We have something new for you today from the Hype Machine Labs. We call it Fast Forward.
Fast Forward is a speedy, immersive way to explore new music being discussed by the world-class blogs we index at The Hype Machine. I mean it: it is really fast.
We’ve been thinking about this idea since SXSW 2009, and after some further inspiration, thought to push this experience further. Fast Forward is like a spinning radio dial across radio stations curated by music bloggers.
From the latest, popular, or genre channels of blogged music, we show you screenshots of related blog posts, while playing short samples of the songs being discussed. Want to read the whole post? Click the big image on your screen. Like the song? Click the heart to add it to your Hype Machine favorites. Use your arrow keys, space bar, or the > button to skip to the next sample.
Now, do this for a few minutes. The favorites you add via Fast Forward won’t be auto-posted to Twitter or scrobbled to Last.fm, if you have that enabled on the Hype Machine, so don’t be afraid to experiment.
Find something new to love? Keep going! There’s always more music up ahead.
This is still an early beta, so we’d love to know what you like, don’t like, or when something is broken. Please write here. Thanks!
Comments
66 responses to “From the lab: Fast Forward”
This is absolutely brilliant, really well thought out and implemented, I’m impressed. Been playing with it for a few minutes and I’ve already discovered a few new tracks!
Only gripe: there needs to be an easy way to get back to the main website. There’s no link back to it, and for some reason, using the back button on the browser only takes you back as far as the Fast Forward splash page, despite the fact the address bar states you’re back on Hypem.
Other than that, really great feature, love the improvements you’ve been making recently.
Loved it guys! Please be sure to make all the buzz about this new feature cuz Im sure a lot of ppl will see its value and GET THE FLICK OVER HERE AND ENJOY THIS AMAZING SITE!!
i know this is gonna be a pain in the ass (being a novice web designer), but a back button would be awesome… amazing concept and execution otherwise… keep up the great work… stay awesome
For now, you can press the left arrow key to go to the previous track
Cool! Looks good. Kind of reminds me of thesixtyone.com.
I was looking through songs and clicked one, and noticed that it takes you to the hypem page for that song. That’s great! But then it kept playing on the Fast Forward site even though it said it was paused. And then I clicked the next track and the previous track was still playing over the current one. I don’t know what I did but I couldn’t figure out how to get the last track to stop playing.
And I agree with the others, an actual back button to the preveious track and also to hypem.com would be nice. But other than that, good work guys!
Fantastic concept! Very easy to leave it on and switch back whenever something catches your ear. I already find Hype Machine to be an excellent music discovery tool, but this makes things even easier. Adding in some more options to effect the pool of music being switched through would be an interesting feature.
I have two main thoughts on improvement:
Instant play – when you click the name of a song you’d like to hear, the FF player is paused and the full version of that song begins to play without additional clicks. To have this functionality inline would be great, but even on the child page would be good.
Adjustable sample length – this would be great for folks who would rather hear a little more of the song before liking/auto-skipping. It would help taylor the experience a bit more as well.
Love the direction! Keep up the good work!
It’s really fun and easy to find new music like this and I really like it. There are 2 suggestions I have:
1. add a little button to extend the preview so that if the user needed more time to listen to it, they could
2. on some of the website pages, it wouldn’t let me scroll the whole page
Great ideas though Hype! keep up the good work
totally feel like a complete jackass for not testing the left arrow to get the previous song…
@anthony
good call… my bad… it’s officially the new way i use hypem…
@jacob
the extented clip button… that would be cool… or maybe a jump button that takes you a minute into the song… most dub step songs don’t actually start till about 1-2 mins in…
this is really really cool! but how about a button to let me finish the track. When I used it I often felt like I’m on to something, but I can’t properly decide so I just frantically click the like button on everything so I can finish it later, which of course, i never will, etc etc.
In fact, I missed a track while I was typing this! I want a previous button! what was that song just now, damnit!
This is exactly what I want when I am trying to find some new music to listen to. So, trying to give you some good feedback here:
I love HypeM and I use it everyday at work. I typically browse songs on the main page, favorite the ones I like, and then play from “My Songs” in shuffle mode (or My Obsessions in Listening History)
So for me, this will supplement the music on the main page – and I just love how it is SAMPLES and CLIPS. This is a really great idea, and even using it for 5 minutes I’m very excited about it.
Can’t wait to explore, thanks!
