Easy, intuitive, beautiful!:


Portable pocket-sized stand-alone wonder-machine with 8 synthesizer models, 8 samplers and effects like Delay, Flutter, Filters and EQ all built in. The Operator 1 is tentatively slated for a Spring 2010 release. See TeenageEngineering

Squeaker is romping in heaven

The CD version of mode includes an 8-page booklet of art designed by Alyce N. Hoggan, M.Des.

Twitter: follow us under the alias rareEntity.

Cubase Studio 5 arrived in the mail yesterday morning...we can't wait to dig in.

Ordered Cubase Studio 5 today...gotta keep up. Also, added a few news feeds to the bottom of this blog.

Designing for Scalability

Here's a white paper I authored and published while at Microsoft in 2000 titled "Architectural Design: A Scalable, Highly Available Business Object Architecture." The paper has since been dropped from TechNet, but it embodies the essential guidance for availability and scalability derived from integration testing with the Barnes & Noble order processing system. This paper is referenced by nine technical articles and two patents (6542902 and 7114158). It is here as archival information. The paper can also be found in archive.org



2019 update: The scalable workflow architecture described in the white paper predates what we now call a microservices architecture.
Further reading on scalability can be found here

A Good Cause: A nonprofit group called kynamatrix is supporting interactive communication research. They recently connected a number of university labs together using donated high-definition video equipment. It's like opening a window between labs! Perhaps this can help improve the nation's collaborative research infrastructure...reduce expensive travel and carbon footprints. More people should recognize and support creative efforts like this.

mode

The debut album "mode" is now available at CD Baby. You can read more about the artist there.

Please note: The album is participating in the CD Baby $5 sale, so pick up a copy or two today!

mode is also available at all three locations of Silver Platters in the Seattle area. These guys are great about carrying the music of local independent artists.

All songs composed by James W. Dunn

Instruments & Effects

1-Mode 120BPM 4/4 Fmin
Texture v1.2
Roland XV-5050
CM-505 v1.02
ZebraCM
Crystal v2.4

2-Rhythmetric 76BPM 4/4 Cmin
Texture v1.2
ZebraCM
Proteus VX v2
Atralis OrgoneCM
Motion 2.8
CompressiveCM

03-Octahedral 110BPM 4/4 Fmin
ZebraCM
Dominator
Proteus VX v2
Roland XV-5050 w/ SRX-06

04-Vector 100BPM 4/4 D
HALionOne
Roland XV-5050

05-Harmonic 120BPM 4/4 Fmin
Garritan Steinway
Roland XV-5050 w/ SRX-06
Access Virus Classic

06-Spiral 85BPM 4/4 Cmin
Analog Warfare 3.1
Roland XV-5050 w/ SRX-06

07-Inevitable 81BPM 4/4 Cmin
Proteus VX v2
GenesisCM
Atralis OrgoneCM
Vocals: James Dunn / Alyce Hoggan
E-Phonic TapeDelay v0.2
Phaser / StereoEcho / Reverb
Glitch v1.3
CompressiveCM

08-Transcend 120BPM 4/4 Cmin
Proteus VX v2
Roland XV-5050
Texture v1.2
A1 Analog Synth v1.0
VB 1
Grungelizer / Reverb
Tranceformer v1.2
Vocals: James Dunn

09-Continuum 86BPM 4/4 Cmin
Garritan Steinway
Roland XV-5050 w/ SRX-06
Access Virus Classic
LM7 v1
ReaFIR v1
Sampled ocean waves

10-Departure 120BPM 4/4 F/C#
Access Virus Classic
AmpSimulator / StereoEcho
Mysterizer / DaTube / TAL-Dub-2
Vocals: James Dunn

11-Solace 120BPM 5/4 Fmin
Garritan Steinway
Analog Warfare 3.1
Proteus VX v2
Motion 2.8
ZebraCM
Tranceformer v1.2 / Glitch v1.3
TAL-Dub-2

12-Convergence Fmin
Roland XV-5050 w/ SRX-06
ReaFIR v1
RoomWorks

Here's an interesting music service for emerging artists and interested listeners: TastyAudio

Cubase has announced the next version of its flagship music production system which boasts "stunning innovations and additional enhancements that boost productivity and performance". (And just as I was getting comfortable with Studio4!)

Microsoft Research has an interesting tool called SongSmith which generates musical accompaniment to match a singer’s voice.

We received 204 pounds of CDs today (that's 1000).

mode

The debut album "mode" went up on CDBaby this week. Check it out!

(listen to some samples and follow the link to CDBaby)

Monster Power PRO 2500 arrived Thursday safe and sound. Did a benchmark noise level test prior to installation. Then, after making room and rewiring everything, Ran a comparison test. Going from two power strips to a rack-mounted power supply is quite a change and all the equipment is sensitive to position of just about every wire. Not detected a significant change in background noise yet. In fact, hearing more computer processing noise, which leads back to the issue of where all the wiring is running and where the computer is positioned. More A/B testing is necessary. Latest discovery on the web is http://www.soundsnap.com/ where you can find all sorts of interesting sound effect, loops, and aural delights.

Learned this week that ground loop is possible even among two surge protectors. With all studio components plugged into two daisy-chained strips, thought everything would be OK. It wasn't. During a mix down, noticed some background hiss and hum. This led to inserting Blue Cat's FreqAnalyst to investigate the problem. (the CM version from Computer Music Magazine.) Shut down equipment one-by-one and observed the relative noise spectrum. Several bumps were predominant in the 60Hz and multiples thereof.

Found that just having the ground pin of one of the KRK studio monitors was enough to introduce a spike in the the hum levels. Heard the term "ground loop" but never really knew what it meant. After investigating the term in wikipedia, did some further research and found some interesting products that can help with power cleanliness. In particular, Blue Circle's BC86 and any of the Monster Power products in the Pro Power line for musicians.

