# What Are Relatable™ Features?

Relatable™ recently joined Emusic™ as a co-sponsor of the open-source FreeAmp project. Relatable™ features automatically recommend music playlists and streams, introducing you to new music you would like. Relatable considers respecting and protecting user privacy as its highest priority in offering these features. (See Relatable Privacy.)

The Relatable system 'understands' listener preference patterns through FreeAmp and compares them with the preferences of like-minded listeners. Consider it like a virtual 'word of mouth' system that introduces you to music that people like you have enjoyed. Essentially, Relatable creates communities of people who like similar music, regardless of genres, no matter how eclectic their tastes.

Relatable Profiles (Opt-in only)

You can create an anonymous profile through the My Music feature or through the Relatable Profiles tab under Options. Opting in allows music selection and playback information to be combined with musical preference data of other FreeAmp users on the Relatable Engine. Note: you must be connected to the internet in order for musical preference data to be shared.

When you use the My Music window to to create and play playlists, the Relatable Engine pays attention to the relationships between musical selections you pick and actually listen to, for your and everyone else's benefit. This enables your selections to be recommended to others who like music similar to you, and vice versa, introducing everyone to new music in the process. You can also manually submit playlists, so that the Relatable system learns that a group of songs go well together, by selecting 'Learn Playlist' off of the Relatable menu on the My Music browser.

About Profiles

Your profile is a record that is automatically updated every time you use the FreeAmp music player to reflect your ever-changing musical interests.

When you first launch the Relatable-enabled music player, you will be asked to create a profile. If you choose not to create a profile, you can still use the music player. If you choose to create a profile, you are always in control. You can turn your profile on or off, or delete it at any time.

Your profile is anonymous and is identified by a random number. Your profile is not linked to any personal identifiable information such as your name or email address.

As you use the music player, Relatable will note your ever-changing musical interests and adjust your profile so that it reflects your interests. Relatable will use this data in the aggregate to enable you to automatically generate playlists based on your interests and introduce you to music related to what you listen to with the player.

Relatable does not sell, trade, or rent an individual's personal identifiable information; we don't even collect it. We may provide our music partners with an understanding of emerging music trends, which can help them introduce new music that matches listeners' interests.

Relatable Audio Signatures

Relatable's audio recognition technology has been integrated with this version of FreeAmp. When you opt in to Relatable features, you will be asked if the player can make unique signatures of your music files. You must say 'okay' for Relatable features to work.

The audio signaturing process scans your music files for certain audio characteristics, and from this information generates a unique, identifiable 'fingerprint' for each song. Why do this? So we can be sure about which songs you have, regardless of whether they have been accurately tagged with text data indicating title, artist, etc. Often, music files are not properly tagged. We can also use the audio characteristic data to better understand what type of music you like, regardless of what labels others may have placed on it. The signaturing process is a brief, but essential step in enabling us to understand the music you listen to and find more music that you would like.

You can also start and stop audio signaturing through the Relatable Menu on the music browser.

Relatable Playlists

After opting in and using the player for a while, go to the My Music window. You'll see the Relatable menu. Select 'Recommend Playlist' to hear other music similar or related to music you have been listening to through FreeAmp. You must be connected to the internet to create a Relatable playlist. You can also manually submit playlists by selecting 'Learn Playlist' off of the Relatable menu.

Relatable Streams

Choose Recommended Streams from the My Music window to hear a Webcast stream with music similar or related to what you have been listening to through FreeAmp. You must be connected to the internet for this feature. Note: this feature will be enabled in the near future.

Relatable Privacy

The Relatable System is private by design. Anonymous user preference data is aggregated and personal information is not collected. Each music profile is stored on Relatable's secure servers, and we're continually adding safeguards to protect our users. Your music profile data is kept completely anonymous and is never shared with 3rd parties. You will never be contacted by Relatable or anyone else (unless you ask, of course!). That's Relatable's privacy promise. Please feel free to ask any questions at info@relatable.com. We'll be happy to address your comments.