Process and politics in interactive musical works

Thesis: S.M. in Comparative Media Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Humanities, 2016.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references (pages 83-85).As everyday musical experiences move further into software platforms, an interest among musicians in taking fuller advantage of computational media produces a strand of interactive, software-based musical works I call open mediational music. This phenomenon stands apart from other types of creative work centered on music and interaction by valorizing the listener's responsibility for instantiating musical works. It also advances an agenda of openness with respect to interactivity as a principle of new media. I center four case studies on a set of interactive musical works that exemplify this phenomenon: Reflective by Reiko Yamada, Thicket by Morgan Packard and Joshue Ott, Jazz. Computer by Yotam Mann and Sarah Rothberg, and Baggage Allowance by Pamela Z. Each of these works takes shape out of unique motivations and in different forms and settings. Collectively, they advance a notion of platforms as objects of critical awareness and propose listening as a model for mindful participation in algorithmic environments. Illuminating the distinct claims that sound and software hold on one another as creative domains, open mediational music invites listeners to rehearse a conscientious engagement with the sites and conditions of computationally mediated cultural encounter.by Andy Kelleher Stuhl.S.M. in Comparative Media Studie

ENTANGLED AUTONOMY ON AUTOMATED AIRWAVES: THE CASE OF RIVENDELL

Rivendell, a free and open source software suite for automated radio broadcasting, has brought several groups with clashing stances on technology, communication, and cultural politics into cooperation. This paper treats Rivendell as an opening onto the politics at play when the liberal ethos propelling free and open source software (Coleman, 2013) meets the autonomy-prizing traditions of independent broadcasting within an automation system. Complicating this already tense juncture, Rivendell has drawn users and code contributors from drastically opposed political groups within American broadcastings—right-wing Christian talk radio networks and progressive community stations—and has sustained a difficult terrain of working compromise that the activist push for low-power FM broadcasting inaugurated (Dunbar-Hester, 2014). In this paper, analysis of Rivendell's open source code base sheds light on its development and helps connect it to longer histories of media automation and its attendant social frictions. Interviews with lead Rivendell developers complete the picture of the project's trajectory, of its relation to the religious right context where the project began, and of the negotiations that have played out among its developers and its community of users in terrestrial and internet radio. The ongoing compromises and tensions threaded through Rivendell can offer insight into an issue that becomes larger and more pressing as media become increasingly complex and networked: how artists, activists, and media technologists who prioritize independence have reckoned with their reliance on socio-technical infrastructures whose connections may strike them as far less than savory

Panel: DH Perspectives; Panel Session 2: Jonathan Dettman, Andy Stuhl, Titilola Babalola Aiyegbusi & Miriam Peña

Digital Humanities Forum 2015: Peripheries, Barriers & Hierarchies, University of Kansas, September 26th, 2015: https://idrh.ku.edu/dhforum2015 "Digital Cuba: Problems and Possibilities." Jonathan Dettman is at the University of Nebraska-Kearney. "Critical Making, Platform Politics and Open Source in the Study of Digital Artworks." Andy Kelleher Stuhl is at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "Decolonizing Digital Humanities: Africa in Perspective." Titilola Babalola Aiyegbusi is at the University of Lethbridge. "eLaboraHd: Project of Digital Experimentation." Miriam Peña is at the National University Autonomous of Mexico