In the course of a conversation with Tim Westergren, founder of Pandora, for an article to be published elsewhere, we began discussing this fact that should be of some interest: Pandora -- an incredibly fast-growing service providing "personalized online radio stations" is a human-powered endeavor. Its musical selections are picked by humans who are presumed to be expert, and trained, in their field.
The quick takeoff of Pandora, and its experts in the company's Music Genome Project who identify and map popular music by 400 musical qualities, should give human editors solace. The growing community of Pandora users seems satisfied with letting the experts pick their selections (albeit with some guidance).
Pandora stands in contrast to social networking sites, where links, tastes and features are offered because a lot of other people like them, as well. There is room for experts (journos, read: editors who actually have given some thought to what is important and interesting).
CORRECTION: The original version of this article reported an incorrect first name for Tim Westergren.
