Headphones and earbuds, being smaller and quieter, do indeed give better sound per dollar, but they move with your head and remove the bass notes from your skin. Digital CDs ā being digitized but not otherwise compressed ā still sounded nearly perfect to me, but not so MP3s, AACs and, later, streaming, all of which made audio more portable and convenient but at some cost. It is very clear to both my senses and my intellect that too much compression really does damage sound quality ā no one disagrees with that part.
This all comes back to the sensory experience of how the body picks up vibrations:
Imagine youāre alone and frightened in the woods, in the dark, with threats nearby. Suddenly, crack! A twig snaps close by. At that moment, which would matter more to you: where the sound came from or what type of wood the twig was made of?
The best way to locate sounds is to use the whole body ā ears, skull, skin, even guts ā since the entire body contains vibration sensors. The brainās main job is making sense of vibrations throughout the body, eyeballs to toes to eardrums, all consistent, all at once. One single vibratory image unified from skin and ears.
Headphones and earbuds fracture that unified sensory experience.
Softky explains that the digital sampling and compression associated with CD’s and MP3’s denies the information resolution the nervous system cares about. This is where analogue technologies are still superior.
In response to all this, Softky predicts the emergence of three new technologies that could change the world by reconnecting people with sound:
- Devices that quantify sound the right way
- Microtime recording and stereo
- Micropresence = microtime telepresence
Alternatively, we could see a return to more ‘acoustic’ music concerts:
The best connection will always be a physical presence and proximity. I expect more āacousticā music concerts, all-live musicians, no microphones or even hyper-flickering LED illumination. Acoustic dances. Acoustic conferences. It turns out the so-called āemotional resonanceā people enjoy together really is a kind of neuromechanical resonance, aided by acoustics and reduced by reproduction. (Itās best experienced in sacred spaces like churches, temples and Aurovilleās Matrimandir. Live silence, like live music, will always connect people the way Neil Young hopes.
This reminds me of intimacy of La BlogothĆØque.
For more on sound and technology, Geoffrey Morrison discusses the problem with digital compression. This is also something discussed on Switched on Pop in an interview with Dallas Taylor.
Welcome back for another month.
On the family front, I took my daughters to the Fairy Park just out of Geelong, our eldest had her end of year music concert, while my wife was successful in application to become assistant principal next year.
At work, I continued to balance the multiple roles of on-boarding new schools, supporting current schools and work through some of the issues associated with our workflows. The biggest challenge I find is that each party thinks you are their resource for the whole time, but we get by ā just. I also attended the regional elearn meeting where I was lucky enough to touch base with Tony Richards and Kimberley Hall.
Personally, I listened to a few new albums from Elbow, Nils Frahm and Angel Olsen, but to be honest, I spent more time reading. I was inspired by something Philip Roth said, which Craig Mod quoted in his newsletter:
I am thinking that I have not really been reading then. Therefore, I wondered through Martin Lindstromās world of Small Data, reflected on Edward Snowdenās Permanent Record, returned to Clive Thompsonās Coders and also dived into Philip Glassā memoir Words Without Music. With all this in mind, I have not really been doing a lot of long form writing, although I have a few drafts of things going.
Here then are the links that really stood out to me this month:
Education
Sweeping changes to HSC and syllabus proposed by government review
Jordan Baker reports on the proposed changes put forward by Geoff Masters in the NSW Curriculum Review Interim Report. Most importantly, this raised the question as to what the purpose of curriculum is.
Sustaining School Organisational Change
Mal Lee and Roger Broadie unpack the difference between driving initial change and sustaining it for the long term.
After Babel: Designing for Community
Sean Michael Morris unpacks the challenges associated with learning in online communities.
Psychodata
Ben Williamson disassembles the growing world of social and emotional learning.
The Need for Transformational Learning is Long Overdue
Val Margarit discusses the six steps she uses for encouraging heutagogical learning environments.
Education before Regulation: Empowering Students to Question Their Data Privacy
Autumm Caines and Erin Glass discuss data privacy and the importance of educating students about the topic.
Technology
Is Amazon Unstoppable?
Charles Duhigg takes a deep dive into the world of Amazon, including day one thinking, relentless improving, copying culture and the spectre of anti-trust.
The strange world of TikTok: viral videos and Chinese censorship
Anushka Asthana and Alex Hern discuss the censorship associated with social video app TikTok and its timeless algorithmic feed.
How memes got weaponized: A short history
Joan Donovan unpacks the history associated with memes.
Is Anyone Going to Get Rich off of Email Newsletters?
