abstracts
Scramble
Shea, G., et al

In this article, we describe a collaborative word game that is being created for cell phones as part of the Mobile Digital Commons Network research project. The first iteration has been built and tested and further iterations with harder and easier levels of gameplay are being planned.

 

Alter Audio: Mobile and Locative Sound Experiences
Geoffrey Shea and Paula Gardner

As part of the MDCN research project at OCAD, Banff NMI, and Concordia/Hexagram, OCAD faculty Paula Gardner and Geoffrey Shea have constructed a series of interactive user experiences for presentation on cell phones. These were designed as a series of iterative development exercises, each exploring different technical possibilities and a range of content types and user engagements. At a charette (or workshop) in Toronto in June, 2006 three interns worked with Gardner and Shea and MDCN engineers to implement the first four of ten planned iterations. Here we review the technologies and strategies adopted in preparation for continuing work on the further iterations.

 

Alter Audio Development Report
Paula Gardner and Geoffrey Shea

Summary of a group brianstorming session building on past discussions and decisions taken in the previous Montreal meeting and subsequent online exchanges. In this session we:

  • identified some basic questions about the experience we were designing
  • imagined a simple instantiation of the experience
  • considered some alternatives and expanded functionality
  • planned a series of scaled prototypes
  • identified internal metaphors
  • and then shifted our focus by considering entirely different applications of the system

 

Democratic Audio Technologies
David Gauthier

Here is a quick not-too-deep overview of possible technologies that could support our application. I've separate them in three categories : Audio Sampling\Resampling\ Effects

 
Alter Audio - Draft Technical Specification
Geoffrey Shea

In order to begin testing the range of shared music composition / performance scenarios that we have discussed I have sketched a preliminary platform that could support some of these activities. Different sets of initial content can be created and deployed on the system to test aspects of the experience.

 

Considerations for Preparing a Cultural Mobile Experience
Geoffrey Shea

Notes and references based on discussions with Paula Gardner, David McIntosh, Martha Ladly, Bruce Hinds, Sara Diamond in preparation for engineering and content development for MDCN II.

 

Alter Audio Treatment
Paula Gardner

The Alter Audio project contains a variety of digital musical experiences that allow users to engage creatively in sound and music composition in both urban and mountain environments. Users can engage in composition over time and in live musical collaboration. In the composition scenario, users can experience any or all of the following three phases: Audio Sampling\Resampling\Effects (manipulation), Audio Choreography (mixing) and Repositing audio samples (containing/sharing). Sounds, which are collected from caches, created by users or mixed (or remixed), are intended to reflect, in some way, the environment in which they are obtained, created or remixed.