Wow, it’s been too long. Three whole months since my last batch of uploads. I went on to pursue a doctorate, and I just survived my first doctoral semester!!!! It was eight very intense weeks of learning new ways of writing, research and citing. I’m in a technology and innovation management degree program, which doesn’t seem like much of a stretch considering my thesis interest. I was going to go for eLearning, but it just didn’t feel quite right for me. It has been a challenging but enjoyable jump.
I’ll always love music and make time for it. I’ve been itching to drink wine and put on my favorite records. As a gift to myself for surviving semester one, I bought myself one of my favorite records Songs From the Big Chair, by Tears for Fears. I found it near mint while crate digging! It’s even more brilliant on vinyl spinning on my cork mat! The other night I busted out the wine and put it on. To share on here, I captured Yves Montand’s Paris simply because its spring and spring is the season for love. Nothing captures that feeling better than Montand.
Whether he’s singing about new love, old love, or lost love, it’s quite pretty and poetic. I like finding the translations around the net, and this site is nice. Paris has a few more ticks and pops than I remember. It’s gotten play over the years that I’ve had it. The stylus tracking along the surface somehow followed the ups and downs of my life. In my younger years, I wasn’t absolutely perfect with my record care. Like anyone, my age record care has been a learning process. The pops and ticks I think improve it somehow and I left those in for character as it added to the mood. The pops and ticks make it even more lovely and enchanting drawing me into Montand’s world. Sometimes I like to imagine myself in an old smokey club in Paris when I put this on.
I’ll hopefully be uploading more over my break and hopefully getting out and crate digging. I’ve got a massive want list going on right now. I also want another writing project on what I did my website around even if I have to make them for myself. The wheels keep turning.
I’m finally an Electronic Frontier Foundation member!
As somebody who loves computers, tech, and the internet I can say I’ve wanted to join the Electronic Frontier Foundation for months now. I finally made the jump this morning!!!
If you don’t know who they are check out this about section. To give the short version of what they do–they are “The leading nonprofit defending digital privacy, free speech, and innovation.” As an online creator and scholar of eLearning, I get scared of what the future will hold. Regardless of where you fall on the political spectrum and what your personal thoughts/feelings/opinions are it is an undeniable fact that the United States is presently embroiled in an unstable political situation. The idea of net neutrality going away should be scary to everyone regardless of personal political views. It could hurt net openness, free speech, and could make biased or data mined research a new normal. That research could contain sources that do not contain credible scientific and/or academic backing. I state “and/or” to encompass research in both the humanities and the pure sciences. Since not everybody understands how to discern sources–misinformation could be perceived as accurate data by many.
Fast and slow lanes and throttling could hurt or disrupt scholarship. I worry about my academic pursuits and future livelihood in all this net neutrality talk. I have those same concerns regarding the future of my fellow academicians. I love working on my archive. This website and the work surrounding my thesis has been at total passion project and great learning experience for me. More than anything I want to get into an eLearning doctoral program. In this time in between programs I’ve been researching things I want to do in my doctoral program. I have been really into research about potential benefits and potential drawbacks of digital ink in classrooms, particularly STEM environments (could hold my interest to be a dissertation topic). It would be amazing to apply my research to a real-world setting one day. I am also really into game theory and the benefits of creating of computer simulations to help college students learn without fear (studies of use in the medical field are particularly interesting).
The EFF are working to “Protect Your Right to Repair and Control the Devices in Your Life.” As a tinkerer, this is important to me. I am no engineer (sometimes I have pangs like I wish I had taken that path), but I have certainly learned a lot by taking apart my own devices and working on them. It teaches me science and engineering principals in a super fun manner. I love taking things apart, and my ability to do so has saved devices in my household and parents household. I haven’t been able to save every device as some are simply beyond repair. Nonetheless, each device I work on teaches me something.
Joining EFF makes me feel like I am part of team internet, team science, and team scholarship! If these are things you are interested in too–check them out.
For my upload this week I picked a holiday album, but not just any holiday album. It’s an exclusive Grants Department Store record made by Columbia Records. I bought it the very first time I went crate digging. It was a snowy January morning, and my very first record player had shown up on the doorstep the day before. I was going to set it up later and needed some records so that I could test it. My mom and I made a trip to Volunteers of America, and I found this record for two dollars. I included in the armful of records I was leaving with that day because of its ties to old retail. That trip started my love of going to thrift shops and digging through records.
