Aether Cone – A Speaker that Intelligently Picks Music For You

Online music has become a leading market. With services like Spotify, Pandora, Bop.fm, Soundcloud and Rdio, online music sharing, streaming, and collaborating has reached a point of technological ease. Yet, there remain a few caveats with online music. Finding new music is not always an easy task. While software like Spotify recommend you new music and Pandora’s platform is founded on finding new music that follows a genre or theme you like, the results can be so hit or miss that you would find yourself context-switching every 10 minutes. Additionally, computer speakers generally do not provide high quality sound. This means there are limited options for those who want to listen to new types of music as well as maintain high quality sound (which is pretty much everyone who likes to listen to music). Aether, a company with a mission statement of “making products that learn about you so they can serve you better,” has developed a cone-shaped speaker that intelligently analyzes what types of music you listen to and finds new music for you to listen.

The cone is a minimalist speaker with a handful of manual features. The cone works like a radio, as you turn a dial around the speaker to find music that you like. When you find a song that piques your interest, perhaps an old, nostalgic track or a non-conformist, emotional tune, you leave the cone to play the song. As you continue to find music you like, the cone grows more wary of the genres, artists, and titles you listen to. By learning the user’s preferences, the cone is able to find new music from various online sources and stream them through high-quality speakers.

Side View of the Cone

Back view of the Cone

In addition to finding new music, the cone can also play specific songs. All it takes is to push the button in the center of the speaker and say the song title and artist name. The cone keeps track of song requests as well. Finally, if you don’t like what the cone has been playing, you can turn the dial to a different song and the intelligent speaker will take note. The simplicity of features, the graceful layout, and the intelligence of the software synthesize to create a remarkable product that makes listening to music refreshing as well as enjoyable.

If you are interested in reserving an Aether Cone, you can find the website here. They cost $399 for a reservation.