There was a time when songs were songs. When there were the albums that you owned and those that you did not. When there was a distinct difference between the music that you liked and the artists that you didn’t care for at all.There was a time when the music you that collected was actually a physical thing; it represented your identity and served as a mirror of your taste. When the albums you had access to, beyond those that you owned, were limited to that of your friend’s and family’s. When the only way you could expand your collection was to purchase more music or temporarily borrow a copy of theirs.There was a time — one I barely remember — where these boundaries defined my music experience, but those days are gone now, and we can never get them back. Once the album format fractured and individual songs became the focal point of music consumption, companies like Pandora, iLike, Last.FM, iMeem, and others began the process of discerning the unique characteristics of each song, and building recommendation engines around them.

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