Spotify is one of the most popular audio streaming apps in the world. It is currently one of the most complete as well in terms of listening options. You do not only have music; you also get the largest collection of podcasts the world has seen so far. On top of that, it might be the cleverest audio streaming app you can find today.
Spotify features nifty ways for you to discover new music. The app understands the sorts of music you listen to daily and gives you suggestions to music that might match your music tastes, your playlists’ moods, or themes. You can even discover music with your friends now with the Spotify Blend feature.
Soon though, you might be able to discover music on Spotify in a brand-new way. You want to keep in mind that this is a feature not fully released to the final app, so you might want to take it with a pinch of salt. The feature was first spotted by a certain Chris Messina on Spotify’s TestFlight build, a beta Spotify app for the iOS. There are no mentions on whether you can find the feature on Android’s version of Spotify Beta apps.
Not only that, @Spotify Discover is basically a pared down version of a TikTok-style feed of vertical music videos (likely using their canvas format) that you can like or skip.#NewSpotifypic.twitter.com/hpOEZ8v9bl
As reported by TechCrunch, the new Discover feature is a button or tab of its own that takes up the fourth spot on Spotify’s navigation bar. Spotify has confirmed that they are in the midst of testing this new ‘Discover’ function. While it does sound like Spotify is simply adding a simple random music search feature to the app, you might want to take a closer look at it.
Discover is a sort of short-form video content that sits on Spotify. It can be likened to TikTok, yes. But the sole purposed of it is for users to discover new music. You cannot be freely posting contents into the platform like TikTok. Instead, the feature now allows users to scroll through short video clips accompanied with curated music paired to the video feed. This does sound a lot like Spotify’s Canvas feature which played short video clips for certain songs.
Again, this feature is only available on iOS devices. It is also not a fully released feature, which also means you must source for Beta versions of the Spotify app. Sadly if you are on Android, you might be out of luck.
In a world where experts thought, just a few years ago, that TV would be dead and short form content platforms like YouTube will takeover, TV and films are doing better than ever. You cannot credit their strength to manufacturers though. Rather, these things come because of technologies that exists and allows the existence of Netflix.
Netflix is now bigger than life though. While there are other platforms like Disney+, or Amazon Prime Videos, Netflix is still king. It is the one platform that you go to time and time again to find contents to watch. It is, at least personally, the first platform that we switch on to find entertainment before even YouTube.
You can never get enough of Netflix though. After every show, you might discover something about the show that you liked. The most common of that is the soundtracks used in the show or movie. Within two weeks of Squid Game’s debut on Netflix, 22,500 unique Squid Game themed playlists were created by Spotify users to keep the show alive.
Netflix very much understands that their users are looking for entertainment far beyond their own scope. Spotify sees this too, obviously, being the largest audio streaming platform known to man. A collaboration was imminent.
Source: Spotify
They call it the Netflix Hub on Spotify and it is the best way for you to experience your Netflix shows beyond the streaming platform, at least according to Spotify and Netflix. In the hub premium users can find all official soundtracks, playlists, and even podcasts from Netflix’s shows. You can easily access soundtracks from shows like Squid Game, Bruised, and even Cowboy Bebop.
The collaboration is more than just compiling soundtracks, playlists, and podcasts though. In honor of the final season of Money Heist, Spotify has included new videos from the cast of the show (not available in Malaysia yet, as far as we can tell). They have also updated the soundtrack playlist with songs used the latest episodes of the show. There are also new features like Character Match Playlist quiz that matches you to your favourite characters from the Spanish show.
Of course, the collaboration will not just end at Money Heist. As Netflix populates its library with new contents, so will Spotify with dedicated Netflix contents. You might see a Squid Game related video content and quiz in the future, you will never know.
Today’s generation is the most connected one so far. But it is a generation also where cutting off someone is as easy as a click of a button. There is something called ‘cancel culture’ in the world of social media today.
While there are plenty of reasons why you would want to cut a person off, for whatever reasons, on social media, wanting to block a person on streaming platform like Spotify is a little odd. There is a way to block certain artists from ever appearing on your Spotify home feed. That feature was introduced back in 2019. For whatever reason as well, users have been wanting to block other users instead on the platform.
