End of Semester Presentation

Presenting our project at Microsoft Accelerator

street beat from Itamar Gilon on Vimeo.

Mentor Critique Sound Recordings

Part 1 (8 Minutes)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/vc3hyung0xmm4w3/Critique%20P1.m4a
Part 2 (~4.5 Minutes)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ucjziay2xtf6qro/Critique%20P2.m4a

Final Week of Semester: Summary

Critique for the StreetBeat:

Adi (MS Innovation leader):

• Our architecture ignores several obstacles: First and foremost, VANDALISM.
• Consider adding a WiFi connection
• Think about vandalism issues
• Our technological side must be emphasized and a complete tech EndToEnd scenraio should be defined

Spock

• We should know that playing just music from YouTube is not allowed (Ran already addressed this issue by suggesting SoundCloud)

Amiel:

• Our survey data is questionable
• We should look at Serendip: http://serendip.me/application/login
• We should not overlook "general" data (we're not planning to)
• The design is not very good; we should speak with Liat*

Itai:

• Our story is still rough
• We should look at TuneWiki: http://www.tunewiki.com/
• We should think about starting event-based (like HashTagArt)**

Henit:

• Our experiment is not credible: we should look for problems when conducting an experiment
• Our differentiation is lacking in the sense that we didn't present a need that can't be better addressed in other manners -> We should try to position ourselves more precisely, when looking at the competition***
• We should also describe what happens "after" our current scenario; data-wise and user-wise; this should be added to the vision(?)

Guy:

• The pictures on the user survey didn't match the talk

Bottom line and next steps:

*We should ask to speak with Liat and consult about a better design. While we're at it, consult how to actually build it.
**We could start at a head-phone party, they have these at Dizegoff square every once in a while.

***Find a better way to show a competition slide that categorizes other products/services.

Now really, the bottom line: |
                                            V
________________________________

Presenting StreetBeat

Preparing for the presentations tomorrow :)

Omri and Itamar are preparing for the presentations at Microsoft tomorrow. We're very excited! 

User Studies

During the first weeks of January, 2013, we employed several methods of data gathering to try and understand what our potential users might feel when they use the StreetBeat. These are the main results:
First, following a FaceBook survey we conducted (52 participants of which 25 were female; conducted during the first week of January, 2013), we learned that close to half of participants rated their concern about the invasion of privacy by the StreetBeat as 1 (minimum) and the as the rating goes up, the frequency goes down:

But we also found that only 22 of our participants reported actually listening to music while walking outside (no correlation between gender and this tendency: ).

To better capture the StreetBeat experience, we conducted an experiment at the IDC Psychology labs campus, between January 9th and 14th. Participants were 9 first and third year psychology students (6 female). First year students received academic credit for participation.
The experiment was conducted with small (2-4 people) groups. Each participant arrived at the labs campus and with his or her respective group, selected a favorite song and was asked to listen to this song on a device provided by the experimenter. All participants were told that these devices were loaded with a software that "senses" the song being played and sends it to a server to display this data.
Following a 1-minute listening session, participants were asked to follow an experimenter to another room, where all the songs listened-to by the group were displayed on a wall-mounted 19" screen.
Following this, participants filled in a questionnaire.
Here we found that 7 of the 9 participants rated issues of privacy (how they felt about seeing their own music on the wall and how they felt about other's seeing their music on the wall) as 1 (minimum). The highest rated measure was "how interested were you in the music played by others?". 5 participants rated this as 4 or 5.

With each of the groups we also conducted a focus group where we explained the idea thoroughly. Here 9 out of 9 participants said the idea of adding headphone jacks was "excellent". 7 out of 9 said they think it's a good idea and 2 said they thought it is not relevant for joggers.

3 participants agreed to be provide video feedback (interviews conducted in Hebrew):
Participant No. 1

Participant No. 2:

Participant No. 3

2 participants (3rd year students) reported that they did not believe us at any point of the experiment.
2 participants stressed out that they enjoyed our experiment :-)

This is a good base to design a more detailed experiment at the IDC campus, which is currently in the works.

System Diagram

Mockups!

We started building an Android app that connects to the StreetBeat. 


In the app, the user can listen to the StreetBeat history music or use the app as a music player and share his favorite songs. 
If the user chooses to use the app as a music player, the StreetBeat app checks his location. When the user listens to his music in the StreetBeat area, the app's background changes to green and his song choice will be sent to the StreetBeat server. Now the StreetBeat share his song choice. 
When the user is out of the StreetBeat's range, the app's background will change its color to Blue and it won't share his music. 

Here are a few mockups of the app.

The app's main screen

This is the music player 

The user can choose to listen to a song from the StreetBeat's history

Differentiation

We found a few existing projects that are similar to ours, but still not quite the same. 

The table below shows our differentiation from other projects and products out there:

Many applications allow Geo based music. The issue with that is that the music isn't really there, the location
element is artificial and abstract. The existing tangible projects either focus on sounds rather than music, or force the music on pedestrians, which is too intrusive in our view.