Also, I love the arrow keys for changing tracks. Arrow key support on the main page would be a great improvement… Or maybe it does work, but just doesn’t work for me.
wow look like I’m not the only one, shouldve read the previous comments, whoops. I get the dilemma though. If you’d have a ‘full song’ button people would press it all the time, and gone is the purpose of this awesome feature. Maybe a ‘hold’ button, so the clock continues ticking on release? Forces you to really pay attention, read the blog post.
This is a bad idea. Now i’m going to have even worse itchy trigger fingers for that seek/next song button.
Love it. I started using it and though it was just a rip off of http://shuffler.fm/, but really am digging the auto-advance after a period of time. Very fun way to explore.
mad props.
mobiltune: just added arrow key support to the main site too
aaron: we are shuffler.fm fans too, this is a combination of ideas inspired by them and something we’ve thought about for a long time (see links in blog post)
maybe the up key as a favorite shortcut…
and the down key as a hold button as suggested by someone else to hold a song for continued play of current song…
i know this is asking allot… its really good as is… and you should def showcase this on the main page, much like you do with artist albums and advertising…
can you have a no remixes option for this?
nice and all, but has anyone else lost the ability to adjust the music volume for the site?
@estaban- me too! Seriously missing the volume control
@Anthony, Arrow keys for the main page, thaaaank you!
@Steve, I like idea of No Remixes checkbox also, sometimes I like to use that.
I miss the volume control!
Please, oh please restore volume control!
“alt+L” is the shortcut for “Heart’ing” a song… extra nice… just thought other should know;)
also when listening to the “latest” station, it seems to ignore my subscriptions… maybe add to the list of listening stations a “my subscriptions” button… or possibly a search bar to enter an artist and quickly cycle through said artist songs…
keep killing it… really impressed with this tool… just calling this a beta is crazy… it works pretty damn good… beta usually means “nearly unusable” to me… heck of a job
Oh yeah, we’ll add the Subscriptions mode, didn’t get to that yet.
And yeah, we’ve added l or h as a key to heart on the main site.
Looks very much like shuffler.fm – but it’s a great new development!
Anthony, any word on volume control? Or why it was removed?
It’s actually a test. We think it is no longer needed – most modern computers have easy ways of adjusting system volume.
Curious. I’m sure we’ll see Youtube and Pandora follow your lead. And I look forward to fine tuning the audio mixer each time I log into a library computer. Cheers
Would love to have volume control back. I like to have music playing when I am editing down some of my video work (don’t worry, I listen to everything without music playing in the background as well) and not having volume controls means that Hype Machine music is typically louder than the audio I am working with.
@Anthony: I would understand the desicion if the volume control take 50% of the page… but it isnt annoying someone. also you had the work to bring it on, so why clearing this useful feature?
pls bring it back 🙂
Maybe this is the opposite of helpful, but I think the default Fast Forward option is TOO fast.
I like the idea of fast forward but the clips aren’t long enough for me to judge what the songs are like. Maybe give me the option to set the song clip lengths on Fast forward – if I could select between 30 seconds, a minute, 2 minutes or the whole song it would be amazing.
If I had it set to the entire song, I could always skip the song forward manually, but I feel I need to be able to listen to a much more representative clip of each song before I’m going to favorite it.
On my Mac, it doesn’t work at all on Safari. On Firefox, navigation and blog displays work but I can’t hear any music and play controls have no effect. Works fine on Mac Chrome.
Is this just me? Or ….. ?
Please bring back volume control. It’s true system volume can be adjusted, however only at the cost of adjusting the volume of all other system sounds. Many systems lowest offered volume (apart from off) is a volume above desirable, especially in headphones. I for one often multisound (read: multitask with audible whatnot) and so reducing or increasing system volume often doesn’t work if it brings other applications above 100% output volume.
A temporary way to bring volume control back (if you really miss it), is to add a bookmark with the URL set to:
javascript:document.getElementById(‘player-volume-outer’).style.display=”block”;document.getElementById(‘player-time-total’).style.left=”520px”;document.getElementById(‘player-progress-outer’).style.width=”450px”;
And then just click that when you visit the site
Great idea and near flawless execution. Definitely visually pleasing.
One thing: needs a back button! several times I have been listening to this in the background and haven’t been able to get to the page in time to see what the song was or the blog that it was on. Add that and it will be almost perfect
I’am listening to Hypem on headphones and default volume with lowest volume in system settings is still pretty loud 😉
Volume adjustment is just convenient.
I want my volume control back!
Thanks for bringing back on-site volume control!
Thank you for bringing back the volume control! Much appreciated.
I really love it. Thanks guys.
This feature is really, really cool. I just wish there was an option to listen to the whole song instead of just a little snippet. Aside from that, you guys continue to be the bomb diggity.