To be fair, Spotify is more than just a music streaming app today. It is also a social platform where you can add friends, follow their playlists and even see what they are playing in real time. In a sense, if someone is in your friends list, their listening privacy is gone. You can ensure that your listening session does not appear on any of your friends feed by turning on ‘Private Session’, but that only lasts for a limited time before Spotify kicks you back into online mode to update your songs and your recommendations.
You now can decide to block other users from accessing your activities now though. It is as simple as clicking the person’s profile and tap the “Block User” option. Once you have done that, the person will not be able to see you appearing on their ‘friend’s activity’ list on the right side of the app anymore, at least on the desktop interface. That way, you also limit what you show the person you blocked.
While showing your Spotify activity may not seem all that harmful, it could lead to a bigger impact. Some might think that just showing the ‘Now Listening to’ information as an empty information your friends cannot use. For example, other users can use the activity information from Spotify to harass you on other platforms like Facebook or Instagram, for example. They could also use whatever information they can gather against you as well for that matter. Remember, information in the wrong hands can be dangerous.
The function should be available to users very soon, at least according to Spotify as per Engadget.
Sharing your playlist with your friends in the old days means that you have to copy a whole music library you have created over a USB drive, or a CD. That was the days before content streaming services like Spotify came to be. Even when Apple’s iTunes was a thing, it served more like a digital music library that requires you to have the music files stored in your device.
Before the days of Spotify too, you still had to pay money for individual songs and albums if you want to legally listen to them and own them for your own personal consumption or even share it with your friends. Obviously, sharing your music library before then is still a grey area in terms of copyright.
Spotify may not be the first music streaming service and cloud-based music library to exist. It is, in 2021 at least, the most successful thus far. This is amidst the rise in other services like Deezer, Tidal, YouTube Music, and more. If you think about it, Spotify has a tough competition to work with especially in Tidal and YouTube Music at this point. Tidal features a higher quality music streaming that allows music to play at near lossless quality while YouTube Music offers a more robust and complete music library compared to Spotify. At some point Taylor Swift criticised Spotify’s royalty structure and pulled all her assets away from Spotify.
Source: Spotify
When spotify launched, sharing your favourite songs and curated playlists is made super easy. You only need to share a URL with your friends now and you can listen to it at anytime where you have internet or data. Of course, your friends can still comment on your music selection and judge your music taste according to what you have just shared. You could also say sometimes that you share the same music taste with your best friends, but you would not really know how similar sometimes.
Spotify introduced Blend Playlists in June 2021 as a Beta feature. It was introduced as a way for two users to create a shared playlist that is dedicated to their shared musical tastes. It is also created as a new way for friends to interact and bond over their love of music.
The feature is now out in full force on your Spotify. Blend Playlists also now allows you to customise the playlist with unique cover arts for easy identification. The Blend feature also scores your music taste compatibility with your friends. Of course, you can share those on social media to brag that you and your besties are very similar to one another.
Source: Spotify
Blend is not a personally curated list though. It is still a curated list, but it is curated via Spotify’s clever mechanism that adds and changes the playlist to adapt to your listening behaviour combined with your friend’s listening behaviour that you share the list with. The best part is that both you and your friend can have a similar playlist experience but in completely different situations and locations at the same time.
Of course, this experience is not just limited to you and your best friends. It is a good way to start sharing a curated playlist with your family members, or a loved one. This is a way to keep your bonds as strong as they are in these trying times where face time and physical interaction has to be limited.
The feature should now be available on the Spotify app. You can supposedly access the feature from the “Made for you” hub on mobile devices. You simply hit “create blend” and invite your friends to create a Blend Playlist with whichever friends you choose to have a blend with (if the person accepts) and let Spotify do everything for you there. To our knowledge, we have found that the feature has not been made available to us (could just be us). The Spotify app is available for free on both Android and iOS via Google Play Store and Apple Play Store respectively.