Being creative, tried a number of plug configurations, starting with just the computer and working up to having all 7 plugs connected successfully introducing only minimal hum. The best configuration found was the mixer and powered studio monitors plugged into a separate strip. All other components are plugged into a Monster PowerCenter HT700 power strip for now. Both power strips are now plugged in parallel to the same outlet.

Upgrading to a Monster Pro 2500 this week, so will compare the relative noise floor.

Found a really cool site today containing a free collection of online audio tests, test tones, audio signals. Conducting audio tests in the studio and doing some of the listening tests to determine levels of response, range, volume and pitch variance detection. It's almost like a game.

Here are some quality links surfed today:

Love the audio plugin information on the KVR site!

Interesting approach on news. (also see the CEO's blog)

Some good design sites:
Eben (in Seattle)
BlueMarble (in Atlanta)
SmartDesign (in NYC, love the Vista packages)
CarbonDesign (in Bothell)
Motivara (in Redmond)

Update: talk about good design, check out Mode (and their blog too)

The current 2-way high-definition telepresence vendors:

LifeSize Communications
Cisco Systems
Tandberg
Sony
Polycom
HP

Studio Log 20061114: Frustrating! One of the Bluebird mics cannot be used due to its higher noise floor.

Thanks Ed for a great article on running a Board meeting: http://www.beyondvc.com/2004/09/running_an_effi.html

In his book "Orbiting the Giant Hairball," Gordon MacKenzie describes how companies become bureaucratic hairballs.

Microsoft has become a corporate bureaucracy which is now being compared to IBM. Gone are the days where employees are empowered. Instead, employees are now just numbers. Small cogs in the corporate machine. With over 50 thousand employees, each voice has become no more than a whisper. It has become the duty of management to corral this morass of intellectual horsepower.

When someone has a bright idea, managers are not encouraged to reward this behavior. Instead, if an employee thinks outside of the box, they will likely find themselves without a job. Employees have reported that when they go to Human Resources for help in finding the right fit for themselves within the machine, they are told that it is not the responsibility of HR to assist in such matters. When they go to Human Resources to file a grievance, they are told that such a process does not exist at Microsoft and that the matter should be taken up with the manager directly.

The growth of the hairball is no fault of Microsoft. This is a natural progression of corporate growth. As a company takes on new policies, it becomes a tangle of precedent and attitudes. Attitudes such as "we don't do it that way here" and "you are at a level below me so your ideas are not worthy."
Managers find themselves slaves to the hairball. Employees report that when they go to management with ideas, they are often told to keep quiet and work as directed. Some of the brighter bulbs in the bunch are under orders to not to talk to executives. This is a 20th century "factory" mentality and is justified by the excuse that Microsoft is good at shipping software and management knows how to do this in the most optimal way possible. "Just do it" management says.
Microsoft's Achilles heel is that it has become the world's leading software manufacturing machine and it leads market share. In this position, it has become arrogant and complacent. This could spell disaster for the Titanic of software. As one employee pointed out, who wishes to remain anonymous for fear of being fired, "Microsoft is a lot of smart people doing a lot of stupid things. What it lacks in vision it makes up for in acquisition, quality, and production."


Ironically, Microsoft touts innovation. It claims that it is an innovative company. Yet, as Bryan Chaffin points out: "Microsoft does not innovate and never has. Everything they have done has been done elsewhere first. They don't develop new products, they buy or usurp them." This may be true for the products and services it has already acquired and repackaged. Also, it has been said that the only way to outwit Microsoft is to innovate. If this is true, then Microsoft's weakness is that it waits for others to innovate and then because it has the resources, it can afford to buy up this innovation and repackage it.

Microsoft is testimony to good business. Bill Gates is not a Turing Award winner, but he is the richest man in America. If we look at the results, we see that money is the end product of his business acumen. We are all blessed by the software that presently exists as it has made our lives easier and certainly led to higher overall business productivity world wide.
But what is next? Is it to be another upgrade? Is it to be another feature? Is it to be another acquisition?
Contrary to the growing hairball, is much evidence which proves that innovation is required in order to survive in the modern marketplace. If Microsoft is to take a lead into the next century of computing software, it will need to listen better both to its employees and to its customers. The next step in the evolution of Microsoft should be compassion.

As Tim Sander's points out in his book "Love is the Killer App," compassion is requisite for growth. This means compassion for its employees and compassion for its customers. Management wonders why internal morale and its organizational health index is declining. Management wonders why there is a disconnect with customers. As Paul Eames put it so aptly in an article titled "Good Management" from 1949, "Brotherly love is the true incentive in good management." "Brotherly love widens and clarifies vision, attracts and reveals opportunity, provides balance and strength."

Microsoft can find true love for it's customers (our friends and neighbors) or eventually die a slow death.
From Joey Reiman's 1998 book "Thinking for a Living", page 110:
Management guru Tom Peters says, "Don't rock the boat. Sink it and start over." Creative destruction is fundamental to all change. The new can only be created by destroying the old. As Picasso said, "The painter must destroy. He must destroy to give it another life." Frank Lloyd Wright was so destructive that the New York Times called him "the anarchist of architecture." Anyone afraid of destroying the old to get to the new never will be able to achieve a worthwhile, breakthrough innovation.

Many companies hire an ideation firm because their own corporate culture works against unique thinking. The culture says, "Don't think outside the square, or you may find yourself outside the company." This is the kind of kind of culture that rewards stodgy thinking and dull, safe ideas. At the same time, it strangles great thinking.

Companies and environments that have a "certain" way of doing things - that are stuck in a rut of routine thinking - will undo any possibility of having breakthrough ideas.

See Gelernter's description of a life stream repository.