I’m sure many of you haven’t heard of Grants Department Store. I hadn’t either when I made my purchase. I had to look it up when I got home. Grants Department Store was affiliated with the chain W. T. Grant. W. T. Grant was started by William Thomas Grant in 1906. He was 30 years old at the time, and initially, the business was called “W. T. Grant Co. 25 Cent Store.” It was located in Lynn, Massachusetts and mostly sold home goods. Grant started his business with $1000.1 That would be like $27,090.91 currently.2 Grant had worked as a salesman and had earned the $1000 by saving a portion of his paychecks.3
By 1936 Grant’s business had expanded considerably and he was earning almost $100 million a year.4 Grant was incredibly wealthy, likely beyond his wildest dreams. The things written about him make him sound quite personable, and like he had a big heart, as that same year, he started the William T. Grant Foundation.5 Despite the fact that Grant died in 1972 and his stores went bankrupt in 1976 his foundation is still running today. According to their website, they stand for “supporting research to improve the lives of young people.”6
If you are a scholar with big dreams regarding “reducing inequality” or “improving the use of research evidence” check out their website.7 You might be able to score research grant. If you check out their history section, they have funded some truly fascinating and relevant research through the years.
William Thomas Grant’s retail empire may be dead, but his legacy is remembered through artifacts like this one. More importantly, his legacy is still alive in the support for evidence-based scholarship that tries to better the lives of young people.
“Some method should be found by which scientific knowledge gained in various fields can be translated into the enrichment of a normal, healthy family life.” William Thomas Grant8
I was on another blog this morning replying to a post in the comment section. The person wanted to start a blog but didn’t know where to start. I posted some advice. A little later I was doing dishes and thinking about the advice I gave. I was also thinking about the graduation phone call I had a few weeks back where my instructor discussed having my website as an example for future students. A future student might see my example, but they wouldn’t necessarily know how to start a website of their own.
While we use the internet all the time and visit all kinds of websites, it can be challenging to know how to start making your own place online. Sound For A Future Generation has been around for one year! I thought I’d pass along a little advice on what I have learned, so future students and visitors know how to make their own little corner of the internet.
The first thing to do is have a goal and purpose. Because I had been collecting records and had been a scholar of sound recording since 2012 my goal was to make a website that was a sound archive/place to make an interactive thesis/place to present my writing and research. Try to devise a goal. What do you love and feel super passionate about? Your goal and purpose could be anything. It could be dead malls, ornithology, the story of the home computer, old-time recipes, collecting comic books, sharing your fiction or non-fiction writing…it could literally be anything. Ultimately it has to be something you are super passionate about.
Once you have a goal in mind, start brainstorming to come up with a cool name that reflects your goal and purpose. I went with Sound For A Future Generation because I’m preserving past works so the future can use it for research. I love collecting old media and think it would be sad if there weren’t movements to digitize like xfr. I was got the name from the B52s “Song for a Future Generation.” The B52s are one of my favorite bands. When I’m not collecting old 78s and interesting mid-century finds I like looking for 1980s new wave vinyl.
Next, start researching blog hosting through your favorite search engine. I looked at and compared what blog hosts offered and the experiences of others. The experiences included the creative product (blog) and what bloggers were saying about their hosting. I decided WordPress would work best for me and my needs. I probably spent a couple of hours over the course of two to three days looking around the internet to come to this conclusion. The decision is yours, but I do highly recommend WordPress and find it to be extremely user-friendly.
Next, choose the layout and design of your website. Choose something attractive, and that is complementary to what you would like to present. For example, if you are doing something that relies heavily on photos look for a layout that emphasizes your images. Make sure you have something that has easy to read fonts and an easily visible color scheme (ex: don’t use a white font against a light pink background). I have been taking an online course recently that discussed making educational materials that can be read by everybody. People with who are color blind or have low or impaired vision won’t be able to see the aforementioned color scheme. A crazy font might be hard for someone with dyslexia. Ultimately think as universal and inclusive as you possibly can.
Once I laid out the bare bones and structure of my website I chose to learn some HTML. I did this because I had an interest. Coding is fun for me. Most host services don’t require you to know HTML. Part of why WordPress is so user-friendly is because it does not require knowledge of coding, but I would recommend at least picking up a reference guide. I keep on my shelf “HTML & CSS: Design and Build Websites” by Jon Duckett. The thing I find most helpful about this book is it contains many visual examples and offers great all-around tips. Knowing some HTML has helped me have better control over my text— mainly because I have to factor in academic formatting in what I do. I am far from being an HTML superstar, but I know enough to do what I need to do.