Spotify is giving its users more flexibility with the introduction of new Premium Mini subscription plans. The new plans will allow users to subscribe to Spotify Premium in bite sized pieces ranging from daily to weekly. Users will now be able to subscribe from MYR1 a day to gain access to ad-free streaming on the platform.
In addition to being ad-free, users on these Mini plans will also be able to access Spotify’s many other features. These will, however, be in a more limited manner. Users on the Premium Mini plans will be able to use Spotify to access the full library of songs and podcasts available on the platform and will be able to skip tracks freely. You will also be able able to share playlists and tune in to the same podcast with up to five friends using the Group Sessions feature. However, when it comes to downloading songs for offline playback, users on the Spotify Premium Mini plans will be limited to 30 tracks.
Source: Spotify
Subscribing to the new Spotify Premium Mini plans is pretty simple. All you have to do is click the “Get Mini” option in the subscriptions option. Spotify is also introducing more payment options for Malaysians. Users in Malaysia can now pay using multiple methods including through their mobile bill or even using one of the many eWallets available; absolutely no credit card is needed. Keep in mind that the Premium Mini plans are prepaid plans. This means that you will need to pay upfront for your daily and weekly subscriptions.
Spotify Premium Mini will be available in two options – daily and weekly. You will be able to subscribe to the Premium Mini Daily for MYR1 a day while the weekly option is priced at MYR3.90 a week. The same subscription plans are also available in Thailand, India and Indonesia. Prices start at THB7, INR7 and INR2,500 respectively.
Spotify is already the world’s most popular music streaming app. The platform probably also houses the largest collection of podcasts known in the modern world. In some sense, in the world of audio streaming at least, Spotify arguably has the best interface and discovery Artificial Intelligence (AI).
Looking for music and discovering music that would suit your preferences is a breeze on Spotify. Spotify itself will surface music that suits your tastes based on your playlists, and even based on songs that you frequently listen to. Podcasts is a different story though.
It is not exactly difficult to find podcasts in Spotify. We would not call the podcast discovery function excellent either. We think that they might as well be non-existent sometimes. That is about to change though.
Spotify is acquiring Podz, a podcast discovery service. It uses AI to generate highlights for a particular podcast and let users listen to 60-second samples of a chow or podcast before listening to the full show or subscribing to a channel or show. In some ways, it allows you to evaluate the podcast even before you spend your precious time on it.
With the acquisition, Spotify will be looking to integrate Podz’s clever AI algorithm and working into Spotify itself. The integration will make it not just easier and less time consuming for users to evaluate shows before committing to the show. It will also allow Spotify to improve the discovery algorithm of their podcast platform with the highlights.
At the same time, as a user, it will really make Spotify’s library of 2.6 million podcasts much easier to navigate and a lot more interesting. Spotify has been continuously building their podcast platform over the years, even getting some podcast exclusives up and running in the past two years. With Podz integrated, they could surface and push their own exclusive podcasts on users’ landing page in their app or web player. If the service is successful also, it could attract more creators into the platform just because their contents will be a lot more visible than before.
Spotify is planning to integrate Podz into Spotify before the end of 2021. Of course, that also includes the roll out to users all around the world. Last week, Spotify has also launched their Clubhouse competitor, Greenroom. Greenroom is now available for free on both iOS and Android. With the integration of Podz and Greenroom, Spotify looks to be the world’s largest audio streaming solution.
HUAWEI is now more than just smartphones. They are an ecosystem of products that forms a bigger picture of Internet of Things (IoT). HUAWEI has been making products other than smartphones for a while now though. The only issue is that you do not know about it because they do not make those things available in Malaysia.
One of their most successful products from China is their televisions. Yes, you read that right, televisions. Now, you can experience that too, in the HUAWEI Vision S, touted to be available in Malaysia now.
Here is the thing though; why should you buy a television from HUAWEI? There are other smart TVs around that you probably have been eyeing for a while now. You get really good options from the likes of Sony, LG, and Samsung. If you need something that fits a smaller budget, and still want 4K with smart TV functions, there are manufacturers like HAIER, TLC, and even HiSense.
