Episode 5

1. What Krukowski is trying to say when he asks us this question is that the world as we know it is changing day by day. For example, music nowadays is being digitized and we can reach it by simply clicking on the apps in our phone instead of having to go to a store to buy a physical form of music. What he is also trying to say is that with these new advancements we are forgetting many treasures and making other forms of interacting with music forgotten. Music indicates the differences between the powerful and the forgotten in many ways, one specific way that it does this is that we are more exposed to mainstream artists and lesser known artists are being denied the opportunity to prosper.
2. Forced Exposure is different from platforms such as Spotify because they create different experiences for the users. With Forced exposure we are given different songs and artists who we like to select and with platforms such as Spotify they use algorithms that are man made that give us a wider range of unknown music.
3. The differences that Krukowski states between being surprised by music and discovering music is that we can be surprised by a song being good or better than anticipated but when we discover music we find music that may be different from what we are used to or new music from new artists. These experiences are different because they give us different sensations, be it of satisfaction from something we know or pleasure from discovering something new. This is important when it comes to music because these different experiences for users allow for music platforms to give relative answers than specific answers.

Episode 6

1. According to Krukowski, noise is an unimportant sound that we can easily ignore because it is unattractive. On the other hand signal is said to be the sounds that we are attracted to and do take interest in. These distinctions are important to know because it gives an insight to what sounds might attract others and be easily ignored to others.
2. Basically the central idea that this episode conveys is the differences between different sounds such as noise and background. This is very significant because it shows how artists and music producers will try to make the signal the most heard sound within a song to maximize the attention and also minimize the amount of noise so that people aren’t distracted by something they might not like.
3. This episode relates to the other episodes because it gives us another look at how sounds change and how we receive each different sound and even label the sounds we hear. This episode also relates to the others because it helps us understand the process that artists undergo when creating music and what strategies they use to convey their emotions to us and how they do so to also get an emotion from us.

Episode 5

D1 : By saying , “the marginal-the rejected-the repressed-is whatever the powerful have decided  is of no use at the moment .”Mr Krukowski want to share with people the significance of the critic . And also suggest by there that music wasn’t appreciated through CDs anymore because everything is moved fast now and it is easier for people to download music instead of going to store and purchasing CDs.Tapes and CDs are less appreciated .

D2  Music Listening experiences enabled by Forces Exposure taking time to get everything heard . If you have to listening or make a searching of a song , you must scroll thousands of of them before you got it while those that Paul lamer is working on with platform like Spotify is easier to access and decrease the time that you spend searching .

D3 : Being surprised by music is like hearing songs that we haven’t  heard before but is not that we heard it and discovering it is not ever new because we listening g to song that had ever exist .According to the author , both are not the same  and he mentions that surprise is not a helping thing . He went further asking question like :  “did google want to surprise us when we’re searching for something? Did facebook want to surprise us when we look for a friend ? ”

Episode 6

D1: Noise is everything else that doesn’t  interest us and signal is whatever is interested to us .volume alone cannot let us detect signal from noise.Everything around us is signal as long as it is not important to us but when we are in  a crowded  noise and somebody tells us things that we are interested to , so it become signal . It is really significant because these differences are important in terms of how our brain focuses on what we actually want to hear and less probably to disturbed by the surroundings noises .

D2 : In every noise there is a signal and base on the noise we can deduce signal but both are really related because when we turn the volume down we cannot hear the signal .

D3 : It Is related to all others episodes because it clearly  gives some details and present good   definition  and explanation of “ways of hearing in general .

Discussion questions for episodes 5 & 6

Episode 5

1. At the beginning of this episode, Krukowski asserts, “the marginal-the rejected-the repressed-is whatever the powerful have decided is of no use at the moment.” What does he mean by this statement? He goes on to ask, “But might it [the marginal-the rejected-the repressed] not be a key to alternate approaches to art, to society-to power itself?” (“Marginalized” is an adjective that describes a person, group, or concept that is treated as insignificant or peripheral.)What is he trying to get at with this question? How does music indicate the differences between the powerful and the marginalized?

Krukowski asserts “the marginal-the rejected-the repressed-is whatever the powerful have decided is of no use at the moment.” he means that the changes come from the audience. The audience has the power to replace bookstores and physical places that sell the music and books online such as Amazon, and eBay. Our lives are being busy and running fast so people prefer to shop their books or music online to go store to explore and what the book stores or record stores have. Record stores became in a margin because of technology and digital apps that offered thousands of songs on their phones.   