A good free resource for HTML is the Khan Academy course! There are also a lot of good websites out there that you can find with a basic search that covers the basics of HTML.
Next, familiarize yourself with “fair use,” “public domain,” and the “creative commons license”. If you are not supplying your own images, get ones with the creative commons license. I relied on Wikimedia a lot in my thesis. I also used the Internet Archive. There are a lot of great open source websites out there. Open Culture is an amazing website! It offers so many forms of media and scholarship that are part of the creative commons. If you are a scholar, the Library of Congress and Smithsonian allows for you to use their images in many instances. I have relied extensively on the Library of Congress for images.
Lastly, have fun and enjoy the adventure. Writing and web design is a fun pursuit and learning experience. I couldn’t imagine my life not partaking in those activities. I’m happiest and most content with my life when I’m making things on the internet.
Hi Everyone,
Sorry, the updates have been slow. I’ve been in the final months of writing and coding a thesis. It has been crazy. I did the very first online thesis for my school. At this point, my thesis is done and completely coded so check it out. Right now, I’m waiting for the semester to finish and the paperwork to go through stating I have graduated. Once it has gone through I’m putting in for doctoral studies. I want to enter into an educational technology program because making educational things (websites, videos, preserving audio) on the internet makes me happiest in life.
Even though I’m done with the requirements of my program, this website and technology/audio history means a lot to me, and I plan to keep working on it. I’m looking forward to using my break to read sources for future endeavors and upload more audio. I think I only uploaded like half of my record collection for school. I’d like to aim for a record a week like I was doing before writing the thesis took over my life (not in a bad way—just demanding). I want to do some mid-century findings as I didn’t get to really touch on that era much of that in my thesis. I think mid-century findings are awesome.
Net neutrality is up on the chopping block again. I don’t like to get political to the point of I wish I could live on the moon to escape politics, but this is a subject that hurts people regardless of where they fall on the political spectrum. The FCC head seems really bent on gutting net neutrality. My livelihood and how/why I go to school is dependent on the internet. My partner’s education and livelihood too. The content you want could be throttled or blocked unless you pay extra (hey wanna do your holiday shopping online—that could be another $5 to 10 dollars just to have access to eBay or Amazon). The death of net neutrality could push low-income families off the internet period and shape what information we have access to (and what we don’t have access to). This has strong potential to be a free speech/net openness issue. Please use the internet to look up a local politician to contact today. You can even text 50409. This number lets you text with a computer that will help you communicate to politicians about this. We need net neutrality and people to be concerned about its safety. This is a topic that needs to be trending.
A screenshot fromthe television show Bob’s Burgers. Think how a repeal of net neutrality would hurt the characters. Bob/Linda/Jimmy Pesto’s food might get overlooked in favor of advertising a mass chain establishment. Teddy the lovable repairman and Mort, the Mortician’s services, might run slow in favor of a bigger business. You probably have people just like this that make up your towns. How would a repeal of net neutrality affect you and your local economy?
How the digital world looked when I was a kid. Let’s all be its gate keeper and keep it alive so future generations can do and feel all the same things we did.
Hi Everyone
I know I haven’t written a new post on here since May. This has been a super busy semester, and I’ve been coding things for my thesis that you can check out under the thesis tab. I have made some listening portals so check them out. I also started my thesis, and upon the conclusion of this semester, I’ll be half way done with it. I wouldn’t be able to pull off a thesis or a masters program without the internet. Without a chance to do an online thesis I would be so bored and getting through it would be about as fun as pulling teeth. I’m a computer geek and the internet gives me a place to express myself and belong somewhere. It always has. I was always that weird anxious kid in school who liked weird dorky things that nobody else did, like retro gaming, and cranking “old” music while retro gaming. I was kind of like that Futurama episode with the “what if” machine.
Here I am on a Saturday night. I have no date. I have a bottle of Shasta and my all Rush mix tape. But the internet is magical, and like the Felicia Day book is titled “You’re Never Weird on the Internet (Almost).”
