Lou Fuiano
ITI Spring 2006
Duff

The Art of Human Computer Interface
Talking and Listening to Computers
Joy Mountford, William Gaver

Sight Sayer

Computers talking and listening seems like it would flow seamlessly with our day to day activities. As I was going through the reading, it became evident how complex these functions truly are. Much like working with gesture and 3-d motion, the variables and how they are mapped is daunting. However, my real interest was in the implications that this new rapport would have.

From my first experiences working with graphics in the digital environment, I was always amazed at how the screen simplified the task of graphic design and fabrication. It was also no surprise that the language of graphic design became commonplace. Everyone was tossing around the jargon. Icons this, type face that. As a result, the educational opportunities for the entire graphic design form grew exponentially. It makes perfect sense. Navigating the screen, interacting with it, creating content for it became a part of everyday life for more and more people. Not just in their jobs, but at home as well. This in turn made us all the more astute in regards to the visual language.

My first thoughts about incorporating sound were that the user would thereby become much more sound savvy. Speaking and listening would be very specific tasks. Dynamics and articulation would be deftly handled. More of us would be able to identify pitches and chord tones. In fact, sounds that produce a sustained tone along with accompanying tones makes for a kind of music. One that informs and instructs. These could be quirky melodies that would serve as indictors rather than amusement or rhythmic buzzes, dings and beeps. This was very intriguing to me. Music, as everyone knows, has a great emotional power. For the most part, music is used to entertain and enhance. It lends a robust quality to story telling in theater and film, and it also survives as commodity just based on it's properties as sound. Of course, it's the people making the sound that ultimately holds our interest. Never the less, sound and music can single handedly direct popular culture.

The idea of our electronic devices communicating and hence directing our daily activities creates a very new form of sound and music. Mountford and Gaver pointed out that; sound feedback from the computer gives us something "tactile". Something that would reference the real world. These are wonderful devices when used properly. Sounds that we recognize from the world outside of the screen. The sound of water filling a glass, tapping on a surface, mechanical objects, etc. The curious thing to me is when the sounds the computer makes are not referenced sounds. The sounds that are unique to the computer as it speaks to us in it's own language. My interest is in the evolution of those sounds and how they will affect language and music.

top of page