 - iTunes Genius (Feb 2010)

Where I find new music: Part 4: Streaming radio (Sept 2010)

Where I find new music: Part 5 - NOW Magazine  (Sept 2010)

Where I find new music: Part 6 - concerts (Nov 2010)

Where I find new music: Part 7 - inflight entertainment (Feb 2011)

Where I find new (old) music: Part 8 - the used record store (April 2011)

Where I find new music: Part 9 - Fashion shows (Oct 2011)

Where I find new music: Part 10 - internet radio (Oct 2012)

Where I find new music: Part 11 - musicians (Oct 2012)

Where I find new music: Part 12 - MySpace (Oct 2012)

Where I find new music: Part 13 - Shazam (April 2014)

Where I find new music: Part 14 - my son (July 2020)

Where I find new music: Part 15 - festival listings (July 2020)

Part 16 Business Connections

Part 17 Airports

I admit, some are now very dated, but I'm certain there are new versions of MySpace and Blip.fm we can find.

Some music inspired by my latest adventures in Nashville.  

Why doesn’t Apple have this fundamental feature in Photos to easily help people organize their precious images?

I sell enterprise data classification software. In less buzzword terms, one of the features of our software is that it can add labels to things (including photos). This helps business people find things they need to work on.  

In my personal life, I am a photographer and spend time organizing and classifying my photos. I add keywords to photos in Lightroom and tags to videos in Finder (MacOS). These are part of my workflow.  

With the billions of photos people take every day (like the zettabytes of data in the corporate world), I feel it’s vital we use some form of organization.  This helps us find what’s most important to us while eliminating distractions, and reducing unnecessary and costly storage requirements.  

Like many of you, I have an iPhone and use Apple’s Photos app. I noticed today that there is no way to add labels (keywords, tags) in Photos on the iPhone.  You can add captions, adjust place and time, tune people identification, and use markup to add text, but you can’t classify your photos with words that suit you. I know about the game-changing features of AI assisted search but it’s not perfect, and cannot be corrected or customized. I had a quick check of Google Photos on my iPhone and it appears they have the same limitation.  

I can’t understand why Apple would not have this fundamental feature in Photos to easily help people organize their precious images. It’s tempting to think of evil corporate strategies to make us consume more iCloud storage and keep us scrolling for more minutes on our iPhones. I can’t believe they didn’t think about it. It’s possible they may not wish to add features that could be confusing or misused. I can’t think of a technical reason. I’m going to post this on Apple Communities and see what other people say. 

I’m passionate about photography as an art form and for preserving memories. I like helping others get the most from the magic of digital photography. I’ve written about this in the past - it’s a topic I spend a lot of time thinking about.  I’d love to know your thoughts.

Lots of things on my mind since 6:30am in mid-December

It’s cold outside. Christmas is creeping in to my December.  We have the smallest Christmas tree we’ve had in decades.  It’s funny, but mostly sad.  I’m hoping it does its job when it’s decorated.

I’m 40% through Harari’s latest book - Nexus, “I just started Part II and excited about the jump to the computer generation and the inevitable concerns about AI” (excerpt from my update on Goodreads).  AI is on my mind as I doomscroll through social media and simultaneously feed the social media algorithms with my own content, wondering if my more regular postings have any unseen, indirect, small impact on my friends’ feeds. In my business world, I work for a large software company that is laser-focused on AI.  I am confident we need to harness AI to increase automation, but luckily the nag of the dystopian what-could-go-wrong scenarios are more fiction than being close to reality.  On technology, I’m comfortable explaining the impacts of post-quantum computing on cryptography - I have to be, it’s important for my customers and long-term data security. The news this week that Google has made massive strides in quantum computing raises the stakes and may be a tipping poing to enhance fundamental encryption algorithms we all use every day.

I like music, I like to have background music tuned to my activities throughout the day.  In my office, I have a small radio that is tuned to CBC Radio 2 and its format aligns quite well with my weekday work patterns.  Right now, sitting in at the kitchen bar, finishing breakfast I have a long-playing YouTube video on the TV - you may have seen these types of videos - I use them a lot.  I prefer jazz tones and some bossa nova with pretty and calming visuals, but also get into dancier content with live? DJs at the mixing table.  I’m sure watching the videos is messing with my YouTube viewer algorithm, like the algorithmic impact of listening to Sleep Sounds on Apple Music.  I’m wondering if this lovely Jazz music I’m listening to right now is a recording or AI generated?  Hold on, hitting Shazam…the result “Postcards: Cozy Bedroom, Cozy Apartment, Cozy Places” - suspicious!

I’m enjoying the NFL. It helps the Detroit Lions are playing so well, but I think I’ve decided that American football is the best sport this side of the Atlantic.  The main reason - every game (and almost every play) matters.  Netflix and Amazon Prime have realized the appeal of in-depth sports documentaries and I often say to new fans of sport, if you’re interested, becoming a fan, docu-series like Drive to Survive (for F1) and Receiver (for football) are superb.

I’ve been up for a few hours now and feel I’ve let my mind flow onto this page and I can get on with the rest of my day.  It’s cold outside.  I’m going for a walk and then a good coffee when I return and get cozy.

Post-walk: a perfect example of There’s No Such Thing As Bad Weather, Just Inappropriate Attire.