Pandora, the Greek equivalent of Eve, was constructed collectively by all of the gods on Mount Olympus, who each gave her a gift. Hermes, ever the innovator, bestowed upon her the Internet. Thus Pandora Internet Radio was born.

It's a glorious manifestation of the Music Genome Project, which has set out to mathematize songs with the use of over 400 musical attributes. All you do is enter a band or song name into Pandora, then some sort of scientific wizardry happens behind the scenes, and out come songs from bands with similar sounds. For free.

It works remarkably well, which seems to legitimize math for me. For instance, create a station based on Led Zeppelin and you'll get some Pearl Jam and The Rolling Stones. Or if Barbra Streisand is more of your cup of tea, you'll get The Carpenters and Melissa Manchester (yeah I'm not sure who that is either).

If you don't like a song that pops up, click on the down-turned thumb (a nearly universal sign of displeasure) and the song is skipped. Give the same artist this treatment twice and they won't appear again. Conversely, a thumbs-up will make it a bit more likely that future songs will have even closer musical traits to the current song.

The level of control is empowering, and advertisements are rare, making the experience far more enjoyable than broadcast radio. And though the Pandora of Greek myth unleashed evil into this world (aside from opening that box, she was apparently a very pleasant woman), Pandora Radio is a jackpot in this chaotic cyberspace of ours.

Want more? Check out our review on the Pandora iPhone app.