Kaitlyn Tiffany explores the ever evolving world of newsletters.
Social Media Has Not Destroyed a Generation
Lydia Denworth argues that although people like Jean Twenge might be right about the impact of social media on health, correlation does not always equal conclusion. More research is required to better understand some of the nuances.
Want to make a podcast? Here are five things we learnt at OzPod 2019
Kellie Riordan highlights five takeaways from the OzPod 2019 Conference.
Reflection
Inside the Big Day Out
Through a 5-part series, Gemma Pick documents the history of The Big Day Out from its early beginnings in the 90s to its capitulation in 2015.
Planning for a problematic future
Edwina Stott explores the strategy of scenario planning as a way of responding to the complex, complicated and often confounding futures.
āItās a bit Pompeii-likeā: The unexpected āburied blocksā of Melbourne
Zach Hope provides a fascinating insight into the early years of Melbourne where some houses were buried in an effort to raise the swampy areas.
A million people are jailed at Chinaās gulags. I managed to escape. Hereās what really goes on inside
David Stavrou paints a picture of life inside of a Xinjiang āreeducationā camp. This is based on a testimony provided by Sayragul Sauytbay, a teacher who escaped from China and was granted asylum in Sweden.
Annika Smethurst: āWorry is my new normalā
Annika Smethurst provides a sobering account of life after the Australia Federal Policeās raids and what is on the line when reporting on the government and security.
How Science Got Sound Wrong
William Softky explains how vinyl is better than digital music.
Read Write Respond #046
So that was October for me, how about you? As always, happy to hear.
Cover Image via JustLego101
Also on:
I have used Google Music for the last few years, however it is going away. This has been on the books for awhile. As the lights are slowly turned off on another Google product, here is my reflection on the options and my choice moving forward.
YouTube Music
The most obvious choice is to simply move over to YouTube Music. As Ron Amadeo shared, the demise of Google Music is about YouTube as anything else.
https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/gh/Blogger-Peer-Review/quotebacks@1/quoteback.js
Therefore, a few months ago, I transferred my data over to YouTube Music to try it out.
The one thing I initially noticed was that there is some confusion between āYouTubeā and āYouTube Musicā. I had some pre-exisiting music related playlists in YouTube. These too were available in YouTube Music, often meaning that I could listen to live performances without also watching them. I think this would sort itself out in the long run as my playlists become a bit more consolidated. However, it was an initial point of confusion.
Another observation was the way in which YouTube Music organises artists. For those without a channel, YouTube automatically generates a channel. This means without an official channel, YouTube Music incidentally mashes together different bands/artists with the same name. Look at the Canadian synthpop band DIANA for example, their collection is combined with other random DIANAās which I am pretty sure are not the real DIANA band. This is a problem also carried over from Google Music.
Bandcamp
Damon Krukowski recently explored the question as to whether Bandcamp is a streaming platform. The reality is that it is not. Although it provides such features, of being to access music across devices, the focus seems to be on creating a marketplace for people to purchase music, as well as merchandise. Although I have stepped up my purchases on the platform, not every band is on Bandcamp, therefore this is still primarily about supporting artists.
Own Your Own Music
I have read about people setting up their own personal music servers. I imagine I could probably do this with Reclaim Cloud. The other alternative is to go complete old school and scrap streaming altogether and just load purchases to my devices as I used to do. To be honest, it just isnāt a priority for me right now. I guess I have become far too wedded to the cloud, even with all the hidden costs.
Spotify
My last stop was Spotify. In regards to user experience, YouTube Music and Spotify seem very similar.
One point of difference between the two platforms is the ability for children to tune in. Although my daughter was able to create her own account to connect with the family subscription associated with Google Music, this was not possible with YouTube Music. I would assume this relates to the fact that YouTube accounts are restricted to 13+, but am not completely sure. Alternatively, Spotify has created a separate app for children. Although this does not allow access to all artists and songs, it does mean at least allow my daughter to have full control without needing to create an account.
https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/gh/Blogger-Peer-Review/quotebacks@1/quoteback.js
In addition to this, there are still some artists and albums available on Spotify that are not necessarily available on YouTube Music.
In the end, I ended up going with Spotify. This included using Tune My Music to bring across some of my playlists from Google Music. Maybe in the future I will resurrect my music files and create my own server? As I am apprehensive about the data mined and the move into DNA. Or maybe I will join the (re)turn to vinyl in a search for an optimal experience. I guess we will see.
As always, comments welcome.
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Moving On From Google Music by Aaron Davis is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
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