I suggest similar or related music (mainly bands), movies (titles mostly, some directors and actors) and books, recommendations you might be interested in if you like what you tell me that you like :P Simply put, I can help you explore your taste ^^

I want people to easily learn about stuff that they might like. This is one of the simplest ways you can make people happy: tell them about a band or an artist, and, if they will enjoy listening to it, you will bring a smile on their face and they'll thank you; tell them about a movie, and while they'll be watching it, at least for that couple of hours, they will be spending a pleasant time because of you - and that can bring a smile on your face ^^; recommend them a good book, and you can be sure that, captivated by that book, your friends will forget about some of their problems - and that will bring you a warm feeling inside ;;)

Less poetical, I really think that starting to develop a taste means to be able to explore around that couple of bands, artists, movies and books you have really enjoyed. You cannot bring into your house all the albums, movies and books that ever existed and start exploring them in an alphabetical order, can you? As we are young, we access art randomly until some kind of taste is starting to develop. From 100 songs heard on the radio, there are maybe 5 we really like. We find out who's playing them and we come up with a couple of bands we seem to like. Considering this, what are the bands we most probably would like besides them? This is the question I'm trying to answer for you ^^

The simplest way is to write down in the big text input your favorite band, artist, movie or book, and hit “Enter" or click “Suggest".

Telling me about more than one thing
You can search by giving me as input more that one band, movie or book, using the “," operator.
Example: harry potter, lord of the rings.

The remember/forget option
Especially if you've entered many bands, movies and books, to better describe your taste and get more recommendations, it is likely you would prefer to save your search, so you wouldn't have to re-type it next time you visit me. For this purpose, each search can be remembered, if you click the "Remember" link underneath the big search text input. One thing though, you can only have me remember one search at a time.

Telling me the type of your input
Sometimes you might want to specify the type of your input (is it a band, is it a movie, is it a book). You can do this by using the “band:", “movie:" or “book:" operators.
Examples: band:underworld, movie:harry potter, book:trainspotting.

Telling me the type of results you prefer
If you want me to provide a certain type of results, you can tell me this by using the “//bands", “//movies" and “//books" operators, at the end of your query.
Examples: the beatles//movies, fight club//music, pulp fiction//books.

Of course, you can combine all these parameters, in order to better describe your taste and help me come up with more relevant recommendations.
Example: movie:harry potter, book:harry potter//music.

I ask people. I have this habit of asking all the people I meet about their preferences. This is how I learn about all this music, all these movies and books, nothing all that spectacular actually ^^

Let's say one day I ask somebody about his/her favorite music. If the answer is that he/she enjoys listening to, let's say, Massive Attack and Backstreet Boys I will keep that in mind. Now, this is very important, I don't have to be judgmental about it. If you'll ask me to recommend you something considering you like Massive Attack, I will most probably not mention anything like Backstreet Boys, because, hopefully, other 100 people that liked Massive Attack haven't told me anything about them. Moreover, they would have probably mentioned some other bands more often and, so I will recommend those to you instead.

The answers I get sometimes become predictable after the first couple of bands, other times surprise me. This is how I learn about tastes (and believe me, there are some twisted ones out there :P).

First of all, you have to keep in mind that my answer doesn't necessary contain only stuff related (i.e., as genre) to your input. I take your input and I make my recommendations based on what other people like, and people's tastes can be quite diverse.

Second of all, I try to be more of a discovery engine than a “similar stuff" provider. I always try to recommend less popular items (comparing with your input). This increases the chance for me to mess up, but in the same time, it increases the chance to come up with some recommendations you haven't heard of before.

Finally, I know that even this argument can't help me getting out some embarrassing situations when my recommendations really have absolutely nothing to do with your input. I'm working on that. And maybe, just maybe, I like to give some silly answers every once in a while because I enjoy seeing that raised eyebrow of yours :P

As we speak ^^ I'm always trying to learn more. I know I'm still making a lot of mistakes and bad recommendations, but I hope I'll get better and better. Meeting new people and learning about their tastes is my passion, and there's always more to learn out there. I'm still very young, and other girls at my age are listening only to mainstream pop, so.. :D

Well, that's up to you ^^ If you would like to try some of my recommendations, you should do the same way you usually do when you hear about a band, movie or book, and want to listen to it/watch it/read it.

I think that art, like information, should be available to everybody. In the same time, I think that artists should have some kind of income in support of their talent. I discourage piracy, but in the same time, I think there should be some kind of legal ways to access art in a much more flexible and cheaper way than, let's say, buying the whole album of a band that you just want to hear how it sounds. Some solutions for this problem have already emerged on the Internet, but this is a much too complex subject to address here.

If you are interested on developing something based on my recommendations, I have my own API (all available parameters included). Before using it, please let me know.

Andrei Oghina, Founder
Envisioning a service that helps people satisfy their basic need of discovery in a simple and efficient way, Andrei has designed and built the TasteKid recommendation engine. Since then, he has been loyal to this vision and constantly worked on improving, distributing and promoting the service. He has worked as a web developer at SoftHost, a Romanian software developing company and holds a BS in Computer Science from the Politehnica University of Bucharest. Andrei is passionate about TasteKid, is interested in trends and changes, likes to debate, to travel and loves his family and friends.

Ramesh Haridas, Chairman
Ramesh has been involved in entrepreneurial ventures for the last 10 years. He has started and successfully sold two internet companies. He is also an active investor in early stage internet companies. Some of the companies he has invested in include Blip.tv, iMedix, Mashery, Lookery, CPM Advisors, LilGreenPatch, Cooler Planet, Esaya, Zedo, Webchutney (sold stake to TV18), Grisoft (sold stake to Enterprise Investors), Bbmao and Mobitrans.net. Ramesh holds a BS in Computer Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. He enjoys playing squash and listening to music from all over the world.

No, I'm not gonna tell you whether I do have a boyfriend or not :P It's just that me and my developer, Andrei, would like to thank some people that have been helping us to be able to talk to you right now:

- the SoftHost team, for generously providing web hosting, and maybe most important of it all, for being a continuous source of inspiration and discovery
- Romi @ Adworks Media, for giving me such a neat look and feel, a web design that I'm sure pleasures your eye (just don't forget I'm underage :P)
- Znupi (Andrei's younger but sharper brother), for always being there with a good advice and with his wicked skills
- you, my precious visitor!

If you like me, there is one way of helping me grow: by telling people about me. Any way of doing that is highly appreciated, from posting a link on your website or blog, following me on Twitter, using my Facebook App, becoming a fan of my Facebook page, to just telling one of your friends about me.

As I am young and not having a budget for fancy web campaigns this is the only way I can make myself helpful to more people, so I rely on you passing the word :)

Besides that, if you have any other ideas, proposals, suggestions, if you've noticed a bug or if you just want to tell me something, I would be thrilled to hear from you.

Tell me something.