The HUAWEI Vision S 65 is and interesting and compelling product on its own though. It has its own smart TV functions, and its packs quite powerful speakers. All of that costs less than MYR 5,000 too. That said, should you actually consider buying this hardware? We find out.
Design
Right out of the bat though, we have a problem with the 65-incher HUAWEI Vision S. It barely fits our TV surface. Then again, our TV surface is made for TVs at up to 55-inch. The good news is that its legs still fit on the surface and we can work with the TV at a comfortable angle. That is more of an us problem than HUAWEI problem though.
They say that the simply straight and somewhat plain legs that comes with the TV is inspired by ice skates. But its design and angle help make the TV look like it is somewhat floating when you place it on any surface. It hides itself well is what we are saying. Its minimalist design cues help the projecting surface stand out a little bit more and does not leave too much dead space below the TV. In that sense, we like that very much.
The rest of the front silhouette of the TV is pretty much an expected thing. It has thin bezels, like any modern smart TV you can buy today, even the super cheap ones. Really, the thing that should stand out on a modern TV should be its projecting panel, in this case the LCD panel on this large glass thing in front of you.
Once you move to the side of the TV though, there is a small difference between this HUAWEI Vision S and a lot of the modern Smart TVs. The I/O panel is on the right side of the TV instead of the left. While it is not that big of an issue in most cases, if you are used to something that came out of Sony, or LG, or even Samsung, you might want to reconsider rearranging some of your things to fit that layout. Either that, or make sure that you extend your HDMI or AUX cables a little bit.
Other than those though, nothing really makes the HUAWEI Vision S stands out compared to other TVs with its projection panel turned off. Just like any other modern Smart TV, it is just a slab of glass you can either rest on a shelf or hang on the wall. You can turn it into a digital photo frame if you really want too.
Features
What differentiates a TV from one another is usually their features. What separates this HUAWEI Smart TV and other Smart TVs in the market is the Operating System (OS) on it. That OS is also unique to this TV only and will come in the other HUAWEI TV that will come later. They call it HarmonyOS, and it is unlike any other TV OS we have come across, which may not be entirely a good thing.
Keep in mind that the unit we are reviewing is a China unit and there may be some differences between it and the official Malaysian unit. For one, the Malaysian unit will not have VMall pre-installed, and there will not be any exercise guide app. The Malaysian unit also will not have as much content within the App Gallery.
Webcam – MeeTime and Family Photo Time
While we are going to go into HarmonyOS, we first have to talk about the thing that is sticking out of the TV, or the optional item that could stick out of the top of the TV, its camera. When we say optional, it comes with the TV when you buy it. You can choose to keep it detached, however.
If you choose to attach it to the TV, the procedure is pretty simple. Just line up the gold pins to the port on the back of the top of the TV and the webcam will snap in place. HUAWEI also includes a cap to protect the gold pins on the TV just in case you do not want the webcam in place. For a TV, the webcam sticking out looks quite odd to us. If you are buying this for a meeting room though, you might be glad to know that it comes with a webcam, and you do not need to buy one
There is a caveat however, it is a HUAWEI device after all. That also means that it does not work like an Android TV and it has limited apps available to it. That means, you cannot just pick up the TV remote and start a video call on it on any app.
There is only one app you can use for video calls on the HUAWEI Vision S currently and that is MeeTime. MeeTime, as you may have found, can only be used with other HUAWEI devices. So, if your entire office uses HUAWEI’s most current devices, you are good. If not, you are out of luck, because you cannot use it to make calls to anyone else.
If you do have friends with a current HUAWEI device that supports MeeTime though, you are going to get a very cool Full HD video calling capability That also means that you get very crisp, very clear videos transmissions. Audio is not half bad too. Sadly, we do not have enough people using MeeTime in the office to test it out.
Of course, you can also use the webcam to take a family photo of sorts. It is a 13-Megapixel camera, good enough for most social media use and even sharing it with your friends or family. Of course, you need to make sure to share the photo to your smartphone first before sharing it out. That, or you can just use it as a wallpaper for the TV. Make sure you have the Home Vision app for that though.