StreetBeat is physically there, the music is visualized clearly and connects with the street. We don't intrude public audible space, and we let everyone enjoy our experience. All they need is a pair of headphones. People with our app get the chance to mold and affect their street's musical vibe.


Links to similar/rival projects/products:

http://boombox.tinkerista.com
http://www.equala.fm/
http://www.broadcastr.com/
https://soundcloud.com/
https://www.soundtracker.fm/app/home

Theoretical Background

This is what we're basically going to say in our presentation at Microsoft on Thursday, regarding the theoretical background which we base our project on. 

We started off by checking out what research has been done in the area of listening to music, specifically in an urban setting. We found that generally music has a very positive effect on people, especially when they select it themselves. From emotional regulation to a better feeling when encountering strangers, music truly soothes even the savage beast. Furthermore, the experience of listening to music has a neurological effect on the visual experience (yes, the visual). This basically means that when people walk out in the street and are confronted by any negative visual stimulus, listening to music actually works to neutralize any negative affect they might feel.

We also addressed the issue of "leaving a mark".

For further reading, find the full theoretical background here. 

StreetBeat - Storyboard video take#2

This is our storyboard video for the StreetBeat. This video contains explanations and mockups. In our presentations at Microsoft in a few days, we will present this video without the explanations and Itamar will explain while the video plays. 

Processing Mockup

We created a mockup for using Processing in order to demonstrate the interaction with StreetBeat.

Click here to download our Processing project.

This mockup is based on an earlier mockup that we drew in class.

Scenario

This is our scenario for StreetBeat. We will base our storyboard video on this scenario. 

Dean is 22 from Tel Aviv. On his daily walk to work, Dean always listens to Pop music, Britney Spears in particular.

In one of his walks, Dean walked next to the StreetBeat while listening to "Toxic" and saw his song's name appear on StreetBeat's LED screen. Dean, filled with self importance, stopped to watch StreetBeat's "musical pancakes" beat in different rhythms, and opened his app to check out which previous songs were listened to in Rabin Square. Dean chose to listen to the red pancake by choosing the red color on his smartphone's StreetBeat app, which promptly opened up Rihanna's "Please Don't Stop the Music". Having enjoyed Rihanna's single, Dean decided he should be more open to artists other than Britney.

As Dean was about to take off, he looked at the upper screen of the StreetBeat, and saw Britney's bubble grow, representing a rise in her popularity on the street.

Filming the storyboard

This is us (Itamar and Sharon) creating a storyboard again, according to the new design and the comments and feedback on the last storyboard. 

Mockup for StreetBeat

This is a mockup we drew, according to the new design we decided on. The red writing is LED lights moving around (Like in WallStreet), and it will display the last played song. The colorful "Pancakes" present the beat of the last played songs and the top part will display the genres/artists played on the street, according to the amount of times they were listened to. This part will be displayed like "bubbles" with the genre/artist name. 

Meeting with Noa 7/1/13 - Summary

Date: 7/1/13

Participating: Noa, Sharon, Ran, Noam, Omri.

Discussed the new "pancake" concept (mockup and new design will be uploaded to blog soon)

Noa said this is missing personal feedback. Omri suggested feedback through phone-app.

Also discussed purchase of a ticker instead of LED strips. 

Most of the meeting was preparation and tips for the 17th:

• Noa emphasized that we are mostly an art display
• We should not promise anything that we cannot deliver
• Noa is still a bit concerned with the definition of the experience
• We should start thinking about product design

For Sunday we should have a pitch draft prepared. This includes:

• 1 Minute intro
• Movie [Noa commented that we should use more closeups]
• Collage design slide
• System Architecture slide
• ~1.5 minute Psych. Background
• Next Step/Vision/Dev. Plan
• Phone App mockup
• 3D design of the device

User Study Design

Our study has been approved for running at the Psychology labs at the IDC by the Dean of the New School of Psychology - Prof. Mario Mikulincer. We have also been given credits for recruiting student participants.

StreetBeat User Study Design

StreetBeat is a measure of the streets’ musical DNA. It Allows pedestrians to leave their mark on the street as well as see what other people are listening to; all this without violating their personal space.

In order to verify that this project can actually have an impact on the urban experience, we propose the following behavioral paradigm.

Pre-arrival:

3-5 participants are scheduled to arrive at the same time to the psychology lab lobby. Each of the participants is requested to send a favorite song(s) before arrival. A screen showing data about songs chosen by all participants is waiting in Observation Room 2.

Upon arrival:

Participants are given a smart-phone device with a pair of earphones/headphones. They are then requested to listen to the song they have previously sent while walking towards Observation Room 2 where the StreetBeat © data is shown. They are informed that the data on the screen is generated in near-real-time according to the content of music they are listening to.

Participants are finally asked to look at the sign and contemplate the experience of (a) seeing the song they chose on the sign (b) seeing other data on the sign (c) having others see what music they listen to (d) seeing music listened to by others.

Participants fill in a questionnaire relating to (a) attitudes regarding privacy (b) attitudes regarding leaving a mark (c) attitudes regarding exploring new music and interest in song-charts (d) general info (including general tendency to walk while listening to music) (e) any general comments about the experience.

Participants will be thanked.