Last year we reviewed the book I Miss My Pencil, by IDEO's Design Director Martin Bone and Materials Scientist Kara Johnson. We just came across a very cool project on their attendant website, which is dedicated to creative experiments, called C60 Redux.
The concept behind the C60 Redux is this: We've gone from handling vinyl, tapes and CD's to clicking on MP3's, losing tactility in the process and making a casualty of the mix tape. Is it possible to bring that back in a digital way? Bone, Johnson, and a group of IDEO designers endeavored to do so by creating a music player built with RFID readers and some Arduino Mini Pros, all housed in a record player case. See for yourself:
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Sorry, If I bought this I think I'd use it for a few hours then put my earbuds back in cuz they're way more convenient and conpact.
http://roteno.com/?q=node/78
Skip and shuffle seems me unnecessary. Skipping track would mess up the constant flow of music, if it's a bad song you can still remove the song. And shuffle happens automatically as the tags are shuffled...
I'm curious as to whether the C60 Redux allows for someone to overlap two or more cards to play them concurrently. If the concept was to "find a physical representation of the elements of modern [digital] musical life", then perhaps the most important element that the product should address is this idea of the remix -- what is arguably the folk art of the 21st century.
Imagine being able to physically manipulate the RFID cards atop the player, mixing and matching melodies, rhythms, and lyrics to create seamless blends of existing songs. The act of DJing in itself is very much a tactile experience; a remix feature seems almost natural for a device like the C60 Redux.
Definitely some amazing stuff, and even better that it involves music and technology as well as design :D
And to the post above me... gestures would have also been a nice touch, but hey, its already pretty dang amazing!
I would love to see if they have worked out gestures for skip and shuffle or other functions, and if they are just as intuitive as the functions shown. Also, bypassing the computer must be a target for future development...