A Tokyo-based robot manufacturing venture ZMP [J] (pronounced as Zett-Em-Pee) developed a new tune recommendation service jointly with Dr. Yasufumi Takama, associate professor at Faculty of System Design, Tokyo Metropolitan University.
ZMP is well-known as manufacter of “Miuro” or a small robot on two wheels that can play tunes and follow you around the house. Refer to Tech Planet’s report for more details about Miuro. Dr. Takama is the lead of studying recommendation engine technology in Japan.
ZMP’s recommendation service distributes to every Miuro user the tune list that he or she prefers, which is generated based on the history of tunes he or she played ever.
ZMP’s president Hisashi Taniguchi says, he would like the company to be the music concierge by improving the service usability much more. (quoted from Sankei Shimbun)
Tune recommendation service is not a new idea, one of the famous examples is Genius introduced on Apple’s iTunes. In order to use the Genius feature, we are forced to turn on our Mac and launch the application, which may cause the users to feel tiresome for standing by. ZMP’s brandnew service takes similar technology approach to that of Genius, but the point is we need no longer have any PC or Mac to listen in favourite tunes.
ZMP plans to sell its SDK to cellphone carriers and content providers, and it will cost around USD 25,000 to 50,000.
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ZMP’s Press Release:
Tokyo Metropolitan University and ZMP jointly studied the new-generation tune-list distibution service based on Robotics and Web Intelligence technologies [J]
Masaru IKEDA