For those of you who were able to watch the election coverage on CNN in America, there was a fascinating technological advancement where newsman Anderson Cooper was able to have a 3-D hologram interviews with people. The exchange seemed flawless. Now I remember the last time this subject came up, the good and knowledgeable Reverend poo-poo'd my futuristic fantasy about someday being able to have virtual sessions with other people. (Or at least tune in to other sessions around the world and play along via the internet) I'm not sure how the folks at CNN pulled this off, but it sure looked good.
I was actually more drawn to the 3D election maps they were doing, especially the part where it looked like the capitol building rose up out of the desk in 3D, and the stuff looked like it was floating in mid air... I thought the "holograms" were rather goony.
But all of this is moot. The latency issues really can't be overcome, unless you can somehow prove Einstein wrong... So maybe some day, we could have virtual sessions with people locally, but you start putting a couple thousand miles between folks, and forget it.
Reverend, quit negative thinking. Jussa Nutter Eejit ,you can still make a good session via the internet, provided that all the people save the one who starts the tunes are psychics, or have strong precognition skills. In the first case even the Internet is obsolete.
well, bogman, you put all the musicians in the *same* studio, no latency issues there... Nothing to stop you from teleporting the gig around the world in holographic form!
Of course, the CNN hologram wouldn't work, because it's not real, you can't see it. It's only a trick for the TV viewers...
This gives a whole new meaning to touring bands with their 'magic bus' & all.
I just hope Liz & John keep coming to town.
If this isn't giving away too much. . . One night John forgot the words to 'Wild Colonial Boy'. Liz Carroll got such a kick out of that. We all loved to see that such great musicians are only human. Can you get that feeling "projected" to you?
Well of course all of what you say is true Reverend. I was just looking to stir the pot a bit last night.
But I do see a potential bit of fun in have live sessions web-casted where people around the globe tune in and play along. Yes I know it would be a one way experience, but I think it would be cool to web cam yours or CPT's session and play along. It sure would be useful for people far away from sessions like our folks in the middle of Australia's outback for example.
This will only be possible when every city, town ,village etc has fibre optic broadband and there is no copper cables left even in the joint boxes in the ground. Once this is achieved then light speed connection will mean absolutely no lag. Until then keep lugging your instrument to your local session.
nah, upmine3, speed of light isn't fast enough for a real, long distance session. We've discussed this a couple of times. Here's a post of mine about it:
Fiber optic data doesn't travel appreciably faster than data over copper. The difference is that you can put a lot *more* data through optical fiber. But that's not going to help with the latency.
If you start getting in to the 100 millisecond (or more) round-trip lag, it's going to get pretty difficult to play (well) together.
A fiber optic connection is not just a bare fiber, there are all kinds of devices in between, each of them adding its own latency.
You can do an easy test:
ping google.es
time=79.4 ms
ping google.com
time=195 ms
In this case, the only copper cable that the data travel through is about 1 Km long in my side. Of course, google's switches are directly connected to the fiber optic network. A local (Spanish) session might work, although the round-trip time to another DSL user will probably be much higher than the one to google.
I wonder how much latency you could really tolerate in a session and still have it be passable, and not too messy. If you're playing a jig at, say, 120 beats per minute, that's 6 eighth notes per second. In other words, the notes are 166 milliseconds apart.
My guess is that you could tolerate maybe a third of that in latency without it getting too bad, because it's at least fairly steady. So maybe a 55 ms lag would be tolerable. But if I were trying to play that jig with someone in Spain, I would be a note behind! *That* would be messy!
That would be fun. You can use Qik, Flixwagon, or Kyte mobile to broadcast live video from you phone these days.
Unfortunately, Qik and Flixwagon's clients for the iPhone require a hacked phone, and my hacking disappeared when I upgraded to 2.0, and I haven't bothered to hack it open again. And Kyte's client on the iPhone apparently only does pictures, not video.
Virtual Sessions, Part 2
Virtual Sessions, Part 2
For those of you who were able to watch the election coverage on CNN in America, there was a fascinating technological advancement where newsman Anderson Cooper was able to have a 3-D hologram interviews with people. The exchange seemed flawless. Now I remember the last time this subject came up, the good and knowledgeable Reverend poo-poo'd my futuristic fantasy about someday being able to have virtual sessions with other people. (Or at least tune in to other sessions around the world and play along via the internet) I'm not sure how the folks at CNN pulled this off, but it sure looked good.
# Posted on November 13th 2008 by Jusa Nutter Eejit
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
Yeah, the was that it was only for the tv viewing audience. It's not like the anchors could actually see the "hologram"...
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/podcasts/showandtell/site/2008/11/07/st.holograms.cnn?iref=videosearch
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/11/06/hologram.yellin/index.html?iref=newssearch
I was actually more drawn to the 3D election maps they were doing, especially the part where it looked like the capitol building rose up out of the desk in 3D, and the stuff looked like it was floating in mid air... I thought the "holograms" were rather goony.
