Intro

Two years ago (Spring 2010) I was working on my Senior Design Project for the Tech Expo at Duke Energy Convention Center.  My project was titled, “Smart Player Piano”.  The whole project and experience was very rewarding a lot of fun.  It wasn’t until a couple days ago when I received an email from someone at the University of Cincinnati saying they saw a copy of my poster hanging up, that I realized I never really ‘released’ my project to the public.  So, here it is, the story of my project, Smart Player Piano.

I won’t go into too many details about the project because it is all been said before and will be supplied later.  The quick and dirty of what Smart Player Piano does is that it takes an image, dots on a page, and converts them into notes like a player piano does. What makes this different is the “Smart” part.  Throwing a bunch of dots on a page wouldn’t sound good, so using some basic music theory chord progression, the pixels are modified to sound better.  Some of the features of the project were:

1. Import/Export images
2. Import/Export midis
3. Drawing abilities
4. Adjust tempo
5. Max smart adjustments intervals

Pictures

Standing by my booth at the 2010 Tech Expo at the Duke Energy Convention Center. Ready to show the world ... or at least the engineers of Cincinnati ... Smart Player Piano

Standing with my advisor Dr. Anca Ralescu in front of my booth at the 2010 Tech Expo

One of the most rewarding aspects of presenting the Smart Player Piano was the reaction it received from all the kids that came to the Expo. I was honored to receive the "Young People's Choice" award out of all the projects at the expo.

The kids loved getting their pictures taken and seeing what it looked like once it was imported into Smart Player Piano. Then they could hear what their picture "sounds" like before and after it was "autofixed". More than once I had a chaperone come by saying that they were nearly to the bus to head back to school and the kids would still be talking about Smart Player Piano enough that the chaperone would come back to see what all the talk was about.

In addition to the Young People's Choice award, I was honored that Smart Player Piano was selected as "Best in Computer Science" at the Tech Expo. With this award I was invited to an IEEE Cincinnati meeting to present my project to some of the engineering professionals around Cincinnati.

Docs

Here are a few docs that I put together for Smart Player Piano

• Smart Player Piano IEEE Presentation
• Smart Player Piano Poster
• Smart Player Piano Handout
• Smart Player Piano Design Report

Application

Annnnnnd here’s the actual project.  As with most coding projects that you haven’t looked at in more than … a few weeks, I’m a little fuzzy on how everything is laid out.  What I’ve done, which I think will work, is zipped up all the project files along with my demo directory that contains some fun midis and images and have a README in the root.  The README should cover how everything is organized.

• SmartPlayerPiano Zip

Closing

And that’s about it.  Hopefully you enjoy Smart Player Piano.  Feel free to leave comments below for questions/comments/concerns.  I had a lot of fun with this project and hope you all do the same.

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So the title of this post might be a little misleading.  Most will think this post is about money and Facebook.  Afterall, Facebook is going public soon… but here we are talking about a different type of investment, your time and energy.

By now you have most likely have heard about the new look Facebook is taking with Timeline.  I’ve only been playing with it for a few minutes, but in one word I would have to describe it as: mesmerizing.  Facebook has taken your usage history and created a virtual story album.  Not just pictures, not just words, but a complete story.

I was quickly drawn to as far back as the timeline would take me, to when I joined Facebook back on September 8, 2004.  I wanted to see what my story said some 7 years ago.  Short shout outs and messages from friends that I still carry on with today as well as friends I have lost touch with spread across the timeline.  I’m telling you, this is mesmerizing.

This is also genius if you ask me.  Facebook has always been a way to not just interact and socialize with others but to really put together and see the image that you share with the world.  When you see pictures of yourself and how you evolve through days … months … years, one can be very introspective if not a bit narcissistic.  You can see yourself in situations in hindsight that may please you or may embarrass you.

But there is a dilemma here.  While it is a debate on its own of whether or not Facebook owns the information you post on their site (this is not the moment for that debate), there is nothing but certainty that Facebook is in complete control of the format that your information is displayed.  You realize this fact all the time when they change the format (much like the new Timeline) and you either love or hate how the site evolves.  This poses the issue of you investing your time and energy in personalizing Facebook to be your go to source for social awareness.  What if you spend all this time making your Timeline look exactly as you please only for Facebook to change the format again … or … go away completely.

What would our social media world do if Facebook went away tomorrow… How many photos would you have just lost?  How many “friends” would you lose contact with or never even think about again?

Each year I make a photo album book for my wife as a birthday present.  It has a few dozen pages of the highlights of the past year with a few comments here and there.  I know those aren’t going away.

I really don’t think that Facebook is going away any time soon.  But it sure is interesting to think about how much time we invest in a site that is, in reality, completely out of our control.  Love the new Facebook Timeline, hope it sticks around for a while … but I don’t think I’ll be dedicating large numbers of hours to updating every little “about me” box.

