Discussion about strategies and ideas for building Wikisonic

Oze: Knows of some potential solutions for linking SL and RL (and vice versa)

Nina: Perhaps simultaneous SL and RL manipulation is too confusing. 

Anne: Could be simplified by making the SL user run whatever their interaction is from a pretty static place - then put a 'camera' in front of them, and use a projector to show this image.  We can make a 'camera' by signing up an account that's just for this, and shoving the avatar in a closet somewhere. Then navigate their POV to the camera position.  On the real life side we take the SL client and delete most of the XUL. That removes all the normal menus and controls. (Hmm... easier might just be to turn on overscan mode on the projector).

Jon: Great idea!  Much simpler and equally if not more effective than simultaneous interaction.  Ideally, although perhaps too ambitious, we could also stream a camera of the real life museum into SL as well, so the avatars could see the real life installation. 

[NB- Annie - running a camera from RL to SL isn't hard]

Jon: The best part about this would be, with sound enabled, you could subtly hear the SL Wikisonic song, combining with the current song created at the real life museum and vice versa - so the two songs would overlap slightly.

Perhaps the sounds in RL vs. SL were complimentary to each other, such that the combined song sounds better than either of them do on their own (one treble/bass - strings/horns - whatever).   Lag effect would be fine, since its not a pre-arranged composition, it can get away with meandering and being slightly off-beat at times.  I see lag as just a part of the context of the media we're working with. 

[nb - Annie - yes, but  it wouldn't be  'a little', it'd be more like  two people who can't hear each other trying to sing 'row row row your boat'.  - I doubt anybody will find it interesting, it'll just be broken]

Jon: Ok, but then the purpose of the projection is limited to just letting visitors see that there is a virtual build, but not able to hear the corresponding composition.  It's purely visual interaction in an installation that is all about an audio experience.  I'm not sure that would be terribly interesting either - perhaps even confusing.  Also, I think there's more to the composite 'song' than just trying to create a carefully organized arrangement - it can be messier than that imho- and the sound-bytes we use can be harmonic and equivocal so they blend more seamlessly.  Also, it could just be a matter of volume control - the virtual composition could be playing quite quietly in the background so visitors can decide to hear more or less of it, depending on where they stand.

Nina: There is a benefit building this in a more linear way instead of circular -

Jon: That makes a lot of sense. 

Jon: Instead of having the song go on and on indefinitely, I think there should be a Reset button somewhere that turns everything to off, letting a new user start from scratch.  I'm not sure if it's practical, but introducing a Save option would be ideal - such that one person could use the installation to write a song of their own and save it.  This might be over the top, but it would be really sweet if those arrangements could be somehow 'life logged' to a server somewhere, and made available on a public website so anyone can grab those samples from their own computers.

[annie - Don't see a technical problem doing this, except for the one of identifying the user. But I doubt it'll ever be used.] 

Cooler still, they could upload their re-mixes back up to the website for others to build on or re-mix some more.  I don't think the interface would have to be terribly complicated - just one long string of audio with date/time 'snapshots' that were saved or uploaded.   Kind of like what Sheep Labs did with Destroy TV - only instead of life-logging everything - just absorb all the audio samples for public consumption and manipulation.  It might also give the project a longer tail - lasting as a web resource long after the installation closes - again, similar to Destroy TV - all of the videos and flickr screenshots are still quite popular to this day.  But again, if it's too much, or too complex - that part could be nixed.

[Annie - Dunno - this doesn't seem like it's going to create anything deathless. This looks like creeping featuritis to me]

Jon: Fair enough, but what we have then is a wall of notes people can use to see how chords sound when arranged differently.  Isn't this just big piano keyboard?   It would definitely need a new name, because it's not really a wiki at all.  It would still be musical, and educational - being able to see how changes to the musical score effects the outcome of song.  If the group agrees that's interesting enough to warrant the trouble of the installation, I can be ok with it too.

Nina: I think it would be cool for people to be able to "upload" various arrangements created by other visitors and by staff to the wall to check them out.  We can use the staff ones in particular to illustrate certain educational components of chords etc., and if you are able to "save" your music and add it to the set of available arrangements, it can be wiki-like, continuously changing.  the instrument itself can always be a reflection of what previous users have done, but people can also start from any of the stored options.  That way, SL and RL users could both store to the same database, but the on-floor interactive would only "play" the SL arrangements the way any other user arrangements would be played.  Storing data doesn't make too much sense in the museum context because so many visitors are not repeat visitors, so they only experience the wiki component while standing at the actual exhibit.  Because of that reality, logging can seem overkill...

Also, at the RL museum, visitors have "tech tags"--bar codes on their tickets--that allow them to store data from their visit (primarily photos).  They could save their composition as a music file to the tech tag, for retrieval on the web later and potential cross-sharing and manipulation via the tech tag sites.