But all of this is moot. The latency issues really can't be overcome, unless you can somehow prove Einstein wrong... So maybe some day, we could have virtual sessions with people locally, but you start putting a couple thousand miles between folks, and forget it.
# Posted on November 13th 2008 by Reverend
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
wow, nice first sentence... erm... it should read "Yeah, the problem was that it...."
# Posted on November 13th 2008 by Reverend
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
Reverend, quit negative thinking. Jussa Nutter Eejit ,you can still make a good session via the internet, provided that all the people save the one who starts the tunes are psychics, or have strong precognition skills. In the first case even the Internet is obsolete.
# Posted on November 13th 2008 by Janek
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
Mmmm, pity about latency. Otherwise bands could make a fortune. Dozens of gigs every night without leaving a nice warm studio.
# Posted on November 13th 2008 by bogman
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
well, bogman, you put all the musicians in the *same* studio, no latency issues there... Nothing to stop you from teleporting the gig around the world in holographic form!
Of course, the CNN hologram wouldn't work, because it's not real, you can't see it. It's only a trick for the TV viewers...
# Posted on November 13th 2008 by Reverend
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
This gives a whole new meaning to touring bands with their 'magic bus' & all.
I just hope Liz & John keep coming to town.
If this isn't giving away too much. . . One night John forgot the words to 'Wild Colonial Boy'. Liz Carroll got such a kick out of that. We all loved to see that such great musicians are only human. Can you get that feeling "projected" to you?
# Posted on November 13th 2008 by Ben Steen
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
Well of course all of what you say is true Reverend. I was just looking to stir the pot a bit last night.
But I do see a potential bit of fun in have live sessions web-casted where people around the globe tune in and play along. Yes I know it would be a one way experience, but I think it would be cool to web cam yours or CPT's session and play along. It sure would be useful for people far away from sessions like our folks in the middle of Australia's outback for example.
# Posted on November 13th 2008 by Jusa Nutter Eejit
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
This will only be possible when every city, town ,village etc has fibre optic broadband and there is no copper cables left even in the joint boxes in the ground. Once this is achieved then light speed connection will mean absolutely no lag. Until then keep lugging your instrument to your local session.
# Posted on November 14th 2008 by upmine3
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
nah, upmine3, speed of light isn't fast enough for a real, long distance session. We've discussed this a couple of times. Here's a post of mine about it:
http://www.thesession.org/discussions/display/4929/comments#comment103635
Fiber optic data doesn't travel appreciably faster than data over copper. The difference is that you can put a lot *more* data through optical fiber. But that's not going to help with the latency.
If you start getting in to the 100 millisecond (or more) round-trip lag, it's going to get pretty difficult to play (well) together.
But I like JNE's one-way remote session idea
Pete
# Posted on November 14th 2008 by Reverend
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
A fiber optic connection is not just a bare fiber, there are all kinds of devices in between, each of them adding its own latency.
You can do an easy test:
ping google.es
time=79.4 ms
ping google.com
time=195 ms
In this case, the only copper cable that the data travel through is about 1 Km long in my side. Of course, google's switches are directly connected to the fiber optic network. A local (Spanish) session might work, although the round-trip time to another DSL user will probably be much higher than the one to google.
# Posted on November 14th 2008 by Ramiro
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
Yep, I'm about the opposite:
google.com
time=48.035 ms
google.es
153.908 ms
I wonder how much latency you could really tolerate in a session and still have it be passable, and not too messy. If you're playing a jig at, say, 120 beats per minute, that's 6 eighth notes per second. In other words, the notes are 166 milliseconds apart.
My guess is that you could tolerate maybe a third of that in latency without it getting too bad, because it's at least fairly steady. So maybe a 55 ms lag would be tolerable. But if I were trying to play that jig with someone in Spain, I would be a note behind! *That* would be messy!
# Posted on November 14th 2008 by Reverend
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
Anyone planning to broadast (webcast) a local session? ~
"JNE's one-way remote session idea."
# Posted on November 14th 2008 by Ben Steen
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
That would be fun. You can use Qik, Flixwagon, or Kyte mobile to broadcast live video from you phone these days.
Unfortunately, Qik and Flixwagon's clients for the iPhone require a hacked phone, and my hacking disappeared when I upgraded to 2.0, and I haven't bothered to hack it open again. And Kyte's client on the iPhone apparently only does pictures, not video.
# Posted on November 14th 2008 by Reverend
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
Hey Reverend, maybe we could play Pachelbel's Canon!
# Posted on November 14th 2008 by Ramiro
Re: Virtual Sessions, Part 2
LOL, yeah, let's all play Irish music as a round!
# Posted on November 15th 2008 by Reverend