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By johnny (Fri Mar 11, 2005 at 11:31:14 PM EST) (all tags)
As politicians "test the waters" before making a decision to enter an electoral contest, I'm hereby testing the waters regarding the possibility of my reprising the role of "crackpot in residence" at next week's O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference.

As a precondition to finally deciding to take the plunge, I'll need to have a mashup of my book Cheap Complex Devices ready by Tuesday.

 


As C in R, what I do is set up a table and hawk my self-published books. (I'm allowed to do this under a grandfather clause for old pals of Tim O'Reilly.)

The experience usually turns out to be about equal parts fun and embarrassment, with the finally ratio determined by how many books I sell. The only reason I'm even considering doing it -- there are travel expenses involved, and I would have to take off work-- is that not only are these cons good places to sell geekoid books like mine, but also the people attending include lots of the digital k3vv1 k1dz and a few mere blog mentions actually can turn into cash for me.

However my most recent book is 2.5 years old and, as much as I love 'em both, they're hardly news any more.

The theme of this year's con is "Remix" and so I thought it would be good to produce some kind of remixed, mashed-up version of CCD, which I might produce on a few dozen swag CDs & post to wetmachine.

Kinda following the lead of the various remixers of Cory Doctorow (boing boing)'s Eastern Standard Tribe".

Especially since the central goof/conceit of Cheap Complex Devices is that it's supposed to be a bunch of computer-written stories, I thought it might me fun to make an audio book with different audio voices for the different parts.

Technical roadbumps a few microns high have slowed me down.  Frinstance, the best text to speech programs seem to be derived from the AT&T  engine. You can get 'em for $30 or so, but none of them run on the mac. (I don't want to use the cheesy mac voices.)  I do have a PC in the house but it's slow and presumably all virus-compromised and I'm not thrilled by that prospect.

Another giant hurdle is that I forget how to set permissions on a PDF to make it possible to snarf the text.

My friend Gary also suggested other ideas for remixes, such as markov-interpolations(mashups) of CCD with the Book of Revelations and similar.

So I turn to the loving bosom of HuSi to see what y'all might have to say on this score.  Is there anything worth doing? By worth doing, I mean a remix/mashup that you would actually listen to.  Is there anything worth doing that can be done in 48 hours?  Is there anything that YOU feel like doing?

Finally, how to I scarf the damn bits from the PDF?

In the interest of generating as much abuse as possible, I think I'll also post this on my near-moribund diary over at the mother site.

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Poll
Mashing up?
- Hey! Sounds like fun! I'll get right to work on it 14%
- Kapusta 71%
- I hear the faint echoes of Paddy One-Tune singing from his allegedly soundproof room. 42%
- That reminds me, I want to buy some of your books. I'll paypal an order right now! 14%
- Theophile Escargot gave your books at best a lukewarm review. Need I say more. 42%

Votes: 7
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Related Links
- husi
- O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference.
- Cheap Complex Devices
- Tim O'Reilly
- wetmachine
- Eastern Standard Tribe"
- text to speech
- johnny's Diary
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Cheap Mashed up Devices | 19 comments (19 topical, 0 hidden)
Remix by lm (4.00 / 1) #1 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 01:16:51 AM EST
Feed the text through a randomizer piped to a voice synthesis program such as festival and record the output. If you feel so inclined add a back beat.
Kindness is an act of rebellion.
If you do the text-to-speech audio book ... by jacob (2.00 / 0) #2 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 01:58:19 AM EST
Split it up into lots of different tracks and play them on shuffle at your booth. Robotic remix!

The problem with making a Markov-chain mashup is that while it's cool to look at for one second, it's not going to be cool to purchase and read because it'll be nonsense. On the other hand, maybe you could sell your books in program form, where the program produces a new PDF each time and the user can set how 'Markoved-up' the books should be? Anywhere from straight vanilla (the original books) to totally remixed (Markov-generated with the Markov chain relinking single-word units) to more and more normal, done by (e.g.) picking a position in text, spitting out the next paragraph, using probabilities to pick another word based on the Markov technique but then actually looking up the text position of the word you chose and spitting a paragraph from there out, and iterating ... The advantage of selling the books this way is that you're selling the books in a readable form, but there's a fun value-add that ties in with the theme of the convention and that people might really want to play with.

(Programs to generate a new PDF each time aren't necessarily hard to make. There are free liberries out there to make PDFs programmatically, so it's just a matter of writing the engine that generates essentially a plain-text representation of the on-the-fly book and then running said liberry on it.)

I dunno, maybe that's more complicated than you're willing to do, just throwing out ideas.

--

Thanks by johnny (2.00 / 0) #3 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 02:26:20 AM EST
I think just a vanilla reading of the book is probably all that's warranted. The book is already pretty post-moderny and mixed up.  Any further shuffling is likely to turn it into pure noise.

In any event, thanks for the suggestions.

She has effectively checked out. She's an un-person of her own making. So it falls to me.--ad hoc (in the hole)

[ Parent ]
PDF by ad hoc (4.00 / 1) #4 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 02:43:11 AM EST
You'd need the owner password.

I found this, but I have no experience with it.
--


Hey wow, thanks. by johnny (2.00 / 0) #5 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 04:34:57 AM EST
I must be the owner, since I created the file way back when.  (Or else Gary, the book-designer, did. . .)

But who knows wtf the password  may be. . .

