Creative Control
For over a year now I have been the proud owner of a Creative Zen Sleek MP3 player. And it’s been brilliant. 20 Gigabytes worth of music at the touch of a button. Gone are the days of switching CD’s or fast forwarding audio cassettes to get to your favourite track. However, there is one tiny little problem that I have with this technology… and it’s not just me that’s noticed it.
You see, it seems that the player has it’s favourite songs. ‘Riders on the Storm’ by The Doors. ‘Lateralus’ by Tool. ‘Glorious’ by Andreas Johnson. ‘Creep’ by Radiohead. Anything by Bob Dylan. Songs that come up far too often to be just random selections of the 3000 odd that I have on there.
My housemate Jim noticed the same thing (until his broke… not everyone is a satisfied customer). My girlfriend has a slightly different model but she’s also noticed it. My girlfriend’s flatmate has a better, more expensive version and he’s also noticed it.
Coincidence? We’ve all picked up on the same songs so it seems unlikely. Jim has a theory that it’s because of the numbering of the tracks - for example track 500 is more likely to play than track 347 because its a round number. (at least, I think that’s his theory - I’m sure he’ll correct me if I’m wrong). This seems unlikely to me, but it’s the best explanation I’ve heard yet.
It does seem odd that the songs chosen as ‘favourites’ are all by well-known, mostly American artists. I can go months without hearing Flotation Toy Warning or The Clientele and then be subjected to ‘Riders on the Storm’ twice in the same day.
And, let’s face it, if I was to develop a hugely popular electronic medium for playing music (it could happen), I’d make sure it played all my favourite songs more often than Daphne and Celeste or the f’ing Libertines.
Oh, and I’ve long noticed that Winamp does the same thing.
Seriously, I’m confused. I’ve scoured the Interweb to see if anyone else has noticed this to no avail. If anyone can throw any light on this (and, let’s face it, if they can and they’re reading this site then the odds are that their initials are ‘PSJ’ in some order or other) I’d love to know…
August 18th, 2006 at 12:27 am
Morning Phil, sort of true, but WRONG!
My suggestion is that say you have 500 tracks listed 1-500, the machine will randomly pick tracks. It just so happens that the ‘favourite tracks’ happen to be towards the middle of the listings.
I’m guessing it all about the mode, mean and median (some maths phrases there) I suggested that its more likely to pick, say track 235 rather than number 2, as randomly its more likely to be around there. Just a suggestion.
Also, if your not happy about hearing the same tracks all the time, on the Zen you can choose to have random but played only once. That way you’re guaranteed to hear every song!
August 21st, 2006 at 12:29 pm
I vote the ghost of Jim Morrison in the machine choosing Riders of the Storm. Jim’s Ghost also likes the other tracks too.
My other theory is that Jesus did it. If all logical thought fails…then Jesus will prevail….
August 22nd, 2006 at 12:29 pm
Let’s not give up on logical thought just yet.
First, this is not an uncommon perception, and while some simply put it down to the human tendency to seek order/patterns even where there are none, I think it also comes from a misconception about what constitutes “random.”
The word “random” means, of course, that all outcomes are equally likely. A 6-sided die (or 20-sided, or crazy die) is random: any face (4, say) could come up on any given throw. Crucially, the same face could come up on a second throw — and even a third. Does that mean the dice manufacturer has a secret preference for 4s? No, just that random refers to the long run. By the same token, a track played twice (”Riders on the Storm”, in your example) in a day is perfectly plausible in a truly random system.
Apple’s iPods* use the word “shuffle” instead of random, and it’s important to contrast this term because it connotes a different method. The shuffle metaphor obviously invokes a deck of cards (emphasis added):
That last portion adds another piece to the puzzle. Let’s say you switch your Zen to the shuffle equivalent, what Jim refers to as “random but played only once.” Might you still hear “Riders” twice before The Clientele? On an iPod, at least, the answer is ‘yes’ because the player will re-shuffle when turned off. This might be counter-intuitive; why not save the shuffled list once made, then play through to the end? One answer would be to pick up new tracks: without re-shuffling, you’d have to wait up to 150 hours** after new additions before your new track had a 1/3001 chance of being played. And therein lies the rub. Because your collection is a solid week’s worth of music, you’ll never leave it on and play it enough times to see if the algorithm truly is random.
So why not try a synthetic approximation? I took a 1 second sine wave and wrote a script to duplicate it to 100 different files, named test00…test99.mp3. Then I loaded them into an iTunes playlist (I couldn’t even find my iPod Shuffle, which tells you how much I listen to music), selected Party Shuffle, and played exactly 100 tracks.
Here’s the resulting histogram:
A continuous shuffle play of my “collection” resulted in exactly what you’d expect: each song played a single time.
Next I wanted to simulate the playlist-jumping/power cycling/short sessions that would be typical with casual use. Using Party Shuffle with the same 100 tracks, I played 10 sets of 10 tracks. Between each set, I switched the playlist from the test set and then back, to achieve a re-shuffle.
Result:
Still 100 plays, but obvious differences. Some songs never made it through, others made repeat appearances. As you might guess, that spike of 4 plays was not anything by Bob Dylan; it was the same 440Hz tone as the rest. (That copy happened to be test33.mp3.)
Now think of your collection. Which chart would it resemble? Have you set the “random/play only once” option? Do you always keep your Zen on, pause songs when you leave, and immediately resume? For at least 150 hours of listening? Of course not.
So, before you start wondering about the ghost in the machine, try this test. Download my 100 test tracks [711K] and add them to your Zen via a “test” playlist. Let your Zen play the shuffled playlist for as long as you can (overnight would be great, but I don’t know about battery life) then sync up and check your play count. After thousands of plays (achievable in just a few hours), a truly random shuffle would result in a distribution very close to equal amongst the whole set.
If you see different results, come back and we’ll get into entropy and random seeds.
Yours in Science,
J
* By the way, if you wanted to create “a hugely popular electronic medium for playing music” you’d be better off creating the iPod. Apple’s share of the (US?) MP3 player market is 75.6%; Creative’s, 4.3%.
** Assumes 3,000 songs at 3 minutes apiece.
August 23rd, 2006 at 3:21 am
Final proof, as if any were needed, that JSP is not only smarter than PJS and SPJ but also the overwhelming majority of these people as well.
Cheers John! My only pertinent observation on your analysis is that Apple’s 75.6% market share is precisely what makes them achingly unattractive to contrary sorts like myself.
August 24th, 2006 at 10:14 am
If only we could persuade him to work on world peace we’d have it solved in no time. But then again… nah. Ipod’s are more interesting.
August 27th, 2006 at 6:59 am
It disturbs me that such arguments have become compelling in these matters. Your so called ‘logic’ based on ‘factual evidence’ and ‘reasoning’ have no place in these important discussions. We at the Waca-day Church of Jim Morrison know that only faith alone can explain such complex occurrences. Our Lord Jim has intelligently designed everything to lead you all to the truth. You heathen scum who ignore these obvious signs shall be cast into the fiery pits of hell and forced to listen to the Bay City Rollers for all eternity! *Maniacal laughter ensues*