How is Interacting with Sound Different than Listening to Sound?
Collins K.
‘most sound effects…fall midway [between music and noise]: like ‘sound-centaurs’, they are half language, half music.’ – Walter Murch 2005
Collins proposes that in the case of video games, the three modes of listening defined by Michel Chion are not sufficient. Three additional modes of listening are introduced:
- signal listening – ‘listening in readiness’
- sing along listening
- retentive listening – when we try to remember what is being heard, usually for the purpose of repeating it
These are all interactive ways of listening to sound.
‘Interactivity causes tensions between author and audience that give rise to attempts to control authenticity and authorial ‘purity’ through intellectual property rights or digital rights management.’
consumer/producer dichotomy blurred with new technologies – ‘prosumer’ coined by Alvin Toffler – ‘cocreative media’
The idea that immersion is strongly correlated with interactivity is enforced: ‘our understanding of the world is shaped by our ability to interact with it physically’.
‘Our direct physical interactions with the world through our sensorimotor capacities are key to shaping our cognitive development in childhood.’ – This is something that came up in our VR game brainstorming. Learning through the exploration of space.
Don Ihde – Bodies in Technology:
- ‘sensory body’
- ‘cultural body’
- ‘technological body’