Audio App Programing For Fun And Freedom

Once upon a time Apple made great products, tools on the cutting edge of creativity. Not so much anymore.  Today's iPhones are similar to those of yesterday, just faster with better cameras. The laptops are dummying down and the iPad is slow to catch up.  Since the death of Steve Jobs, Tim Cook's direction Apple has begun to focus primarily on content and short term economic returns.  In my opinion Apple's Content branch bullying users into using their streaming services while suppressing user content teeters on violations of antitrust law.  I don't expect that this will change anytime soon, people will simply have to stop buying Apple products.  The strong arm is exaggerated by iTunes and iCloud being the only authorized way to access and move the files on your phone.  The Music app and iBooks on the basis of copyright protections have progressively limited access to files by trapping them in a closed "SandBox" system.  It has always been difficult to migrate music off the remote device starting with the old iPods. Once the data was on the device it could not be removed with out a hack.  Now Apple is making it impossible to get files onto the music player presumably to force users into using their streaming service.  I don't want access to Apple radio or genius playlists curated from their monolithic Record label buddies.  I don't want to listen to their prescribed commercial swill.  If I wanted streaming, I would be paying Spotify to steal from musicians for me.  Personally I record my own music.  I want to take that music and listen to it in a playlist while out and about test my files on different sound systems. Yes I want an aux output (headphone jack).  Quit fixing things that were not broken.  It's not a difficult concept to grasp.

With the introduction of Files, Apple opened a door to a possible improvement by using iCloud made useful by purchasing a subscription for more space.  The file management system should work through USB, its faster more secure... not going to happen.  Apple's walled garden is becoming an amusement park.  Multitracking music in GarageBand is primarily an invitation to purchase sample packages.  Pay for your ticket, ride an ever more uniform and homogenized ride.  The proffessional path is buy ProTools and a massive Waves library.  Pay your slowly increasing subscription fee to Adobe Creative Cloud and get on with making high end studio quality productions with the prescribed tools, buy your ad space on Facebook so that your creation can be visible in the algorithm.  Surely the only conflict arises from trying to beat the system.  Individual success has no standing in the profits of the machine. You paid for admission to be creative.  By using the machine, the machine uses you.  Downloading a bunch of stuff not only will clutter things up but it increases the risk of viruses and and what not.  All paths open doors for malicious code.  Piracy isn’t what it used to be. Cracked software is becoming harder to find and so many apps are "free", but is anything really free? Is anything risk free? Free steals your privacy sold to your ads.  Using someone else's software means they own you.  Big Companies prey on this.  Monoliths of software steal and replicate lines of once open source code, compiling giant collections of tools the basic user may never get around to using.  The giant economic model of printing money, selling digital copies at top dollar or worse: Subscriptions.  How many minds contributed to the development of that technology built upon the creativity of the many who have come before?   Ethically shouldn't the creator be rewarded for making something useful rather than the assimilation snowball of marketing and gate keeping.

For this and many other reasons, we wish to know the back doors.  We do not wish to be used by the tools. We seek the SDK.  -   and its all here:

https://developer.apple.com/documentation

Knowledge can convert a future of app consumerism and generic AI rearrangement of cookie cut samples into your own profit and freedom.  The new craft advancing technology will be interfacing multiple systems, utilizing strings of code like brushes in an illustration app.  Knowing is a matter of immersion, and of having some one walk you through the process.  The Open source programming multimedia and arts community is a small cult around the world.  Hackers, musicians, animators, gamers, they are those on the other side of the veil.

There is a world of Java shells for hacking the unfamiliar into open connection.  Converting the hard storage 8 bit programming of a NES cartridge and Atari game controllers on a 64bit iPhone,  MacOS, Windows, Android to GNU/Linux, UNIX, Arduino, Raspberry Pi, Xbox,  IP addresses, SSL, New neural pathways for porting the information to and from different devices, comprehending components usage of libraries of code.  Single run functions, objects, arrays, storyboards, library locations, endless variations breaking all the way down to hexadecimal and binary machine code and eventually to electrons flowing through switches, potentiometers, microchips. The jargon itself is intimidating.  A quantum physicist might argue that technology eventually becomes spiritual...or not.   Soon we will need to interface with robots and automated cars. The future will become ever more modular for those in the know the rest will be consumers changing out devices every two years.  The only question is how deep do you want to go into what the foundation is built upon?

