IASIG Web Audio Working Group
Formed: July 2001
Status: Final Report
Chair: Steve Horowitz,
Nickelodeon
Members
Purpose
This group will look at the current platforms (technologies) for delivering audio on the Web and produce a detailed overview with which to assess the current state of Audio development over the web. Hopefully this will aid in the development of
- New Authoring tools
- The expansion of already existing technologies
- Authoring Expertise for existing and new platforms (The sharing of information)
- New analogies and ways of thinking specific to the internet as a medium unto itself.
Background
Over the last few years the web has seen an explosion in the possible uses of graphics, video and animated delivery systems like Flash and Shockwave. But the audio side seems not only to be neglected but seriously lagging behind in development. The things we see most (like, MP3 for example) are generally simple encoding and decoding functions within specific file formats, that do not address the needs of interactive designers. We must start to explore and acknowledge the interactive potential of these formats over the web. It is important to develop tools and interfaces that are useful for sound designers working in the field.
It is also important that we look at the current interactive tools for composition being used right now in the video game field (Direct Music and the like). Many of the issues that we are dealing with over the web in terms of best resource allocation and streaming possibilities all seem to be directly related to long standing debates within the gaming community.
This group also needs to take a good look at the recommendations preceding us in the interactive composition work group. The information published and presented by them on the IA-SIG is of vital importance and relevance to this body and will speed up and aid in the agreement and normalization of industry standards pertaining to the future of all interactive composition regardless of platform.
Summary (June 2003)
The group finished the first draft of the Web Audio report in June 2002. Shortly thereafter, Beatnik announced it was no longer going to develop the Beatnik player for the Web, and a few month later Microsoft announced it was not going to provide the DirectMusic/HTML+Time player in future versions of Internet Explorer. As a result of these two announcements, and the release of Quicktime 6.0 in the same period, additional edits were made to the report, which delayed the release until 2003. The report will be available for downloading from the IA-SIG web site in July 2003.
