Sonification & The Problem with Making Music from Data

Tantacrul
2 HN recommenders · recommended in 2 months, 2020–2024
YouTube
259K views · 9 years ago · essay · evergreen

Tantacrul (Martin Keary) looks at sonification, the practice of turning data into sound. He asks when it helps people understand data and when it is just an arbitrary way to make music or publicity.

HN people link it as the standard caveat whenever a sonification story appears, for its sorting of real analytic and artistic value from publicity use.

“Tantacrul has a typically incisive video [1] about the real potential of sonification as a powerful technique for understanding data”
Data visualizationDesign critique & analysis
#sonification#datatosound#tantacrul#datarepresentation#critique

4 comments from Hacker News

o
@omnicognate2022 · in “New NASA Black Hole Sonifications with a Remix”
Tantacrul has a typically incisive video [1] about the real potential of sonification as a powerful technique for understanding data, and its real artistic possibilities, vs the dishonest and arbitrary way it gets used to generate publicity. [1] ▶ this video
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j
@jw12242020 · in “MuseScore 4: Moving from notation software to composition software”
As soon as I saw this pop up on HN, I thought “hey, MuseScore — isn’t that the notation software Tantacrul loves to hate?”. I’m not a composer, and I’d never heard of let alone used MuseScore before stumbling on his videos a couple of weeks ago. What a great surprise to see they’ve been listening to their critics! After finding his channel I slowly worked my way through watching all his videos. One of my favourites is about “sonification”, or creating sound from of data. Might be quite interesting to the HN crowd: ▶ this video
RecommendsView on HN
r
@richbell2024 · in “Hear the sounds of Earth's magnetic field from 41,000 years ago”
I'm reminded of "Sonification & The Problem with Making Music from Data" by Tantacrul. ▶ this video
CitesView on HN
h
@hibernator1492022 · in “Gaia sees strange stars in most detailed Milky Way survey to date”
Disclaimer about sonification (especially when related to space): ▶ this video
CitesView on HN