I only want a link to it, maybe from our dashboard or up at the top of your page with “Latest” “Popular” “Blog Directory”… Is this even possible? I can’t find a way from our page? Just some easy way to access it and go back and forth between HM and Fast Forward. Just make it easier to get to and from and I’d be happy, I LOVE it that much!!! I had so much fun discovering new songs. I love the look of it, everything offered on it. Much easier to navigate, a much more pleasing design that thesixtyone.com. I only want to be spoiled rotten just one tiny bit more by being able to click on it from our pages and go straight there and back. Please? I loved it!!! Thanks!
When I press the play button in Internet Explorer, it links to the homepage. Therefore, I am unable to play any tracks 🙁
thanks for bringing back the volume control!
Fast Forward:
Very cool feature. Its easy to forget that the bloggers are the ones actually feeding Hype Machine. This feature brings them back to the fore front while scratching the blogger’s back by encouraging Hypem.com visitor to check out the blog.
(criticism alert) – I found the 30 second clips a bit too short. I’m reluctant to heart a song after 30 seconds. Some of the songs haven’t even really started at that point. The result is that I haven’t heard enough of the song to be interested in ‘loving’ it or visiting the blog. Solutions could range from simply changing the clip duration to a more time consuming feature addition allowing the user to change the clip duration or just playing the whole song.
Keep up the kick ass work.
Richard
Is the volume control back then? I don’t see it? (But I might be looking in the wrong place…)
When you open one of the songs in a new tab, it shouldn’t auto-play, since the fastforward is still likely playing
Just wanted to let you guys know I think this is awesome. Good work.
Thanks. Awesome.
Liking this for quick browsing! Suggestions: There should be a way to skip forward 30-60 seconds to another segment of the song, and a way to stop Fast Forward from moving forward (ie Hmmm this is a decent track, wonder where it’s going aaaw crap next song). Most of the time I have to click on the track and go to that second hypem window to confirm the song doesn’t suck before starring it. Key thing is we shouldn’t have to leave Fast Forward to investigate a song further!
Since this feature puts more visibility on the music blogs, only makes sense that you should be able to ‘like’ musis blogs while browsing in this mode, right?
I like the big next and prev buttons that are ghosted to the side of the web browser but it’d be good to have them up at the top with the other buttons, especially if you add a STAY ON THIS SONG button or SKIP 30 SECS AHEAD button. When you’re sitting around for an hour or two browsing music, it helps not having to carpal tunnel yourself moving the cursor around too much (especially on a laptop touchpad). Yes, this is possibly the laziest suggestion ever, but you asked 🙂
This seems to be more of a bug, but when you’re listening to ‘Latest’, it’s not bolded in the drop down menu like all the other categories.
Keep up the good work guys!
I was using fast-forward and was just thinking it would be AWESOME if I could choose a category to FF through, and there is. Just click the “o” next to “play” and “heart.”
Also good how I can easily click the link to listen to the whole song. Sometimes I’m not sure if I “heart” a song just from a small piece. Maybe could make the sample piece a tad longer. After all it is easy to skip songs.
I also like how the “left arrow” takes you to the last song. So I don’t have to just keep moving forward.
All in all, GREAT ADDITION TO HYPEM!! (was using random hypem song for the longest time.)
This is just awesome ! Very good stuff !
Would be nice to be able to use fast-forward on My Friends’ Favorite Songs section to shuffle through their latest.
Really interesting, would like to be able to slow down though, or even pause the whole speeding through thing and then start it back up on demand.
pls clck.
Really interesting, would like to be able to slow down though, or even pause the whole speeding through thing and then start it back up on demand.
I love you Hypem
Is Fast Forward disabled? I haven’t been able to launch it since yesterday :/
We are working on some tweaks to make it better, it’s offline for now though. Thanks for checking in!
Fast forward is my definitely one of my favorite features on HypeM, so eagerly waiting for the tweaked version, thanks for the info Anthony!
Yes, bring back Fast forward!
WHERE IS IT. BRING IT BACK. Its like my life of music has disappeared with it.
been patiently waiting for fast-forward to return, i hope you didn’t forget about us!
did you forget about Fast Forward?
PLEASE BRING FAST FORWARD BACKKKK!!!!!!!! MY MUSIC LIFE IS SO STAGNANT WITHOUT IT!!!!
PLEASE BRING IT BACK! PLEEEEEEASE?
WE HAVE BEEN FORGOTTEN, WOE IS US. :'(
Please bring this feature back!! Why was it taken down? 🙁