• How are the music listening experiences enabled by Forced Exposure different from those that Paul Lamere is working on with platforms like Spotify?

Digital Companies such as Spotify, Apple Music, and Pandora have music recommendations done by computers using algorithms through the recommendations that the audiences give. , acoustic similarity, and cultural recommendations. The difference is that forced exposure can have a human give you a personalized recommendation because they listened to the music themselves. Paul Lamere said the goals of that is they know automatically what you want to listen through your music playlist. Those company like Spotify, Echo nest has designs the recommendation program to figure out what do you want to listen.   

1. What distinctions does Krukowski draw between being “surprised” by music and “discovering” music? What are the differences between these experiences and according to Krukowski, why are they important?

According to Krukowski indicates the differences between surprised and discovering in music surprise are not the same as discovering. Discover that when you use the app to discover what do you want exactly to hear. I am using Spotify app as an example,  You discover what do you want to hear because the application has millions of the song around the world. Later you got a surprise when you find a song that related to what are you listen to. In fact that it should not surprise us because this app uses a recommendation program that gives us the music related to our favorite music to keep us listening to music the app.      

Episode 6

• According to Krukowski, what is noise? What is the signal? Why are these distinctions important?

According to Krukowski indicate the differences between noise and signal, he states that noise the voice that you want to her but the signal is sound that you want to her and interested to or you pay your attention to. 

• What central idea about noise does this episode convey? Why is it significant?

The central idea about the noise and signal in this episode is depending on the person responded for example, when kids in the park scream, their scream is signal for their parents but it is noise for the elderly who are sitting in the park.   

• How does this episode relate to other episodes? 

This episode is special because the impact of digital sound can create serious disease hearing loss according to the world health organization reported that 1.1 billion young people are now at risk of hearing loss from the personal audio. In episode 2 space, Krukowski said digital audio makes people create their private space and also they listen to music instead of talking to each other, It a result of that they prefer the noise and face the risk of losing their hearing. In episode 3 love digital sound has a negative impact on the music quality, the song now became noisier than before because of the digital tools. 

1. At the beginning of this episode, when Krukowski asserts that “the marginal-the rejected-the repressed-is whatever the powerful have decided is of no use at the moment.”, he meant that when people lost their attention on something or when they found it unfamiliar, it will be considered as the marginal. But if we always listen to the familiar one and never be open to the new experiments, we won’t be able to go forward from here. That’s why the marginal-the rejected-the repressed] might be a key to alternate approaches to art, to society, to power itself.
2.  The music listening experiences enabled by Forced Exposure is closer to what we are looking for and what we would like. Because, before they present those experiences to us, they are listening to that music in person and evaluate it the way one of us would do. But in platforms like Spotify, algorithms are the ones that chose and recommend the music to us. So, those recommendations may not be as successful as the ones Forced Exposure’s, since the music is for souls not for machines.
3. The distinction Krukowski draws between being “surprised” by music and “discovering” is how much you feel familiar with what you listen to. Even though it’s the first time you listen to a song, it may feel like you listened to it before. But this is not the case when it comes to being surprised. Being surprised is listening to something that is not likely to anything you listened to before. Many people don’t like being surprised. So, when making recommendations, algorithms chose songs that familiar with what we listen to.
4. Noises are sounds that we are not there to hear, like the surface noise in a record. And, to Dr. Quinnell, signal is whatever sound we are trying to pay attention to. 
5. The central idea of the episode’s message about the distinctions between signal and noise. Anything you pay attention to is a signal, and anything you don’t want to hear is a noise. The distinction between them is up to the person who hears them. For example, in the subway, the sound of a baby who is crying is a noise to the other passengers, whereas it is a signal to the baby’s parents.
6. In this episode, we saw a new thing that the digital world brought to us. From the beginning to the end, every episode we talked about this. Sometimes we miss the analog world but we can’t unsee the improvements that came with the digital.

1.  Krukowski wanted to point out that we are naturally affected by music. Big companies like Amazon, Google, Spotify, or other online music servers, serve us all sources of information irresponsibly .he finds that some specific albums/records are preserved for a long time. Also, these records are expired/out-of-date. Nowadays, people prefer downloading music from the internet or uploading music apps such as Spotify, Sound cloud or YouTube rather than going to the music store wasting time picking up CD’s. But music records stores are a type of art and there are some people who use it. Krukowski mentioned that by visiting the record store, he discovered a lot of information there. He gave an example such as workers over there can provide you with information about years ago that you didn’t know.

