Screenshot of the online poster presentation of our paper Performing Audiences during NIME 2020.

Following up my participation in the NIME workshop NIME Publication Ecosystem Workshop, today I presented our paper:

Abstract: With the development of web audio standards, it has quickly become technically easy to develop and deploy software for inviting audiences to participate in musical performances using their mobile phones. Thus, a new audience-centric musical genre has emerged, which aligns with artistic manifestations where there is an explicit inclusion of the public (e.g. participatory art, cinema or theatre). Previous research has focused on analysing this new genre from historical, social organisation and technical perspectives. This follow-up paper contributes with reflections on technical and aesthetic aspects of composing within this audience-centric approach. We propose a set of 13 composition dimensions that deal with the role of the performer, the role of the audience, the location of sound and the type of feedback, among others. From a reflective approach, four participatory pieces developed by the authors are analysed using the proposed dimensions. Finally, we discuss a set of recommendations and challenges for the composers-developers of this new and promising musical genre. This paper concludes discussing the implications of this research for the NIME community.

Although I have been contributing to different online academic events since the lockdown, including poster presentations as audience, this is my first experience as an online poster presenter. During the NIME 2020 conference, the poster presenters have been allocated in different poster sessions of one hour (named “Coffee / Posters & Demos”) and with an individual Zoom room for each presenter. Links to the different Zoom rooms have been provided to all the conference attendees.

Our approach to presenting our paper has been to create an interactive version of the poster that the conference attendees could look at asynchronously, and during today’s presentation provide a similar experience to what it would have been an onsite poster presentation. The experience has been quite rewarding, actually. In comparison with a real poster presentation, I found that here it is easier to have longer conversations and knowledge exchange with the passers-by than in a real setting. Thanks for the nice conversations! However, the ‘coffee break’ that goes together with the poster walk is very much missed.

You can find below the links to the interactive poster (also embedded at the bottom of the page) and to the poster in PDF. Happy online conferencing!