HarmonyOS on top of Honghu 818– Mirror, Control, and Mirror Control
This brings us to HarmonyOS, a sort of peculiar TV OS that is, on its own, quite brilliant. Once you compare it to other TV Systems though, it starts to show a lot of cracks. We do not know how to feel about the HUAWEI Vision S mostly because of HarmonyOS.
HarmonyOS looks great on the 65-inch panel. We are guessing that it will translate nicely on the smaller 55-inch display too. We like it because it looks pretty, it is smooth, it looks light.
Navigating through the interface is a breeze as well. Everything is laid out clearly and all of them are labelled properly. The settings make plenty of sense and is very intuitive as well.
We like how minimal and simple the remote is though. It is a far fetch from TV remotes of old. The minimalist approach is also remarkably similar to Samsung’s approach with TV remotes these days. The extra space below the buttons are not wasted too, because it is an NFC detection panel, for One Hop sharing features from your smartphone to the TV and vice versa.
That feature itself makes the Vision S a compelling purchase. Only thing is that it only works with HUAWEI devices. Then again, the unit we have is China unit. The HUAWEI Home Vision app will be available the Google Play Store when the official Malaysian units launches, so we do not know if HUAWEI will bring the One Hop feature for the Vision S TV available to other Android devices.
Home Vision App
The Home Vision app will allow you to do a few things with the TV via your smartphone. You can use your smartphone as a regular remote control. You can also control the TV via mirroring the TV on the smartphone screen itself.
You can fire up MeeTime directly from the app itself too. You do not need to go into the TV to even pick your contacts. All you have to do is go into the Home Vision app itself and fire up MeeTime from the home page.
Limited Screen Mirroring
Of course, all Smart TVs should be able to do simple screen mirroring from your smartphone today. The HUAWEI Vision S can do that too, of course. But take it with a pinch of salt though, it does not scale all the way to 4K. Most of the time, you get up to Full HD resolution when you mirror your smartphone to the display.
We use a HUAWEI Mate 40 Pro and a Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra to mirror its contents to the display. This is also the only way you are going to get Netflix contents to project on the TV, if you are using the HUAWEI Mate 40 Pro. If you are on other Android devices, you may not be able to get Netflix on the TV. You most likely will not get Amazon Prime Video on the TV panel, we tried on both the HUAWEI Mate 40 Pro and Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra.
If you have a HUAWEI device though, you do not have to dig through your smartphone settings to mirror your display. All you need to do is to tap your device to the remote’s OneHop NFC receiver area, and you get your TV to display what your smartphone displays. Keep in mind that for you to get a full screen experience though, you want to make sure that you are displaying in HUAWEI Desktop Mode instead. Again, not all apps can be mirrored from the smartphone.
Hey Celia!
This is one feature we did not try extensively on the HUAWEI Vision S because the unit we have is a China unit. We got a quick hands-on the official Malaysian unit before its launch though. We have to say that the AI assistant is responsive and sensitive enough to voice inputs even though you may be sitting four feet away from the TV. That is a good thing, you can sort of lose your remote in this case. The only issue is that it is no Google Assistant, so there could only be so much you can do if you do not own other HUAWEI devices at home.
HUAWEI Video and Music
Despite the lack of Netflix, or Amazon Prime Video, or even YouTube, there are still things you can watch on the TV though. HUAWEI’s Video and Music platform still has a selection of movies and TV series to work with. Although, you will have to live with less contents than the likes of Netflix and Prime Video. Even HUAWEI Music’s library will not be as extensive as Spotify or even Tidal.
Performance
Yes, there are shortcoming on the HUAWEI Vision S. The shortcomings are mostly with the HarmonyOS. In that sense, its hardware does shine through.
65-inch of 120Hz 4K Goodness
HUAWEI did not specify the sort of projection panel they use on the HUAWEI Vision S. We suspect that they are probably working with an IPS panel. There is a reason for our suspicion, more on that later.
HUAWEI claims a DCI-P3 colour gamut of up to 92%, and TUV Rheinland certified Low Blue Light and Flicker Free certification. They also claim that the panel produces vivid, vibrant colours very close to what you might see in real life. We believe them.