• Forced Exposure means listening to the opinion of those who listened to all of the available records and wrote about them.Jimmy from Forced Exposure Collects songs of various genres and when he likes something he records it and he knows what he will hear later.  People picked what they wanted to listen to based on this information. In contrast, Spotify is choosing for us a source of music based on our listening history by using the algorithms.Paul Lamre’s experience in sites like Spotify, he makes an automatic way to choose songs based on the person’s taste, and he selects similar songs.

• Krukowski states the point that surprise is not the same as discovery to a huge digital corporation eager to change every one of us and as much of our time as possible with their product.He gives the examples of Google , Facebook and Spotify. He compares the way how these three companies provide our information we would like to know. According to Krukowski is that people are experiencing a new type of music without the need of searching for a specific kind of music. The main purpose of Spotify is to let the listener hear the music that they are most likely to enjoy.  you can be surprised by a song you discover, for example it could be better or worse than what you expected.Forced Exposure surprises with its variety in which you need to dig a little to find something new and completely different from the usual.

Episode 6

• According to Krukowski, noise is something, we are not paying attention to when we are listening. Signal is the voice we are paying attention to and that we want to listen to. These distinctions are important because until we decide the distinction between signal and noise, we won’t know what we are listening to.Signals are fluid because our attention can shift based on what we want to hear at any given time. Noise is everything we can hear besides the signal we are looking for. 

• Noise is very important, that is something lost. Remove the noise and only keep the signal. He explains there is a richness to noise that allows our brain to choose its signals.The signal in music is something that the producers want listeners to hear. if we cut out noise completely and try to layer signal with other signals, it just becomes competing signals. When there is noise in the background the audio engineer gets to choose what to highlight as a signal and what to leave in back. It allows the engineer to weave sound textures together to create a more complex sound. 

• This episode gives us one of the most important points in music, in real time and space. In the machine time, we come to approach to reduce the noise and focus on the signal. In digital time, we can use headphones to enjoy the signal of our song and reduce the noise we are hearing around. We can avoid the noise.

1. At the beginning of this episode, when Krukowski asserts that “the marginal-the rejected-the repressed-is whatever the powerful have decided is of no use at the moment.”, he meant that when people lost their attention on something or when they found it unfamiliar, it will be considered as the marginal. But if we always listen to the familiar one and never be open to the new experiments, we won’t be able to go forward from here. That’s why the marginal-the rejected-the repressed] might be a key to alternate approaches to art, to society, to power itself.
2.  The music listening experiences enabled by Forced Exposure is closer to what we are looking for and what we would like. Because, before they present those experiences to us, they are listening to that music in person and evaluate it the way one of us would do. But in platforms like Spotify, algorithms are the ones that chose and recommend the music to us. So, those recommendations may not be as successful as the ones Forced Exposure’s, since the music is for souls not for machines.
3. The distinction Krukowski draws between being “surprised” by music and “discovering” is how much you feel familiar with what you listen to. Even though it’s the first time you listen to a song, it may feel like you listened to it before. But this is not the case when it comes to being surprised. Being surprised is listening to something that is not likely to anything you listened to before. Many people don’t like being surprised. So, when making recommendations, algorithms chose songs that familiar with what we listen to.
4. Noises are sounds that we are not there to hear, like the surface noise in a record. And, to Dr. Quinnell, signal is whatever sound we are trying to pay attention to. 
5. The central idea of the episode’s message about the distinctions between signal and noise. Anything you pay attention to is a signal, and anything you don’t want to hear is a noise. The distinction between them is up to the person who hears them. For example, in the subway, the sound of a baby who is crying is a noise to the other passengers, whereas it is a signal to the baby’s parents.
6. In this episode, we saw a new thing that the digital world brought to us. From the beginning to the end, every episode we talked about this. Sometimes we miss the analog world but we can’t unsee the improvements that came with the digital.

EPISODE 5 – POWER

1. When Krukowski asserts, “the marginal-the rejected-the repressed-is whatever the powerful have decided is of no use at the moment.” He means that society forget about anything they get tired of to replace it for something new, and that happens to the music too, the audience has power to control what is on demand nowadays. Why would people go to a record store when they can buy any album they want in Ebay or Amazon? Krukowski says he pick up some knowledge every time he goes to a record store, in a record store you can find new perspectives and approaches to art looking at what the mainstream culture has no use for.

