Blog # 12 Readings for 4/28/09

The Aesthetics of Failure: "Post-Digital" Tendencies in Contemporary Computer Music - Kim Cascone

Loving the Ghost in the Machine - Janne Vanhanen

Cascone's article talks mainly about how the Internet helped to bring a new movement, both academically and commercially, in digital music. Cascone further includes how this new movement is affecting the content and form of electronic music. The Negroponte Epigraph inspired her to say that "the revolutionary period of the digital information age has surely passed" (Cascone Pg.8).

The second article, by Janne Vanhanen, illuminates the development of music as its dependency upon digital technology has increased. She defines the "glitch" and asserts that "creative activity...has to approach the outside of thought...one has to court the chaos and worship the glitch" (Vanhanen Pg.3). Vanhanen seems to dislike the development of the music industry, for as music has become more digitized, its quality has decreased. This shift in the perception of music has done away with the expression of music. The specific devices that process provide an accuracy to music that desensitizes any inner meaning that was meant to be there.

Key Points in the Readings:
1.) Post digital aesthetics is developed from all the experiences of computer glitches, applications, , and errors, as mentioned in the first article concerning the "failure" of digital technology (Cascone Pg.2).

2.) Computers have become the main tool for the distribution and exposure of music to the world. This has made the new genre of music universal and has contributed the shift in the perception of music.

3.) The digitized industry of music has devalued the meaning behind artists' works. The availability of new sounds through the computer has deprived music of its depth, and, according to the article, "the changes in music are quantitative instead of qualitative" (Vanhanen Pg.8).

The most challenging concept for me was understanding that ideas can be made available to the world at the speed of light. For someone who has grown up in a time when changes in technology have been normal, it is difficult to see how advanced we have become in a short period of time. This theme of ideas moving at the speed of light is particularly scary because of the globalization that is following.

Discussion Questions

1.) Do you think that Vanhanen's assertion can be countered by saying that music is only changing and not decreasing in value?

2.) Since technology is known to continuously update itself, is Cascone wrong in saying that the "the revolutionary period of the digital information age has surely passed?" (Cascone Pg.8).

This weeks' readings has contributed to my paper because the same problem with cell phones and kids is happening with music and kids. They immerse themselves with their iPods and iPhones and lose touch with the real world. They also become very biased in their idea of music and therefore have no concept of the origins or the values that music is supposed to have.