Ace reporter Caroline McCarthy joins the show today to give us a little preview of South by Southwest, while we ream Justin Yu for totally being a pushover on our competing podcast "Bore Out Loud." Caroline says there isn't really much scheduled that will be ground-breaking this year, but that's because The 404 isn't there.
Ace reporter Caroline McCarthy.
(Credit: Wilson G. Tang/CNET)McCarthyism says that she's got the connection to get us on "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon." We think we can get on if Diggnation can get on. Letterman ain't having us after a week with U2.
Jeff and Caroline have a pale-off. It's pretty damn close, but we've got to say Jeff wins this one. He temporarily blinded Wilson yesterday when he sat underneath a light when shooting the brand new Nintendo DSi. Speaking of which, CNET gets an exclusive first look at the device, and we think Jeff is a believer now. It only took 100 million Nintendo DSs to get it done. Also, check out Jeff on Loaded today, where he gives his first impressions of the new Resident Evil 5.
Finally, we end the show on a classy note. A man has managed to get a USB flash drive installed on his prosthetic finger. The jokes ensue when Justin comments that he'd love to get a USB drive attached to a certain peripheral on his body. This is truly the home of the "Nerdy dirty."
Our contest is still going on. Send in your suggestions to the show. We love hearing them, especially the international ones. Much praise goes to brisebanelistener for quite possibly one of the funniest voice mails ever!
EPISODE 297
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ArcAttack's performances include two singing Tesla coils, a robotic drum set and a PVC pipe organ.
(Credit: ArcAttack)
When you think of things related to science, music may not make the top of your list.
But the folks involved with a small collective called ArcAttack would like you to change your associations.
ArcAttack is all about one thing: building singing Tesla coils and crafting entire musical performances around them. For some time, at events like Dorkbot and other geekfests, the team--Joe DiPrima, Oliver Greaves, and Tony Smith--had been pulling off straightforward demonstrations of their creations. But they were synchronizing the machines to other people's music and not adding much in the way of their own innovations besides the singing Tesla coils themselves.
Now, however, ArcAttack has a whole ensemble mixing science and music and plastic--the Tesla coils, a pipe organ made from PVC, a robotic drumset--and putting it all together in short concerts with original music.
"We've got a solid 45 minutes or so of original content," DiPrima, an engineer at the University of Texas, told me recently, "and sometimes we'll incorporate themes from popular songs or do mixups with video game music.
When you see the singing Tesla coils, it takes a minute to really understand what you're watching. At first, you don't hear the tunes in the crackling of the electricity. But after a few moments, you realize what you're hearing and it's startling--especially if you have any experience with Tesla coils--to see these scientific wonders spitting out little bits of lightning with a beat.
"I've always loved music--playing it, and electronics too," DiPrima said. "I've been in a lot of bands, along with the other guys in the group, and this is probably the most fun we've had out of any other project we've been in. The way people respond to the coils playing real music with other instruments involved is amazing. People love it."
In particular, DiPrima suggested, ArcAttack's performances give their audiences--both in person and on the Web--a sense that music and science can indeed blend in a way that teaches something.
For many people, music is not the first thing they would associate with a Tesla coil, but ArcAttack has managed to build entire performances around its singing versions of the geek-favorite machines.
(Credit: ArcAttack)
"It's...a great way to get people interested in the science behind it," he said, "to present a Tesla coil, not just (as) an 'air core resonant transformer,' but (as) an effective tool for high intensity music."
This year's South-by-Southwest Interactive seems to have reached a kind of critical mass, with lots of smart and opinionated people converging around a rapidly changing industry, creating the kind of excitement that used to be found at CES or (way back) Comdex.
This year's South by Southwest Interactive conference seems to have reached the kind of critical mass that used to characterize CES and Comdex.
