World Band
Ray Tomlinson and I developed a demonstration of a performance in real-time of an ensemble of musicians in response to a request from DARPA to come up with Internet applications that could be used in the DoD Dependents School System, a school with locations around the world where U.S. forces were deployed.
It started in the early fall of 1993 when I was down in Washington visiting the Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA). I was talking with some IDA guy about an upcoming conference where DARPA wanted to demonstrate such applications.
I came back to Cambridge and thought about the request for a while. Ray and I used to carpool to BBN and over several round trips, I talked about my idea of a "World Band" where kids could play synthesizers (so that we could capture digital streams) at various locations and to combine these streams by advancing or delaying the streams to account for delays in the Internet. Since I wasn't a very good programmer, I was counting on Ray to make sure we could actually implement something that would show off the idea. Of course Ray took the bait and dove into this really difficult problem. And as always, he managed to come up with an implementation that worked -- at least for the duration of the demo. :-)
Here is a quote from a paper written about the demonstration:
Well, that last sentence leaves out all of the problems that Ray Tomlinson had to solve! Not to mention the hair-raising day of the demo where Ginny Travers helped Ray to make this demo happen. Others in Steve Blumenthal's department we involved in making sure that the Defense Simulation Internet (DSI) could support this activity. And eventually, people from the BBN Education Department took over the idea that Ray and I first demonstrated and had an offering named "World Band" using similar ideas:
It started in the early fall of 1993 when I was down in Washington visiting the Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA). I was talking with some IDA guy about an upcoming conference where DARPA wanted to demonstrate such applications.
I came back to Cambridge and thought about the request for a while. Ray and I used to carpool to BBN and over several round trips, I talked about my idea of a "World Band" where kids could play synthesizers (so that we could capture digital streams) at various locations and to combine these streams by advancing or delaying the streams to account for delays in the Internet. Since I wasn't a very good programmer, I was counting on Ray to make sure we could actually implement something that would show off the idea. Of course Ray took the bait and dove into this really difficult problem. And as always, he managed to come up with an implementation that worked -- at least for the duration of the demo. :-)
Here is a quote from a paper written about the demonstration:
- "In the World Band demonstration, students at the DoD Schools performed in concert a musical composition they had arranged and orchestrated via the DISDSI network. To do so they used computers, synthesizers, the MIDI musical instrument digital interface, and [a] digital effects generator. Prerecorded background musit (sic) was initiated in one location and blended with accompanying music from the four school sites to the VITSEC audience. To accomplish this, the students had to solve the problems associated with synchronous, real-time muskal (sic) performance over a network circling half of the world."
Well, that last sentence leaves out all of the problems that Ray Tomlinson had to solve! Not to mention the hair-raising day of the demo where Ginny Travers helped Ray to make this demo happen. Others in Steve Blumenthal's department we involved in making sure that the Defense Simulation Internet (DSI) could support this activity. And eventually, people from the BBN Education Department took over the idea that Ray and I first demonstrated and had an offering named "World Band" using similar ideas:
But the bottom line is that for one bright shining moment in time (a description of many BBN demonstrations of early Internet applications) we showed that this seemingly impossible problem could be pulled off!
Here is the introduction in the attached paper about this demonstration.
Finally, I have attached the paper published by the IEEE about this demonstration.
Here is the introduction in the attached paper about this demonstration.
- "Beyond DoD: non-defense training and education applications of DIS
The capabilities of DIS technology and networked simulation to support these instructional applications were investigated in Fall 1993, and demonstrated to plenary sessions of the 15th InterServicehndustry Training Systems and Education Conference (VITSEC) held in Orlando in November. Three demonstrations-Wright Flyer, World Band and Galaxsee-were undertaken. The demonstrations involved collaborative instructional activity among four Department of Defense Dependent Schools (DoDDS): Fort Knox High School (FKHS) in Kentucky; Patch Ameri- can High School (PAHS) in Germany; Ramstein American High School (RAHS) in Germany; and Seoul American High School (SAHS) in Korea [15] (Figs. 14). Wright Flyer and World Band activities were demonstrated in real-time, “live” presentations by DoDDS students in all four schools to plenary sessions of VITSEC. GalaxSee activities were shown on videotape during the same sessions. All three demonstrations at VITSEC were moderated by the Secretary of the US Department of Education and were intended to demonstrate the applicability and promise of military-developed networked simulation, DIS protocols, and the Defense Simulation Internet (DSI) to augment educational activities."
Finally, I have attached the paper published by the IEEE about this demonstration.