Ps. Yes, I know you can download your Facebook profile.  But it really isn’t the same now, is it?

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One of the many ways Apple changed the world was by giving a single dollar, real monetary value.

The App Store opened up a whole new and exciting world for software developers to flex their digital muscles and see where the wind could carry them.  I have only recently begun my trek into the world of app development, but in these few months, my eyes have truly been opened to the monetary value of digital media.  Now I am careful to say “monetary” value, because many things can have value, but only certain things have monetary value.  And by value, I mean what someone would be willing to trade for the product or service, monetary value … obviously, money.

The Internet brought out the pirate in all of us.  Moving songs from one computer to another … it really didn’t feel like stealing … it was just like moving the files of a group project from a classmates computer to yours, simple.  Record labels fought it, lawsuits against individuals (sorry I don’t have the references right now, I may fill them in later).  But iTunes saw the problem and countered with a solution instead of a push back.  Offer individual songs for an affordable price!  Amazing…

Years pass and the iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad come to life and the App Store is born.  Apps on sale for $9.99 and selling well.  Competition drives the price down.  Apps sell for $4.99 and sell well.  Competition drives the price down.  Apps sell for $0.99 and sell well.  No where to go but free…

An interesting thing happened.  For the price of an impulse purchase candy bar at the grocery check out counter, one could purchase an app of any sorts that would keep them entertained and fixated for hours.  But where one would not think twice about that impulse purchase that gave them pleasure for the car ride home, they would spend an hour looking for reviews and YouTube videos on whether or not this piece of appware was worth their $0.99 (+ tax).  And of course I include myself in this audience.

Why do people feel the need to be so stringent on their $0.99 app purchases while a candy bar is so much easier?  Is it for the mere fact that an app is not (well sorta) tangible?  Is it that there are too many choices on the App Store to really make an impulse purchase?  Is it the presentation of the App Store?  Is it that you are only making a $0.99 purchase while the candy bar is just a percent of a fraction of the groceries in your cart?  Should we be selling app specific gift cards at the checkout counter?

I’m no marketing genius.  I wish I were.  I wish I had the answers to these questions, but I don’t.  I think the answer is probably a little bit of ‘yes’ to most if not all of them, though.

But from the other side, now I am a developer of apps.  I see the thousands that enjoy and endlessly praise my apps while they are free but refuse to touch them as if they were a plague when they cost $0.99.  I see the negative reviews people leave complaining that they have to pay for additional functionality in an already fully functional FREE game.  I see the faceless users belittle my hours and days of late nights and weekends by saying, not worth four quarters.  I know … I’m whining.  But it fascinates and frustrates me to no end because I don’t understand why the dollar holds such a high value in the App Store.  The consumer has every right to do all the things I have mentioned in this paragraph.  I as the app developer, work for them.

What it really comes down to is this though … whoever can take the app store aisle of a grocery store and turn it into an impulse purchase at the register type of experience … those will be shoes worth walking in.

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What a great a special day. We brought our first born home today. Just in time for some trick-o-treating!

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Yesterday my wife took me to see “The 39 Steps”, put on by The Company Theatre.  It was great.  It was based on an Alfred Hitchcock film which was based on an adventure novel by John Buchnan.

We had a blast.  The play was taken on by four very funny, talented and ambitious actors (one actress) where over 100 characters were introduced, by just the four.  We had concerns that with all the costume changes we would not be able to keep up with the plot, but they did a great job.

One of the most unique and fun parts about the whole show was the location.  The Company Theatre had rented out The Big Apple Room, a banquet room at a restaurant, Little Italy.  So we were sitting around what anyone passing by could have thought was a family reunion or wedding rehearsal dinner, watching a show.

The tables were packed very tightly which was at first a little awkward, but everyone was so friendly and ready to chat away.  We actually ended up exchanging information with a couple that were in town visiting for a week.  The food was also very good and well prepared.  I had Chicken Parmigiani and Melissa had Baked Lasagna with Meat.  Delicous.

If you do end up going to see one of their shows, my one bit of advice is arrive early!  The doors opened at 6:30pm and the show was suppose to start at 7:30pm.  So we showed up around 7:05 and quickly realized we were the last ones there and everyone else was already eating … whoops!  Whether I misread the website or something, I’m not sure, but their dinner theater means everyone eats and finishes their dinner, then the show starts.  Not a big deal, we both finished our plates very quickly being very hungry, so no delay was had.

I highly recommend you check out one of their shows.  It seems as though they put on a lot of small cast shows, sort of their specialty.  The atmosphere was great.  Being on the same level as the show and them walking around past you because you are literally in a small banquet room.  Great fun.

And I’ll leave you with a quick video they have posted on YouTube from their show, “The 39 Steps”.

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