Ask YC: feedback on my music recommendation app (round 2)

The Postal Service:<p><pre><code> Amazon: Death Cab, The Shins iTunes: Imogen Heap, Feist, M.I.A. Perceptron: The Knife, Dntel, Bright Eyes </code></pre> Eric B and Rakim:<p><pre><code> Amazon: EPMD, Big Daddy Kane, Public Enemy iTunes: EPMD, Boogie Down Productions, KRS-One Perceptron: No recommendations </code></pre> Fleetwood Mac:<p><pre><code> Amazon: Journey, Bob Seger, Steve Miller iTunes: Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton, The Doobie Brothers Perceptron: Vetiver, The Beach Boys, The Everly Brothers </code></pre> Sepultura:<p><pre><code> Amazon: Pantera, Slayer, Metallica iTunes: Soulfly, Machine Head, Fear Factory Perceptron: Moonspell, Soulfly (x3), Fear Factory </code></pre> In none of these head-to-heads does Perceptron do the best job (the Dntel pick ties it with Amazon's Death Cab pick). I can intuitively guess that iTunes will do a better job of recommending for me than your website, because millions of people's buying habits make iTunes smarter every day.<p>It's not just that this space is crowded; it's that it structurally resists your entrance. You need features, lots of them, compelling features, or this isn't going anywhere.<p>Also, you're trivially XSS-able:<p><a href="http://theperceptron.com/recommendation/artist/h%3Cscript%3Ealert" rel="nofollow">http://theperceptron.com/recommendation/artist/h%3Cscript%3E...</a>('hi');%3C%2fscript%3E?h=true<p>Finally: "astute music recommendations" is a terrible tagline. It doesn't convey value. It tells me why <i>you</i> like your code, but not why your code matters to me.

I don't like the simple, all text interface. I think an app like this needs a clean but graphical interface. Take a look at this screenshot: <a href="http://skitch.com/rksprst/3t9q/the-perceptron-astute-music-recommendations" rel="nofollow">http://skitch.com/rksprst/3t9q/the-perceptron-astute-music-r...</a><p>Am I supposed to understand any of the text there? It looks like a bunch of random works thrown together. No human will ever read that. No offense but this display reminds me of those "crack/serial" search engines that just list a bunch of random programs in alphabetical order just for seo.<p>I think you have a neat idea. But please get a designer.

well, as somebody who has been in this space before and left it to pursue other music opportunities, I think you're off to a great start mary.<p>I wasn't able to get music to play on quite a few tracks (the majority actually), but without any sort of progress bar on the download, it wouldn't be apparent to most people what is happening, so I think that would be one of the first things to do.<p>I didn't go through your code, but have you hidden the flash player somewhere? or are you using a javascript player?<p>Whatever, I think showing a player inline (kinda like you are now, but with more controls) would benefit you. At the least, you need a 'progress bar', and the 'hear' should be linked to start the track too, as that is what I tried clicking on, not the play button.<p>I'll be keeping an eye on your progress mary. Best of luck to you.

I like your site. It has potential. How bout include some album art next to the artist descriptions?<p>I think you can also UI redesign. Starting having some buttons and graphics.<p>good luck!

What it really needs is more data, anything obscure and you get no recommendations.

There ought to be a way to just upload a list of the music on your computer.

It's really cool. I don't love the colors though, I'm not a big red fan (while I wear a Man U jersey...oh well:))

got 2 (way off) recommendations for my favorite band.<p>my opinion is that this space is wayyyy too crowded (huge players involved) and to take any market share seems impossible.