Fast and Furious Fourier Transform

A while ago, MusicBrainz used a technique called TRM for associating audio fingerprints with tracks. This relied on a proprietary, non-free database controlled by a for-profit company.

Your choices were to either use it and have music fingerprinting, or to not have the ability to fingerprint, since no one who knew how to develop a free database was doing so.

After some time with TRMs, MusicBrainz underwent a transition to PUIDs, and after running in parallel for some time, TRMs were dropped. PUIDs rely on a proprietary, non-free database controlled by a for-profit company.

Amazingly, things have changed. Now you can use free software to contribute to a publicly-available database.

If you have a music collection cleanly and properly tagged with MusicBrainz IDs, I urge you to participate in this project.