Brian Whitman (@bwhitman) is the co-founder of The Echo Nest. As he’ll be sharing his ideas on the future of music at our upcoming event we asked Brian some questions…
1) What field do you think is the most inspiring with regard to the field you’re in?
I am very cautiously watching computer vision for cues on how it will affect music analysis and synthesis in the near future.
2) When was fortune on your hand?
Time has been kind to us; we’ve come of age during the “cloud computing” revolution– very little of what we do could have been possible without the Amazon EC2 service, where we remain one of their oldest and likely most annoying customers. The vagaries of the music industry also has worked in our favor; dozens of music technology companies have come and gone since we’ve started and we’ve been resilient and forward thinking throughout.
3) How did you end up as the co-founder of The Echo Nest? What were the critical / turning points in this path?
I was a grad student at MIT and facing job prospects (professor, research scientist, etc) that would not have let me have the potential to change things in the world. The second I knew starting a company was even remotely possible I was certain that’s what I would do.
4) How will mobile music develop over the next 3-5 years?
We will see hundreds if not thousands of ways to listen to music. Just as some people only listen to a fringe style, some people will use a fringe player or experience on their device.
5) What question would you like to ask our audience after your talk?
“Why have the technical barriers to music experiences come down so long before the legal and business barriers?”
posted by Marc Fonteijn |
tweet this
