Although there's no doubt that music preferences change over time and are shaped by social factors like what our friends listen to and where we live, research has shown that our musical preferences is closely linked to our personality—from how conscientious to how neurotic we are.
Apple just made itself relevant to music lovers—again. At its annual World Wide Developer Conference (WWDC) on Monday, the company announced a new streaming music service for the iPhone, iPad, Mac, PC, Apple TV, and Android called Apple Music. The new subscription-based service allows people to search and stream millions of songs from iTunes and also listen to curated playlists.
Over the past fifteen years or so, bed bug infestations surged worldwide. The bed bug's return was, in part, thanks to an increase in global travel, insecticide resistance, and the fact that more of us than ever before are living in cities—a particularly good setting for bed bugs to thrive. But the pest also made a comeback in a less publicized way through our music.
When I was learning to play the cello in high school, my cat Stella used to hide under my bed and yowl pitifully. I like to tell myself we just had different tastes. And there's probably something to that. Whereas humans like music to fall within our vocal range and have a tempo similar to a human heartbeat, those noises probably sound like demonic torture rituals to a cat.
If a robot read a novel, how would it feel? You might get a sense from these little jingles. Below are some songs that were automatically created by a series of algorithms that turn the emotions in novels into short pieces of music. If the songs remind you, traumatically, of your untalented little sister practicing piano… well, you can't say I didn't warn you.