Forget about Business Week reporter Sarah Lacy's awkward on-stage interview of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, which has been amply detailed elsewhere (although watching them might have been akin to the uncomfortable pleasure of watching a fight at a hockey game). I really wish I'd seen the panel discussion on ad-supported music. According to a posting on PaidContent.org, it degenerated into a shouting match, with a Capitol records exec saying he needed more Internet promotion like he needed a root canal without anesthetic, RCRD LBL founder Peter Rojas dissing iTunes as irrelevant, and audience members yelling that Rojas doesn't respect intellectual property. (RCRD LBL is essentially a music blog with free music provided by bands as a promotional tool.)
There was also a presentation by Apple engineering manager Michael Lopp (aka Rands in Repose, he of the greatest guide to Vegas ever blogged), in which he discussed the company's unique approach to design--think painstaking mockups and brainstorming, both of which are taken seriously rather than treated as afterthoughts or mere team-building exercises.
(Credit:
Peter Gavin)
A few years ago we may have asked, "How did we ever live without cell phones?" Now we ask the same question about text messaging. It was indeed a lifesaver last week at the South by Southwest music conference in Austin, Texas. With live music ringing throughout the city 24/7, it was hard to find a quiet spot to make a phone call. So, along with thousands of others, I found myself obsessively texting to stay in touch with my cohorts about great shows (and to find ways to escape the bad ones). Cryptic messages such as "Holy F*ck playing Beauty Bar at 11" were not uncommon.
For some conference-goers, however, text messaging is old news. During the interactive portion of SXSW, there was a buzz around Twitter: the new phenomena best described as "microblogging." With 60,000 users, including presidential candidate John Edwards, it's the latest networking tool for posting one-liners on your whereabouts. You can use Twitter via IM, the Web, or your cell phone.
Rob Crow, master of Beard Rock
(Credit: James Martin)So, did all this texting lead to any good music? Most definitely. However, it also led to sore feet (sometimes it's best just to stay put). Performances by Rob Crow, Peaches, Land of Talk, Ra Ra Riot, Andrew Bird and Datarock were my personal faves. I also had the opportunity to host a live video performance/interview with Nicole Atkins (thank you MP3.com). I'm putting together a Best of SXSW feature for Download.com Music. In the meantime, check out SXSW playlists, videos, and blogs. Oh, and visit my SXSW photo gallery on Webshots.
AUSTIN, Texas--If you happened to be in Brush Square Park Saturday evening for the South by Southwest edition of Dorkbot, the gatherings of artists and engineers in various cities that work with electronic art, I sure hope you saw the singing tesla coils.
I did, and it was one of the coolest things I've seen in a long time. First of all, I love tesla coils--disruptive discharge transformer coils that shoot out bolts of electricity--to begin with. But this took the concept to a whole new level: Two small, side-by-side versions of the electricity-spewing devices that were working in tandem, producing music.
Was it real music? Well, I suppose that the definition of "music" is always open to interpretation, but in this case I'd have to say yes. After all, there was a beat, a rhythm and before I knew it, I found myself doing a little head bob. To the singing tesla coils.
So, I asked the creators, Oliver Greaves and Joe DiPrima of The Geek Group, about the wondrous creation they said it took them a year to build.
"We figured out we could do it when we started playing with solid state tesla coils," said DiPrima, adding it wouldn't have been possible without help from mentor Steve Ward. "We were the first group to document it."
I asked him to explain the concept to me, definitely in layman's terms, as I was a little afraid of a lengthy explanation involving different kinds of waves and spectrometers and things I would never understand or be able to pass on to you, my wonderful readers.
DiPrima was very patient with me.
"We're using a computer to modulate the tesla coils," he said. "They're digitally controlled. We built (what we call the) 'Disruptor,' which takes music and turns it into digital pulses."
I asked him how much it would cost to build a version of their invention, and he said that it would only cost about $100, though his group had spent several thousand dollars on research and development.
He also said he wouldn't be proprietary about the design.
"I figure, if someone is smart enough to understand how it works," DiPrima told me, "then I'm willing to share the information."
Now, The Geek Group is working on a larger version of the singing tesla coils. The current version shoots out electrical pulses about a foot long. But in a future version, the bolts will be around six or eight feet long.
I can't wait to see it.
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