I have been trying to come up with a design for an offline portfolio. Here are a few pages from the latest concept. I created them in illustrator and not in InDesign as I have done previously as I seem to get on better with Illustrator.
Let me know what you think.
Adobe have released betas of some key apps due to be released as part of CS4. I hope that performance has been improved and some interesting new features added because I’m really not a fan of trying to figure out how to do something I know how to do in CS3 but can’t in CS4 because they’ve moved the toolbars!
I wonder how long until a cracked version appears on the net. I say 24 hours from release.
Flash is finally working with MaxMSP, for all the good it is going to do. The Macs in the interaction lab have yet to have Flash Server installed on them and the demo version of MaxMSP is runs out today on everyones laptops. This means that nobody can come in over the weekend and work, nor work at home.
The good news is that there is now some interactivity between sounds processed by Max and Flash generated balls. After some tinkering with settings and inputs, someone can now control the generation of balls with their voice but not the size and the shapes do not play back their sounds.
After many hours of frustration the prototype now has less functionality than earlier in the day as there has been so much manipulation of code and overwriting of files that the perfect working alpha has been lost.
There were some screenshots taken while it was operational as well as some of a side-lined problem. The problem involved the on/off switches that were triggered to start recording. They would be triggered when the buffer was [banged] but then they would stay open when they needed to close as soon as the next buffer was [banged] open.
Progress until today had been slow and painful with few breakthroughs and a loss of direction recently as well as a feeling that contribution to the project had been lacking on my part. That changed when Javascript was abandoned in favour of Flash as Russell knows a lot of Flash. He progressed quickly through the task of generating balls which can change colour and size with a variable (which in the case of this prototype is just a random number that will be replaced by inputs from Max using Flash Server)
While this breakthrough happened in the graphics department of the project, another breakthrough was happening with the sounds. The analyser part has been successful for a number of weeks now but today the recording part was filled out.
The basics of what has been accomplished:
The problem was that if the sound remained above the set peak level, then this would result in it continuously ‘banging’ the [counter] and so recording a fraction of a second into the [buffer] each time. What needed to happen was tracking to see if the sound peaked over a level and then set a [counter] to count for 2000ms (which is the max length of the [buffer]) to allow the recording to fill that [buffer] and not fill several [buffers]. As well as this it needed to know to reset the [counter] and select the next [buffer] if the sound stopped peaking above the set level before the 2000ms was up.
This has now been achieved but needs some fine tuning as when both statements are connected at the same time, they both function correctly but they do so at the same time. So another statement needs to be introduced in order to determine which way to go. One was with short sounds and one way with longer sounds.
Also when the [counter] ‘bangs’ the check box to record into the [buffer] it only turns it on, so the next time the cycle passes that [buffer] it will turn it off and not on, so will not record anything until the cycle after. The same problem occurs with the recalling and playback of the sounds.
Is internet privacy giving way to internet security?
There is an inherent paradox with security and privacy issues surrounding the internet. They seem to be unable to work in harmony even though their definitions are exclusive of each other. Could this be due to pressures from the music and film industries with regard to file? A look into other areas where privacy and security issues have been addressed, possibly in the area of terrorism, something to which file sharers have been accused of.
A large part of this and in fact what has brought this to light is file sharing and the problems & controversy that it is causing. ISPs are being forced to take responsibility for what their customers are downloading which means they are forced to void their subscribers’ privacy through ‘deep packet inspection’ which has issues within itself. To try and combat this, the ‘three strike rule’ was proposed which was narrowly defeated. Neither the government nor the music / film industries know how to combat illegal file sharers or ‘unauthorised distribution of copyrighted material’ so they are trying to see what EVERYONE is downloading in order to catch those few who with nefarious purposes.
Historically there has been a problem with security and privacy, none more so than during times of war. The privacy of other nations was being invaded but it was needed to ensure the security of the home nation. Is this the reason people when we examine privacy vs security within the borders of a nation? Is the problem now an international one and should it be dealt with on an international scale with all countries signing a document? There is a possible reference to the enigma machine, message encryption and code breaking. Has anything really changed since then and is it just the technology that has advanced on both sides of the current ‘cyber war’?
Why is illegal or copyright file-sharing so prolific? Is the government to blame or is it the greed of the industries which are being infringed?
Sony BMG has released their entire music collection for free, with a 10 second advert at the start of each song. It is free to download and listen to but costs to transfer to an mp3 player, for which one would hope they would have removed the advert. This is a sign that things are changing and industries are realising they cannot simply BAN everyone who they suspect is illegally getting their content. Instead they are seeing that there are other financial models that gives users’ and themselves what they want, without pressuring governments and regulatory bodies into taking foolhardy ’seen to be taking action’ actions.
The aim is to find out why we need security and why we want privacy. The key difference is in the need vs want. Security is paramount as without it we are vulnerable yet we want privacy which seems to be infringed upon by security. Can we ever find a way that we are being protected and anonymous?
People to Contact
Torrent Users – as part of the Bit Torrent community I am able to easily contact people about how they use the service. Some of the largest copyright infringement lawsuits are aimed at the users directly or at the people who provide ‘trackers’.
Torrent Trackers – such as Torrent Leech and The Pirate Bay the latter of which is a more prominent name and is currently undergoing a legal battle in Sweden which started by the Swedish police confiscated 180 servers. The site remains operational.
Phorm - internet advertising agency that have been in the media recently about violating internet privacy laws even though they tried to make their targeted ad system anonymous. Their video indicated that it was anonymous so I would be interested as to what they have violated.
ISPs - internet service providers such as BT, Virgin, Tiscali, Pipex etc. would be a great source of information with regard to the pressures they faced recently with the government’s proposed ‘three strike ban’. Luckily this was voted out, but only narrowly.
Government - contacting any area of the government that deals with this area would be very beneficial as the argument needs to have an official line in order to get both sides and ensure a balance and having a direct quote from a government official would be a fantastic example.
Sony BMG - it would be interesting to find out how long they have been thinking about their move to freely distribute their content. They are in partnership with one site which would also be worth contacting to find out how they managed to get a huge distributor to do what no one said could be done.
I was browsing around YouTube to find some videos about Microsoft surface to post about the actual point of it all as I was discussing today that the only thing you can do with most touch screens is look at photos, resize them and have a really cluttered desktop. Anyway, I came across the promotional video here which I recommend you watch but then I came across the video below which is a parody of the ad.
…and so you don’t think I just hate Macs, I also hate Microsoft… I am doomed.
Normally when you hear about tracking you just assume that it’s a very expensive piece of kit or a highly sophisticated algorithm. Well Cam-Trax is sophisticated but with its simplicity.
The system allows you to control anything you like by tracking an object’s colours. You will understand when you watch the video below. It seems very apt considering we are all experimenting with tracking in some form or another at the moment.
This is a really cool use of touch screens and interactive visuals in a DJ music environment. This would have been great for Rave On Air and it seems to show great use of new digital media taking over again from the ‘analogue world’.
Here is a quick Photoshopped image of my eye.
Click the image to view the set in Flickr.
I have started using Flickr to manage my photos as Wordpress doesn’t do what I want to with any degree of ease so I bought a Flickr Pro account for £12 for a year giving me unlimited space and sets. I am now looking for a good Wordpress Flickr plugin so that I can display the images here. I have tested and seems to work after some tweaking and googling.
Click the image to view the set in Flickr.