Whoa, the BOB SEGER catalog showed up on streaming services overnight, with no warning and no explanation. OK, post-1974 only. Still, we're talking about this Bob Seger. Still workin' on his night moves, apparently... I've dreamt for years of a device that I can tell "play that RIHANNA song" and it will know what I mean, or to which I can hum the hook of that '90s hit by that band I can't remember, and it will queue it right up. This would be my parallel-universe SHAZAM, where I utter random weird snippets under my breath and my stereo instantly understands what I'm talking about. I have dreamt for years, it turns out, of exactly what the tech and music industries want the AMAZON ECHO to be. And what seemed like a magical sci-fi orb to me turns out to be a simple metadata issue, more or less. Or maybe not so simple, as BILLBOARD's STEVE KNOPPER makes clear in his story about how labels and tech companies are trying to solve it. When you request drinking music, do you mean FRANK SINATRA or DJ SCREW? When you say "play ED SHEERAN," do you mean something you've never heard or the same song you hear 12 times a day? When you ask for "rock songs from the '80s with a female vocalist for a running playlist" (that's "six or seven points of metadata," one startup founder tells Knopper), can you trust that labels have encoded enough metadata into their back catalogs to provide the best answers? And here's the twistiest problem: Do you want the most popular answer, the answer that's most personal to you, or the one that reflects the promotional needs of SONY or UMG at any given moment? You know, and I know, where this is going, or at least where it could go. Music programmers, we are counting on you, please... BARACK OBAMA loves JAY Z, who loves a whole lot of other rappers... My old boss TIM QUIRK points out what's missing from MARTIN BANDIER's call for streaming services to credit songwriters... The TUPAC movie boomlet begins today, with BENNY BOOM's ALL EYEZ ON ME opening nationwide on what would have been Pac's 46th birthday... Also this weekend: MONTEREY POP, redux... DR. DRE pledges $10 million to build an arts complex at COMPTON HIGH SCHOOL... Spotify tops 140 million users and closes in on $600 million in net losses... It's FRIDAY and that means new music from LORDE, BIG BOI, JASON ISBELL & THE 400 UNIT, COM TRUISE, FLEET FOXES, YOUNG THUG, BETH DITTO, KEVIN MORBY, 2 CHAINZ, ELI YOUNG BAND, RIDE, GOLDIE, STEVE EARLE & THE DUKES, PEAKING LIGHTS, PALEHOUND, PORTUGAL. THE MAN, HEY VIOLET and ROYAL TRUX... And a new SHANIA TWAIN single, her first in 15 years, which will either make you weep with joy or "run towards nails on a chalkboard."