The open source environment can be daunting when considering what to download.  To click or not to click. Navigating GitHub, using Terminal, information overload. The Rabbit hole is endless.  countless programming languages, a million flavors of ice cream.  I don’t for see myself building PC chips,  but how deep into the controls do you want to go.  Is this a means or an end?  Time and daily effort is required, so much information to acquire, watching online tutorials, reading documents as the technology keeps moving knowledge from under your feet.  I started out wanting a simple looping delay on my phone and end up doing research on how to install a VirtualBox on my laptop to investigate Linux Kernel hacking...WTF.   Keep asking: "If only I had this thing I would be able to create properly" if someone makes a reliable instance of that specific tool.  What is it worth?  How do I acquire that one single simple tool. A string of code like a hammer. Besides getting around Apple's ridiculous controls,  I wanted to make programs from laptop portable through the phone.   I want to be able to build them for myself.

My initiation to multimedia programming was MAX/MSP/Jitter heavy.  Max allows a certain level of autonomy and a baseline for coding knowledge. It acts similar to Reactor or modular synths with a visual signal flow.  Seeking ways to port Max projects into IOS  I found the MobMuPlatform and PDParty which both run PD music files.  PD is by Miller Puckett’s simplified and free version of MaxMSP.  PD Vanilla is the most basic architecture. 
http://puredata.info/
http://www.pd-tutorial.com/english/

Pdparty vs mobmuplat

MobMu by Daniel Iglesia requires you to build your user GUI interface with in the MobMu Editor.
It also appears that MobMu will actually let you you access a folder "On My iPhone"
http://danieliglesia.com/mobmuplat/doc/index.htm

PDParty
http://danomatika.com/code/pdparty/guide
PDParty seems ports the user interface directly from your PD Project.

Both methods utilize Libpd  http://libpd.cc/ which allows porting of PD into mobile devices.  This is a library you would want to put into your own swift projects if you were to get serious about making your own app. Rather than running your PD projects though a 3rd party app.

https://github.com/libpd/libpd/wiki/Working-with-libpd-in-Xcode

I had some familiarity with Xcode,  but knew nothing of the Swift IOS programming language. I had minimally experimented with object oriented code with Supercolider, Javascript, C in Cocoa.  HTML and CSS gave some advantage but not much. So practically starting form scratch, I started going through tutorials like Coding with Chris and The Swift Guy.

TO BE CONTINUED...

in the meantime

https://thehelloworldprogram.com/

What Musicians Can Teach Us About Employment In A Digital World

It was 1998, the Internet came creeping into our lives like the first tendrils of creamer in a cup of coffee.  The first round of CD burners had to be bought separately. They cost almost half as much as the computer itself with a strong possibility of installing an additional port to connect the giant serial cable.  It wouldn't be more than 3 or 4 years before every computer came with a CD-R as a standard drive. Around that time Napster snuck in with file sharing technology utilizing MP3 compression.  Piracy was no longer about the old tape dub paradigm of buying a cd and making copies for friends. Now you could just go find any new album posted up by someone on the other side of the country.

We had record/video stores back then and the harbinger of doom that would eventually put record stores out of business and loose havoc on the Record industry confronted you in tubes of 10, 50, and 150 CD-Rs on a shelf where top ten albums used to live. The big labels mustered all their collective strength and tried to put up a fight.  DART already gave them a portion of the sales of blank media, but they went further suing websites and even consumers using the file sharing and piracy websites.  It was way too late though, technology had drifted into Wild West territory.  $14.99 could never compete with free.  

In those days, Silicon Valley was quickly maneuvering the wild west of cyberspace into real world supremacy. The computer industry simply had more economic clout than the record industry.  Freedom of speech warred with intellectual property.  There was no game book on how to fight a data storm.  When bandwidth started growing and the video industry became threatened by the same fate as the music industry piracy really met a slightly more prepared foe. The danger of malware being downloaded with the desired new movie or album contributed to that portion of the internet becoming a shady red light district.  SOPA had its moment but collapsed under scrutiny of totalitarianism. Eventually legal disruption would siphon off the profits into software gatekeepers. One by one technology would beat out established institutions,  Netflix would destroy Blockbuster and Spotify and YouTube would become primary means of media distribution. Streaming and On Demand would replace owning and rentals.  Uber and Lyft came for the Taxi companies.  AirBnB came for the hotel industry. Amazon came for brick and mortar retail.  It won't be long before all incomes are effected by this blossoming Technological Revolution, that's the world we live in now.    