2. Forced Exposure employees listen to every new release and they even write about it, and produce a printed catalog, they inform us what is worth it; people choose the music they want to hear based on the reviews. Paul design recommendation programs, instead of having to search new music for yourself, you just hit one button and the algorithm plays songs based on what you like, your mood, where you are, where you are doing. Also this companies like Spotify and Pandora work with almost all the music available in the world so it’s impossible for them listen to every song.

3. Surprise is not the same as discover, when you discover music is because you were searching for a specific type of music, but being surprised by music means that you were not expecting to hear that kind of music. Music corporations want to keep us engaged, they want us to find what we are already comfortable with, they don’t want to turn our requests upside down. They are replacing the freedom and chaos of the internet at large, with the control and predictability of their programs making harder for us to find new perspectives and question our knowledge.

   EPISODE 6 – NOISE

4. Noise and signal are always connected in the analog world, think of a radio if you turn up the volume you turn up the noise, but digital allows the busting of signal without the busting of noise, for example when you are listening to a podcast online there is no static, no surface noise, so if you turn up the volume you get more volume. There is no noise to restrain the sound and everything is louder.
5. Noise is the background sounds, sounds that you are not interested in, signal is the main sound, the sound you are trying to pay attention to. This episode conveys the importance of noise and signal. We are very skilled at shifting our attention from noise to signal, focusing and refocusing on different sounds in the environment, and shutting out others.
6. In all the episodes they talk about the switch between analog and digital changed our ways of hearing, and also the impact of technology in the society. Digital devices remove the noise we don’t want to hear and make more clear the message we want to express. Our perception of sound is not as natural as we tend to believe, we hear what they want us to hear. This episode explores the differences of noise and signal, it’s related to the other episodes because it is like the start of everything else, for example in the episode 2 when they talk about the efforts to control sound or the episode 3 when they talk about how digital devices remove the musical qualities of our voice and the main message are our words.

Episode 5

1. At the beginning of this episode, Krukowski asserts, “the marginal-the rejected-the repressed-is whatever the powerful have decided is of no use at the moment.” What does he mean by this statement? He goes on to ask, “But might it [the marginal-the rejected-the repressed] not be a key to alternate approaches-to art, to society-to power itself?” (“Marginalized” is an adjective that describes a person, group, or concept that is treated as insignificant or peripheral.)

What is he trying to get at with this question? How does music indicate the differences between the powerful and the marginalized?

 Krukowski asserts, “the marginal-the rejected-the repressed-is whatever the powerful have decided is of no use at the moment.” music which is outdated society decided it to no more popular or exist in the market. So, with the demand of time  music has changed  and the interest of people . Thus, music with time can become unfamiliar, outdated and no longer relevant in a society. Therefore, the audience has a power to control the music. Krukowski refers to power as the audience, corporations and musicians for making the decision on what should be played and will be the next.

How are the music listening experiences enabled by Forced Exposure different from those that Paul Lamere is working on with platforms like Spotify?

Force exposure is listening to everything . There is no way to skip  or the way to choose the songs you want . It is a long process. However, Paul Lamere works on platforms, like spotify is a design recommendation program for the Echo Nest , a division of spotify. So instead of having to scroll through millions of songs to figure out what you want to play you just hit a play button and it plays the right song for you. Digital music companies like Spotify, Apple Music,and Pandora want to work with the entire universe of available music. Forced Exposure’s 50,000 titles are a drop in the ocean for them. Next ,Paul Lamere recommends algorithms, which  has become a pretty amazing place. Spotify’s “Discover” feature, and its predictions of  musical tastes are so accurate can be unnerving.

1. What distinctions does Krukowski draw between being “surprised” by music and “discovering” music? What are the differences between these experiences and according to Krukowski, why are they important?

Krukowski explains surprise is something that you are familiar with or known before. If you know in advance that it is not surprise and surprise is not really a helpful thing. He explains  with an example of google and Facebook that why we are not surprised. Google wants to “surprise” us when we use it to search for something? Similarly, Facebook wants  to “surprise” us when we look for our friends? Not at all they want us to find what we are already comfortable with. Surprise is not the same as “discovery”.Discover is the opposite of “surprise” ; it is more about what is a meaningful signal for each of us.

Discovering is clear for what we are looking or searching for. Discovering music isn’t as  usual as  we used to hear before. In the episode Krukowski also has his own experience of discovering music  “Ghost” by the Forced Exposure. 