She has effectively checked out. She's an un-person of her own making. So it falls to me.--ad hoc (in the hole)

[ Parent ]
will it include by Kellnerin (4.00 / 2) #6 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 07:14:56 AM EST
excerpts from the excellent MP/AOS assembly language programming manual?

I dunno that I dig the audio remix of EST that much (though I haven't read the original book). The best text-to-audio translation I can think of is the excerpt from House of Leaves read by the author with music and choruses from his sister Poe's song, "Hey Pretty." I think computer voices alone would be pretty hard to listen to for any extended period of time, (although I'm not really into "human" audio books either). It'd take a lot more than 48 hours' effort to provide a better soundtrack -- but imagine: CCD, the Musical!

--
... though I was always told that I never worked to my potential I assumed someone somewhere was. --blixco

Comment pending by johnny (2.00 / 0) #8 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 08:30:18 AM EST
I'm thinking.

She has effectively checked out. She's an un-person of her own making. So it falls to me.--ad hoc (in the hole)
[ Parent ]
I'll read for you... by littlestar (4.00 / 2) #7 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 07:59:42 AM EST
I'm good at reading, and I can do it in a sexy voice. Everything sounds better coming from a sexy voice. I'm not in my studio or I would record something for you and post it. In lieu of that here is me writing sexy (you have to use your imagination a little more..sorry).

*twinkle*twinkle*


If you're serious about reading some of it by johnny (2.00 / 0) #9 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 08:35:15 AM EST
I would dig that enormously. Thanks.

She has effectively checked out. She's an un-person of her own making. So it falls to me.--ad hoc (in the hole)
[ Parent ]
You could fold us in by iGrrrl (4.00 / 1) #14 Mon Mar 14, 2005 at 03:15:29 AM EST
We have a studio, too.  I could do my sexy voice and you'd have two blonds...

Wait, where is that going?
"I honestly pity the stupid motherfucker who tries to talk down to iGrrrl" - mrgoat

[ Parent ]
Now yer talking by johnny (2.00 / 0) #15 Mon Mar 14, 2005 at 03:42:00 AM EST
I'll be in touch. . .

No, wait.

I'll contact you.

No wait.

I'll send you an email about this topic sometime in the next few days or weeks.

She has effectively checked out. She's an un-person of her own making. So it falls to me.--ad hoc (in the hole)

[ Parent ]
I'll check my email everyday, by littlestar (2.00 / 0) #18 Mon Mar 14, 2005 at 12:17:05 PM EST
in wait for whatever it is you want me to read. I will definitely do it, for real. Why not. I do voice work, this ones on the house. If igrrrl does it too it will be a twosome. Let me know. I love interesting projects.
*twinkle*twinkle*


[ Parent ]
mmmmmmm sexy voices mmmmmmm sexy voices mmmmm by johnny (2.00 / 0) #19 Mon Mar 14, 2005 at 11:19:02 PM EST
The thing to be read is Cheap Complex Devices.  You can find HTML portions of some of it and PDF of all of it at the link above.

Also I believe there's a print copy of the book in your house someplace.

Stay tuned for email, however, as you won't want to be reading the whole thing!  We shall coordinate.

She has effectively checked out. She's an un-person of her own making. So it falls to me.--ad hoc (in the hole)

[ Parent ]
Your Penance for Procrastination: by ti dave (2.00 / 0) #10 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 06:13:21 PM EST
Had you mentioned this earlier, I'd suggest that you contact Negativland and see if they can work a reading into Over The Edge, with Mr. Joyce and his call-in listeners providing an actual soundtrack.

The show only runs on Thursdays, so you wouldn't be able to go "live" before your project's due.

But hey, what do I know? I'm just ti dave.

I don't care if people hate my guts; I assume most of them do.
The important question is whether they are in a position to do anything about it. --W.S. Burroughs

I'm johnny, and by johnny (2.00 / 0) #11 Sat Mar 12, 2005 at 10:57:53 PM EST
procrastination is my stock-in-trade.

Maybe I should start now & try to have something really cool and ready for the open source convention in August.

Thanks for the tip, in any event.

She has effectively checked out. She's an un-person of her own making. So it falls to me.--ad hoc (in the hole)

[ Parent ]
p.s. by ti dave (2.00 / 0) #12 Sun Mar 13, 2005 at 05:27:43 AM EST
If littlestar was reading it, with Negativland mashed into the mix, I'd buy a gross.

I don't care if people hate my guts; I assume most of them do.
The important question is whether they are in a position to do anything about it. --W.S. Burroughs

[ Parent ]
I, too by Kellnerin (4.00 / 1) #13 Sun Mar 13, 2005 at 06:26:19 AM EST
would like to hear Negativland doing CCD. littlestar with Syntax Error would be a groovy match, too.

--
... though I was always told that I never worked to my potential I assumed someone somewhere was. --blixco
[ Parent ]
Get a jar of bees. by mrgoat (2.00 / 0) #16 Mon Mar 14, 2005 at 07:10:23 AM EST
Tape a piece of paper to it with the word "Author" scrawled across it. Electrify a pile of the books, and just sort of leave them there, on a table, in the convention. Wander off and have a beer.

--top hat--
Astounding! by johnny (4.00 / 1) #17 Mon Mar 14, 2005 at 07:53:20 AM EST
Also, I'll need a vat, and some gatorade. . .

She has effectively checked out. She's an un-person of her own making. So it falls to me.--ad hoc (in the hole)
[ Parent ]
Cheap Mashed up Devices | 19 comments (19 topical, 0 hidden)

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