So how do we survive?

Musicians, even in the glory days were at the bottom of the food chain.   The creators of the content so deeply craved were consistently beholding record labels who took as little as 50% of all revenue, after recouped costs for advances on recording, touring and promoting.  As now, few rose to the top and made fortunes.  The industry funneled investment into "sure shots" leading gradually to more generic than the generic that came before. Quality of creation suffered for economics, taste factored less and less as businessmen discovered the population would consume whatever they doled out. Minimum investment maximum gain.  

The Internet at the turn of the millennium held a momentary promise of democratizing the industry, returning power to creators by tearing down the infrastructure between creators and consumers.  Little did we know what that meant, but we all made our MySpace pages and bought into the new paradigm.  We were the forefront of the "indie" revolution, directly accessing and selling to our fans like never before. 

The modern musician cannot consider creating music their sole occupation. The artist needs now be an entrepreneur, a marketing expert, a booking agent, a tour and business manager, a publisher, a lawyer, a graphic designer, a highly connected networker, etc. etc.  Oh, and you also need a day job. Fortunately most of this new "workload" can be done from a smart phone. Simultaneously, technology also simplified actual creation, enabling common to achieve standard quality with little or no effort. The market floods, the commodity of music suffers a sort of inflation despite being consumed more than ever before, and the value of the consumable drops dramatically...Yet fortunes are to be made by offering access. 

So a shift occured in the nature of the artist.  They continue creating, no longer expecting any real recompense in the here and now.  However, the greatest tragedy the artist can imagine is going through the struggle and loving effort of creating a masterpiece no one will ever see, and a new niche of visibility middlemen was born. Those offering access to consumers convinced the content creators that sharing everything for free rewards the commodity of exposure (potentially with a someday payout).  Every kid with GarageBand is giving away their tracks on ReverbNation while BFA Composers lurk in forums like beggars seeking an unpaid gigs to build a portfolio, and if you wiggle your ears right while touching your nose with your elbow you can get your stuff on internet radio or Spotify. Opportunistic Business Sharks circle picking at the edges.  Music libraries accept submissions and take 50% for royalty free placement.   Networking gatekeepers commodify connections.  Pay to post "seeking", pay to respond.  We fall under the spell of "Market through Facebook, build up a following..." Pay for some ads or risk invisibility.  Use the tools and platforms and networking sites.  Play friendly. Schmooze a little.  Email influencers, like their feeds.  Get a shout out from a blog. See a bump in new commodity of likes.  Pour more hours into the marketing struggle. 

Somehow the system, like a great alchemist, turned creativity into a form of consumerism. 

If the goal was to make a living doing what we love, how did we end up convinced that doing something else would open the doors to getting rich off of our dreams?  It was madness focusing on results instead of process.  Putting promotion over the craft, leaning ladders against wrong walls and wondering why results aren't forthcoming. We called the new pursuit branding and identity.  It's what the stars were doing. All the Success Blogs said it was imperative to breaking through the noise and being noticed.  They sold the desire to be perceived into an outer ideal, rather than leveraging our personal truth, we lost sight of the path.  To have all those hours back, to instead perfect something hidden but unmistakably genius. 

Time unlocks purpose when faced with giving up childhood idolizations and moving on or choosing to carry our efforts into an uncertain future.  Every year that passes you must make a decision to continue. The source of resiliency is passion. The journey is the destination. Everything needed to know could be found in practice.  Slowing down through a difficult passage.  Persistence to build strength and speed.  Coordination and altering approach. Internalizing and assimilating.  Learning the rules to break them.  Baby steps towards greatness.  The practice improves the whole person. The pursuit was a spiritual one, meditations in motion, one step cleaner, faster, stronger, longer. To find joy by disappearing in the effort.  

And that is when you get the reward...  

So how does all of this relate to a coal miner?  

