The team at recently-funded semantic news service, Wotnews, have been busy applying their semantic engine to the music business and have launched one of the coolest sites I’ve seen in a while - We Are Hunted.

We Are Hunted is “the online music chart”. Rather than look at shipped unit sales or online music downloads as a measure of popularity, We Are Hunted (WAH) listens to what is happening in online music across blogs, social networks, forums, Twitter and P2P networks to chart the top songs online.

It’s not just simple mentions either. The underlying tech tracks “sentiment, expression and advocacy” to give a list of the most popular music online, which you can narrow down based on song, timeframe, artist or even specific search terms.

—

—

The WAH business model has a couple of arms at the moment  - there’s an iTunes affiliate program where people can buy songs that they discover on the site and WAH are also working with Native Digital to provide record labels with relevant information.

Despite how cool the site is just for browsing, the best thing about WAH, im my opinion, is what it could mean for musicians and the fledgling music industry. With record sales plummeting and new business models needed, what WAH does is once again provide musicians, whether independent or signed, with an idea of where they stand in comparison to the popularity of other acts.

With this almost real-time information, musicians can look for new ways, beyond the mere selling of a digital music file, to make a living from their audience as their popularity grows. I don’t know what those new business models will be, but the musicians I know are a creative bunch, so the outcomes should be interesting.

Richard Slatter from Wotnews explained the genesis of WAH to TechNation Australia:

It occurred to us there is no longer a single definitive chart. With the impact of the Internet over the last decade or so the old metrics have disappeared. We wanted to create a new kind of chart based on buzz and activity across social networks, forums, music blogs, Torrents, P2P Networks and Twitter. Using this unstructured disparate data we measure and determine what are the most popular 99 songs online… right now.

I also asked Slatter about whether diversification is a growth strategy for Wotnews and he said:

This (WAH) is an experiment in how we can extend and apply our text analytics and search technology into other areas.

Music seemed an interesting candidate - an industry going through massive change, presenting enormous opportunities and openings to try something new.

We also liked the idea of partnering up with someone from the industry who understands the landscape. This means we can focus on the tech and lean on Native for other aspects of the project - branding and design, industry knowledge and contacts, etc.

This also allows us to remain focused on our main investments in the news space, while diversifying a little at the same time.

He also added:

we are interested in other verticals and would probably seek to partner with others to make it happen, much like we are doing with Native.

I’ve been playing with the site for the past few days and what’s popular has been really interesting. It seems that the list of the most popular songs on the Internet is actually a mix of old school favourites, up and comers and a few well known songs.

Oddly enough, if you go to the popular artists listing there are a lot more well-known names.

I’m not sure if that means that people like to talk more about well-known artists than their songs, or whether mainstream media pushes those well known artists so much that people don’t feel like they need to use talk about them on social media. It may be something completely different, but that’s another great thing about WAH - it’s putting together information that will make many people think more about the interaction between music, social media and those who enjoy both.

Go check it out - We Are Hunted.