You taped songs from the radio to give to a friend.

You burned a playlist to give to a crush.

DJs recorded mixes to give people a taste of what they sound like.

All curated and made by human hands.

Today, Spotify suggests songs for you. You swipe up on TikTok and you hear the biggest hit of the summer. You make a Reel and Instagram suggests what song to use as a background.

Algorithms have taken over. Even streaming playlists that used to be made by humans are now made by algorithms.

Spotify’s daylist is the perfect example of this. Most of the time it knows what you want. Sometimes, it’s unexpectedly great. But it’s always evolving around you and your changing preferences.

More hits than misses the more you use it.

The playlist mixtape as we know it is dead – but something new will take its place. That’s what change always does.

My take? Humans using algorithms will be more powerful than just algorithms on their own.

For now, if you’re a DJing making mixtapes make sure you put them on both YouTube and Mixcloud.