A walk through a city produces organic hums and chirps, metallic bangs and twists, barks, sneers, and charm. When one takes a closer look at this sound an opportunity arises to filter disturbances and focus the intake to a personalized oscillation of curiosity.
When one catches themselves listening in to a private conversation broadcast into the public, what implications come with eavesdropping? Where do standards of privacy enter the public square?
The proximity of enclosed transit will eventually present the listener with another’s private details. A phone call to home, the closing of a business deal, hopeless sobs of someone with nowhere to go.
The vulnerability of these sounds display motivations and hopes of people unable to cull their grief into a socially accepted public display.
The proximity of enclosed transit will eventually present the listener with another’s private details. A phone call to home, the closing of a business deal, hopeless sobs of someone with nowhere to go.
The vulnerability of these sounds display motivations and hopes of people unable to cull their grief into a socially accepted public display.
What if these displays were extracted as data?
The vulnerability of these sounds display motivations and hopes of people unable to cull their grief into a socially accepted public display. What if these displays were collected and leveraged as intel?
The system listens in on the plaza, train station, or public park and conveys the citizens’ conversations to the those in power. Disguised as noise canceling headphones, the inverse tones are recorded, analyzed and archived in the monitoring room.
Socially Listening is explored here by further diagramming an opportunity for audio recording in a consumer product. The information and knowledge power acquired is reminiscent to that of our personal assistants and smart speakers. Would one willingly broadcast their environment for the comfort of silence?
Spatial visualization of train ride. Frequencies are display radially using MaxMSP