We say that the display could very well be an IPS display because of the colour reproduction of the TV panel. Videos and images looks amazing on the HUAWEI Vision S. While HUAWEI did not mention anything about local dimming features, there is very little colour bleeding on bring images with black background. The blacks are really deep as well when it needs to be.
Colours, as per HUAWEI, are super vivid and vibrant. Vibrant films like ‘The Grand Budapest Hotel’ shines on the Vision S. While it is a shame we could not test Netflix or Prime Video films natively on the Vision S, we were able to test the TV with our contents at 4K as well. Yes, they look really good too.
The Honghu 818 processor is also not just to keep the TV trundling along at a respectable pace. It can also upscale Full HD contents to 4K when it recognises it. Since it is also a 120Hz panel, the processor also scales to 120 frames a second when it can. That also means that you get very smooth viewing experience too at 4K.
The thing is though, when you upscale contents, you tend to get some screen tears and even weird shadow flickers. You tend to not notice too much of that on the HUAWEI Vision S though. What we are trying to say is that even Full HD movies that plays at 30fps tend to look really good on the HUAWEI Vision S. Of course, you would get the full benefit of 4K and 120Hz when you game on it.
HUAWEI Sound – Do You Really Need a Soundbar
This is another thing we really liked about the HUAWEI Vision S. We usually would recommend our friends to get a good piece of sound bar to really elevate their entertainment experience. There are just a few TV out in the market that may not need a sound bar to work with, if you are on a budget.
The HUAWEI Vision S is one of those TVs that we think may not need a soundbar to work with. That is because HUAWEI bothered to fit this TV with four speakers within the TV. The result of the four speakers really changes what we know about modern Smart TVs with the kind of dimensions modern TVs boasts.
There is a lot of detail coming from the quad speaker array on the HUAWEI Vision S. We expected the speakers to sound a little on the weak side. That is the total opposite of what you will get on the HUAWEI Vision S though. The audio profile is pretty much powerful in all ranges of frequencies.
Of course, there will be some benefits to a soundbar. You get dedicated woofers that would really enhances the lower frequencies for bigger booms. But they have not forgotten on the higher frequencies too.
This also means that you can even enjoy music on the TV itself. To save some power the HUAWEI Vision S still can play audio without the display being on. Again though, the HUAWEI Music App is a little limited currently. You can connect your smartphones to the TV via screen mirroring and play music via Spotify or Tidal though.
Gaming on the HUAWEI Vision S
With 4K 120Hz, the HUAWEI Vision S is really made for the new next-gen gaming consoles. The Sony PlayStation 5 and Microsoft Xbox Series X are made to handle games at 4K at up to 120fps to fully take advantage of high refresh-rate displays like the HUAWEI Vision S. Unfortunately, we do not posses any of the next-gen console just yet.
We have a PlayStation 4 Pro and Nintendo Switch though. We also tried plugging our gaming PCs to the TV, for the native high refresh-rate support. We must say that we are impressed here too.
While Nintendo Switch does not scale up to 4K, most of the games on Nintendo Switch are made with more vibrant colours and softer textures in mind compared to detailed, sharp graphics. Vibrant colours shine on the HUAWEI Vision S. Animal Crossing: New Horizons look gorgeous on the 65-inch panel because the colours look so vivid and sweet. God of War on PlayStation 4 Pro looks amazing too. Of course, there is no 120Hz here. Thing is HUAWEI’s Vision S will try to scale it up a little to 120Hz. It is barely noticeable though because you are just blown away by the colours and details you get on games like God of War. You technically can play CS:GO and push the fps boundaries to 120Hz if you connect your PC. But you would have to sit a little further away too. Thankfully though, the blacks are so black and detailed that you still can see the darker spots when you play games like PUBG.
HUAWEI’s website markets its gaming capabilities via your smartphone though. Obviously, we gave that a go. But then again, you are just mirroring your smartphone’s content on the display, so there is nothing too special there. There are also games within the HUAWEI Vision S’s HarmonyOS AppGallery. We did not try any of them though.
