Search noraebang song numbers on Naver, get onebox results

Naver now returns immediate onebox results (only on mobile, oddly) for noraebang (노래방, karaoke singing room) song number codes. No more using a dedicated app like a chump, or that greasy old songbook like a gramps.

If you're unfamiliar, noraebang are the private singing rooms where Koreans go to let off some steam by crying out their favorite songs (and sometimes by ordering in some hanky-panky room service). There's a large screen that plays generic emotional scenes while the words scroll by and you sing into a microphone with reverberation set at 11. But how do you input the song you want? In my day, we scan through a giant crusty old binder in the room to find the 4-5 digit code that corresponds to the song. Clearly this is a slow process, and you had to share the binder with others, and of course it wasn't always updated with the latest tunes.

About a million years later, Naver has saved you the hassle and built this feature right into their search box.

Search 노래방 (or click here) and a special mini-search box appears. Type in an artist or title, and boom, the correct number code is there. Here's an example.

Naver search results for "Hotel California" noraebang song number

Punch in the right code for that machine's brand (pro-tip: they're almost all TJ) and you'll be on a dark desert highway, cool wind in your hair, in no time.

Funnily enough, I hate the Eagles. But if this song doesn't come up in rotation at least once, then we're clearly not drunk enough.

Yes, I know a million websites and apps already had this feature. In fact that was the first official post on this blog (total link rot there). But this is the first time Naver's provided the info directly. It demonstrates how both Google and Naver are absorbing other sites/apps functionality for our convenience. Good for personal productivity, but I worry about the future of the open web when we end up with no reason to ever leave Google/Naver's own provided and contained results. It's a safe harbor, but the more we stay in it the less we explore.

Boy this post was going to be a quick single link dump with pic. Then I got wordy. Maybe I need a visit to a lovely place, with a lovely face.

Comments