I can’t believe I haven’t heard about this before. Check out midomi.com. It’s an online music retail site that lets you search for tracks by singing them! You just hook up your microphone and sing or hum a few bars of a song and bam. There’s your song. And it actually works! After you find your song, you can listen to a 30-second sample of the original recording and buy a digital copy of the song in either mp3 (unprotected?!) or Windows Media format (presumably with Microsoft DRM). Hey, as long as it’s not iTunes- or Zune-related, I’m happy.
There is one catch. Your vocal input isn’t matched against the original recording. To find the correct match, another user out in the world must have already recorded a vocal sample. But that’s even cooler in my mind. It’s a social networking site for compulsive singers! Your recordings can be “favorited” and rated by other users and you can send private messages to them.
Great. Now my weekend is shot. If you need me, I’ll be sitting on the couch in my underwear singing showtunes into my USB microphone.