HUAWEI Vision S – Yes, But No
HUAWEI’s Vision S (65-inch as tested) commands MYR 3,999 in asking price. If you go for the one smaller, at 55-inch, it will set you back MYR 2,999. While you might want to say that the commanding price is what we call expensive, you might want to hold back your horses though. HUAWEI mentions that the Vision S is meant to go up against models like Samsung’s latest AU9000 series TV. That also means the HUAWEI is also in the league of Sony’s X80H TV and LG’s UN74 series TV. Against the competition, the HUAWEI suddenly looks like a bargain at MYR 3,999. The difference in price is up to MYR 1,000 compared to its competition.
Where the HUAWEI Vision S falls apart though is the contents itself. It is the only Smart TV to feature the HarmonyOS and Honghu 818 CPU. In all fairness, HarmonyOS and Honghu 818 works like a charm, they work great; we like them.
While it does look like a bargain, I would still suggest you consider getting the Sony or the LG TV hard. While there can be a significant price difference between the TVs, we would say contents and compatibility matter. In the case of the HUAWEI Vision S, you might want to consider getting and Android TV box, or Apple TV box, or plug in a PC, and even a gaming console to get to contents you want and love. We resorted to relying on our Sony PlayStation 4 Pro to get Netflix, Prime Video, YouTube, and even Spotify working.
The HUAWEI Vision S is an enticing product, with its excellent colour reproduction that rivals even other higher end TVs. It even has sound system we can stand behind, because the four speakers are that good. But to us, its content matters. We really wanted to like it, but we could not.
TikTok is quickly becoming a go to platform for musicians. Just recently, the social media platform had an exclusive event with Korean band, BLACKPINK. Now, the ByteDance owned platform is going to become the exclusive debut partner for a KRU Music artist. DUKU & Tuju will be sharing their exclusive pre-release of their latest single, ‘Salawat 1442’ featuring Tyco on TikTok LIVE. The debut is happening on the 27th October at 8p.m. on the @KRU.Music account.
The collaboration between TikTok and KRU subisdiary, Imaan Music, looks to cultivate a younger audience aligned with the platform’s user demographic. The song being debuted adapts traditional dakwah and is a first in bringing together artistes from different genres for a momentous record.
The debut comes in conjunction with Maulidur Rasul, a Muslim celebration of the Prophet Muhammad’s birthday. To know more about this collaboration and more on the subject, remember to tune live on 27 October at 8pm @KRU.Music on Tiktok.
You would think that when it comes to making compositions and music, you’d need a really good ear and knowledge of the arts. Not so much with Amazon Web Service’s new AI (Artificial Intelligence) service focused on creating musical pieces with a keyboard! DeepComposer is the latest in a series of Machine Learning focused services that AWS has introduced since it’s announcement of DeepLens at Re:Invent 2017.
The new music based AI is a 32 key, 2 octave keyboard which will allow developers to familiarise themselves with using Generative AI. The simple application of Generative AI in DeepComposer will take short riffs and generate a full compositions.
A brief diagram explaining how AWS’s DeepComposer works. (Source: AWS)
The DeepComposer generative AI will be able to layer and generate songs based on pre-trained models or even user defined models. The pre-trained models are able to generate based on algorithms developed by training the AI with large musical data sets. The user defined models give users better control of the generative AI. Users will be able to define multiple parameters including the Architecture and Discriminator. The latter allows the AI to distinguish between the genres and determine the overall composition.
Being a machine learning model, DeepComposer is continually learning to identify music types. The AI will improve with time as it learns and generates more music based on the models and riffs. It will also be able to generate music which mimics a defined model. Amazon’s release touts, ” you have to train as a counterfeiting expert in order to become a great counterfeiter “.
DeepComposer isn’t just linked to the physical keyboard. It also has a digital keyboard interface which allows users to compose on the go. Using this approach, AWS is hoping that Generative AI models are made more approachable for those looking to explore their applications.
The new feature is currently available for preview on AWS at the DeepComposer website. Also on the website is a FAQ to address some of the questions that new users may have.
