Aug 01
Shazam vs. Midomi
Posted by LL Cool C | Posted in apple, music, Technology | Posted on 01-08-2008
Many of you have heard of Shazam, the little iPhone app that will tell you the song that is playing on the radio after listening to it for ten to fifteen seconds, but little has been said about Midomi. It offers more features the Shazam, but is it really the choice for you when you need a song guessed?
Midomi has added features such as saying an artist’s name or saying the name of a song, but the feature they really want to set it apart is the ability to sing or hum a song and let it find it for you. They suggest singing or humming ten seconds or more for the best results. I decided to do a little testing of this. I sang Lodi Dodi by Slick Rick, and later covered by Snoop Dogg, for a good 24 seconds . As you can see in the image below not one of my results have anything to do with Lodi Dodi.
The next feature I tested was Midomi’s search based on a saying a song title. I had a little more success with this. I simply said Lodi Dodi and it searched around for it. You can see it found a live version of Lodi Dodi by Slick Rick, but it is misspelled, the second and third results are not correct, and there is no Snoop Dogg version in sight. I could however listen to the song right here from the results. I am impressed by that feature.
I decided to give Midomi a shot to go directly head to head with Shazam when listening to music playing from iTunes. I played the first 20 seconds of the Lodi Dodi by Snoop Dogg. I was surprised that it brought back no results.
I decided to test this same clip of the song using Shazam. It has one simple feature and it does it well. It listens to the music and then tells you what it is, simple as that. I played the first 10 seconds of Lodi Dodi and Shazam, pun intended, it found it.
Midomi has a future, possibly a very bright future. The best part about it is that if it does find the song you are looking for you can play it right there from the application. With a little more time and updates I think Midomi will become a better app and could surpass Shazam in popularity simply because it offers more. For now Shazam is still the program to get to guess your music from the radio or TV.
[...] well for most pop music (but not at all for classical). It’s an awesome party trick. However, some reviewers have found Shazam to be more [...]
DId you ever think that running a test using one single lame song as your “decide all” test for which program to use might be a little short sighted?
Tyler,
Thank you for the feedback. I am troubled because you call Lodi Dodi a lame song. It was a classic back in the days when I was cooler. I think it might be time for a round two with some emo songs that you would not consider lame. Thanks for the reminder!
Way to be open minded and say that your one song is superior regardless of what people listen to NOW. In a few minutes I’m sure I could find one song that would support my blind claims regarding application preference. If you’re going to test them, do so…don’t just state one case and attack everyone who says this approach is not effective. Feel free to flame me now, as I am sure you will take great pride in doing so.
Just FYI: The original Slick Rick song was called La Di Da Di, that wasn’t a mispelling. When Snoop covered the song they changed the title to Lodi Dodi.
no way dude. your a quack! first what ever song you are trying to say was a hit isn’t even correct. second how far back buddy? never heard of that song, but I’m not surprised. These two programs were tested and when using songs that ARE known they both got the song, Midomi was faster all around. Now that shazam is = in pricing Midomi is the clear leader.
If you want to try a song at least pick a good one like Giant Steps by John Coltrane, hah now there is a good old song!
Anybody saying La-Di-Da-Di isn’t a classic should just blast himself for that stupid comment.
back to midomi vs shazam…. i have had moderate success using shazam in the few weeks that ive had both programs. maybe identified 5/8 songs ive tested. midomi has identified none of the same songs.
im in the process of testing both apps, so every song i try to indentify… i do with both apps.