Episode 6

1. According to Krukowski, what is noise? What is signal? Why are these distinctions important?

According to krukowski noise means probably the signal that you are not interested and so a lot of what we do as ear surgeons is to try to amplify the signal, and decrease the noise. He further added, sound in terms of signal and noise in the recording studio. Although, signal and noise are always joined together in the analog world. These are distinctions  important because digital allows the boosting of signal without the boosting of noise. Digital signal no noise on it from the medium -no surface noise like an LP, no tape hiss like a cassette, no static like on the radio so, if volume is turned up it gives more volume. In the digital audio world, everything can be louder than everything else. There is no noise to restrain the signal.

2.What central idea about noise does this episode convey? Why is it significant?

The central idea of the episode’s message about noise is that if we are not interested. For example, when I am doing my assignment and next to my side my sister asks me something that I want to hear: that’s a signal, and everything else in the room is noise. But then something new at the television interests me as I am eavesdropping, that voice becomes a signal, and whatever is being said by my sister is  now the noise. It is significant because signals reduce noise. We are very skilled at shifting our attention from noise  to signal, focusing and refocusing on different sounds in the environment, and shutting out others. Therefore, musicians  use digital signals to reduce the noise.  We cannot control the noise because it is unavoidable.

3.   How does this episode relate to other episodes? 

This episode talks about the noise and signal which reflect the previous episode because each episode has illustrated the concept of noise. In the analog recording the elasticity of time is one  good example of noise.In analog recording what is done is done there was no replay. Similarly, in the episode 2 “space” Krukowski represents the logical use  of cellphones and  headphones to eliminate the noise  and make space in the crowd. It is a demand of today’s society to use earphones or headphones to eliminate the noise and to get the signals. Consequently, the musicians and digital corporations use the digital audio to reduce noise. Because they make sounds and signals  perceivable to the audience. In conclusion, noise is probably the signal that we don’t want or either interested.  

Episode 5

1. At the beginning of this episode, Krukowski asserts, “the marginal-the rejected-the repressed-is whatever the powerful have decided is of no use at the moment.” What does he mean by this statement? He goes on to ask,But might it [the marginal-the rejected-the repressed] not be a key to alternate approaches-to art, to society-to power itself?(“Marginalized”is an adjective that describes a person, group, or concept that is treated as insignificant or peripheral.)What is he trying to get at with this question? How does music indicate the differences between the powerful and the marginalized?

-Krukowski mentions that walking to a record store  and possibility of finding new genre  which were hits in yesterdays ,is more than the in digital platforms like Spotify where recommendation algorithms is used.Therefore today  those musics which aren’t listened are marginalized by those digital medias. Krukowski believes Those  hard copies  we find in record stores can be great use  and can be surprising.

2.How are the music listening experiences enabled by Forced Exposure different from those that Paul Lamere is working on with platforms like Spotify?
-Digital corporations like Spotify, use recommendation algorithm  where they track your location, mood and they play  music accordingly . you will get to listen what spotify recommends you. But  the music  experience you get through Forced Exposure is different. You could be surprised by music. There is always a Possibility of finding what you don’t want  to listen.Moreover there is always somebody  physically available with great information who can help you  get more  about what you didn’t expect.

3.What distinctions does Krukowski draw between being “surprised”by music and “discovering”music? What are the differences between these experiences and according to Krukowski, why are they important?
-“Discovering” music means finding music in a course of search or finding music that we already know what we we are looking for.Today with recommendation algorithms and playlists, digital corporations have created a media universe that  adapt,predictably  us.It is important in a way  that it saves a lot of time and But” surprise “by music means finding for what you don’t know what you are looking at. It could be pleasure of brick-and mortar browsing.

Episode 6

1. According to Krukowski, what is noise? What is signal? Why are these distinctions important?

According to Krukowski Signal is a sound  that we are trying to pay attention to. Signal can shift the target constantly. Whereas Noise is the signal that we are not interested in.For an instance, we see people running in subways to catch the train as the train approach.The sound of the approaching train becomes the signal  But the same sound could be noise to other who is in phone call or may be chatting  nearby.

2.What central idea about noise does this episode convey? Why is it significant?

Our world is enrich with noise.We can never completely ignore the noise.But everything is noise until find a signal that we are trying to pay attention.

3.How does this episode relate to other episodes?

Each episodes shares  about the switch of analog to digital impact to of ways of hearing.It has impacted our time, space ,love, money  basically what’s important in our life.