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The Eighth
Annual Interactive Music Conference
PROJECT BAR-B-Q 2003
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
by The Fat Man, George A. Sanger
Now that the eighth BBQ is under our belts, I'm happy to say that it seems we've hit our stride. This conference was characterized by a particularly strong sense of confidence and focus. And for some reason, the word "cables" kept coming up, for what that's worth.
We were graced with a beautiful performance of Commodore-64-based dance music from 8-Bit Weapon, and inspiring talks by Dave Smith (the Father of MIDI Among Other Things) and Marco Alpert of Antares. Chris Grigg gave a report on the progress thus far of the IXMF spec, and we got informal impressive demos from Dave Smith and Alain Georges (Dr. Mad) of their musical instrument products, the Evolver and MadPlayer, respectively. We felt great support from DTS, SigmaTel, and Audio Precision, our gold and two silver sponsors, who made the whole thing possible. Getting copies of Kantos 1.0 from Atares and Project 5 from Cakewalk was pretty cool, too.
Looking back on our past achievements held some surprises for some of us in terms of feathers we could add to our caps. Even I had been unaware that the work of a 2001 Rogue Group had given birth to Azalia, the audio architecture that is going to follow on the heels of AC97. I also learned that Ron Kuper had followed up on last year's "Plumbers" group by setting up an MMA working group called GMPI. And it was great to hear that the "Harshmellows" had completed their report from last year, leaving us 100% "followed up" on past commitments.
Another distinctive aspect of this year's schedule is that I took the soapbox myself for the first time, giving a fireside talk about my vision of the remarkably strong effect on the industry, and on artistic development in general, that would result if the IXMF file format (BBQ '02) were to be adopted.
THE CHUNKS laid out a step by step plan for demonstrating, promoting, and evangelizing IXMF. One of the most focused groups yet, they outlined the benefits, both short and long-run, of the use of IXMF, and determined a method by which those advantages can be clearly demonstrated to the audio community. Their plan included workable plan to build a demo of the tools and sound manager for two different platforms. The question, "What is the future of Interactive XMF?" led the PROVOCATIVE DOORBELLS to first define interactive audio, and then define in a document their vision of what the future of interactive audio should be. Plans were established for disseminating the document. PLAY DOUGH considered the likely scenarios for the future of DRM, with the intent of recommending a path. They also spun off a rogue group, nASCAP suggesting three "crazy ideas" on which audio content revenues might be based in the future, based on the stock market. Building on top of the 2002 "Harshmellows" report, OTIS set out to analyze and decide how to elevate audio by promoting a high quality sound experience to both the consumer and manufacturer.
Based on our track record of exploring the process of establishing standards, Ron Kuper suggested for next year that we study the idea of creating "A design pattern for establishing standards," to make our experience available to guide others through this process.
This year's group has left me once again proud to be called a BBQ Brother. Maybe this is the best group we've had yet. I can't wait to see what comes out of their excellent work! I thank them deeply for their time, brilliance, and commitment to audio. You guys are truly Great.
Love,
George A. Sanger
The Fat Man
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