I don't think of coal mining as an emotionally rewarding task.  Not particularly good for the environment either.  Coal miners are, however, losing their lucrative jobs like musicians did thanks to changing technology.   Like musicians they are in need of day jobs. Gainful employment.  

What followed originally was a diatribe against the failings of late capitalism and a romantic exploration of a utopian future. This derailed into a whole new post. To be read...

Instead I'll conclude with the original design intact.   What musicians have to teach us about 

employment in a digital age is:

On occasion you may have to do some menial shit you don't want to do in order to finance the life you accept living.  It may seem beneath you but if it keeps you fed, with a roof over your head you can survive enough to side hustle a true ambition.  Start planting the seeds today and water them every chance you get.

Constantly seek personal improvement with persistence and focus.  A siren song of media and marketing seeks to convert your efforts into their profits. Don't fall for it.  Pursue your goal diligently. Find interest in the cloud surrounding your path and grow from where you are.   Become the best at what you want to be, if you are not that then the propping up will blow down in the first wind.  Change is inevitable, the skills of today will become obsolete tomorrow. If you are not climbing you are sliding down hill.  A good investor will tell you to diversify... the same goes for skills and talents.  Never stop learning.

The Making and Breaking of Woodstock 1969

Who could have possibly imagined that a "Music and Art Fair" dreamt up by four young men would become one of the most talked about events in recent history?
Many skeptics believed that an event supported by a bunch of drug crazed youths would inevitably turn violent,  after all the organizer were advertising a gathering of about 60,000 people.  However, as a slap in the face to dumbstruck elders, the festival now known world wide as Woodstock, turned out bigger and more peaceful than anyone could have ever imagined.  Not to say there were no problems, but considering that an estimated 500,000 people from many different walks of life were mixed together for almost four days with a limited food supply, few restroom facilities, an abundance of drugs and alcohol,  a show stopping rainstorm,  and don't forget the evil loud music, things were basically positive.  Elliot Tiber referred to Woodstock as,  "a Counter-cultural mini-nation in which minds were open, drugs were all but legal, and love was 'free."      Although Woodstock was not the first outdoor festival it set the stage for all outdoor festivals that have since followed.  Woodstock can not be acurately imitated ever again, but it sets an extraordinary example for those who would try and follow.

In 1968 at the age of twenty-three Michael Lang got into show business after running one of Florida's first head shops.

The Merge of Democracy and the Insurance Company

we each play a part in the system

one to their own way

the way we fill our time

the way we teach

the way we grow

the point of living every day

to play

is to teach

the radiation

from which the power does spread

the east

in distance waves

workers on the other side

earliest film

a post apcolyptic playground

rhythm in frames per second

moving in comfortable silence

the eye watching you

the way a child sees his father

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I have thoughts, I can write a Blog

sigh...
I just watched "Julie and Julia". It showed me something about continuity, which is often the cry of the masses, and indeed a mismatched gathering of self stimulation is in fact just that. Yet the overwhelming number of Blogs will testify to the value of self adoration and reaching out to strangers in this time of our civilization's evolution. Shall I share my perspective on the world? In time dear child, but first view this image Tripp Nestor. (I have heard the people like pictures)

Now, there is this ongoing debate about real art vs. digital art, another about real writers and throw away bloggers. Furthermore we have endless copyright issues, remixing of video and music. (by the way that picture you need permission to use that image) Yes we have worked our selves towards something, in a few hundred years they may explain the phenomenon. Will it be a modern Renaissance? What is going to be seen as the worth that comes out of this time of reckless freedom of expression? Is success to be measured by the number of google hits one has? Will those hits equate to ease of living, wealth or prosperity?

Who knows?

In the vaults of the future...

The proof will be in the pudding.

Banksy and Hirst Show Us How To Make "Real Art"

I'll go ahead and kick this off with a work by Two of the biggest names in Contemporary Art:  Banksy putting a stencil on top of  Damien Hirst's patented polka dots.  More than likely an outside party was commissioned to paint the exposed canvas frame if not the whole thing.
The work is titled "Keeping it Spotless" and sold for $1, 870, 000.00 at Sotheby’s in New York on Valentine’s Day, 2008. Not a shabby price! Bono and Gagosian Gallery were also involved in The (RED) Auction held for the United Nations Foundation to support HIV/AIDS relief programs in Africa conducted by The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.  Isn't it cute?