What I want to say today is if you love this wonderful digital world that we call the internet, please write letters or make phone calls to preserve net neutrality. I took time out and wrote a letter to the FCC today. Net neutrality is a really important topic. It makes it so all of us regardless of what income we make or who we are can access anything we want to learn about or explore from the news, check weather, commerce, search for new job opportunities, keep up with friends and family on social media, and watch cool videos on YouTube. We all spend so much of our life online, and the concept of net neutrality makes it so we all can enjoy the internet at the same speed. I really am passionate about this topic and the open source movement as well. Please take the time to say something about this topic online today and every day. We would not be a free country without this freedom. We should all be able to equally access everything without paying extra. Net neutrality is different than net openness but there are ways that net openness could get hurt. Don’t let this magical realm die. We all need to fight to keep our magical home worlds safe, throttle free, and open.
Record Store Day was on April 22nd. I haven’t had a chance to talk about it yet because I have been starting my thesis. I’ve been working on my first listening portal and writing the introduction. Check out my 1890s Listening Portal.
Record Store Day celebrates brick and mortar record shops in our community. I’m from a small town and the record stores are all in the city. I wanted to give my business locally this year. It is important to keep small town America alive. This year I found a local antique shop that I had never been to. I found an armful of really cool records that I’ll put into a slide show.
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I’ve been loving what I picked up. I can’t stop playing Herb Alpert and I’m really enjoying Cocktail Time. I find Cocktail Time to be a great coffee drinking record first thing in the morning when I’m starting my school work. I honestly bought Cocktail Time just because I loved the cover. I’ll be uploading them to my YouTube channel soon.
If you haven’t celebrated Record Store Day yet jump in your car and enjoy a belated celebration somewhere. What I am about to say probably goes against the spirit of Record Store Day which places an emphasis on going to brick and mortar locations. If you don’t have any cool stores around you make a purchase from a small reputable eBay store. I’ve known a few great people in my life that work really hard on their eBay stores. They put as much care and energy into their small online shop as someone with a brick and mortar location. Their shops are a job and source of income to them. I know we all want to keep our physical locations open because there is nothing like the experience of crate digging to find an awesome treasure. Online stores have their place too. They are often a great resource to find titles that we’ve been struggling to find—and often times you are supporting someone with a dream and a passion.
One of the places I buy my records from is a store where the owners search out storage locker auctions. Because of their travels, I have found some very interesting records that I have purchased for my collection. They have a very muddy container of 78s that I have periodically picked. The first time I picked about twelve of the cleaner looking discs. Only one side was out of approximately twenty-four had dirt caked deep into the grooves. I used a little mild dish soap and after a little work that record cleaned up nicely. This success made me want to try to experiment with some different methods to try to clean up and save other records in that muddy container.
Here are the records I worked on saving. You can see that three out of the five aren’t bad, but two are very mud coated.
Shopping:
There was one record I remembered that I passed on originally. Because I was successful with that one really dirty side I had to go back and buy it. Last month I went back and it was still there. It was a 1926 Coon-Sanders Nighthawk Orchestra record. It was exciting and I bought five records for $10. A $10 gamble is worth it to experiment cleaning techniques on and maybe save some interesting pieces. Here is a little bit of insight into my thought process when I go record shopping beyond physically examining the discs for cracks or other damage.
Victor 20015—was released in 1926. This was the one most mud coated and that I was most concerned about. Side A was Coon-Sanders Original Nighthawk Orchestra. I was so excited to find it. Coon-Sanders was such a quintessential 1920s band that for $2 dollars I had to give it a try. Side B is Russo and Fiorito’s Oriole Orchestra I was unfamiliar with this group but had a hunch that it would be some great 1920s jazz.
The last sentiment aligns with why I picked Victor 19332 and Brunswick 2950. They just looked like 1920s gold to me. I was unfamiliar with the acts on both, but sometimes I find my best stuff and a new favorite song on these hunches. The Brunswick disc was Carl Fenton’s Orchestra and the Victor disc had International Novelty Orchestra and the Garber-Davis Orchestra.
I went for the Okeh disc because it had a track from the Ziegfeld Follies of 1920.
The Decca disc I found to be an exciting prospect. Both sides were Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Jordan and His Tympany Five. I never knew those two worked together and have fond memories of being a teenager and playing Louis Jordan CDs with my dad. Louis Jordan is a forgotten jump blues artist and he influenced early rock’n’roll music. I have looked up this recording and it is one of many that the two made together for Decca. I had a hunch that this was going to be the case because the Decca “personality series” was a series that was mass produced in large numbers. These discs contain popular musicians and songs. They are super common to find.
Trying Something New:
Supplies
Because two of these are pretty mud coated and were stored in less than stellar conditions for a really long time I am not going to do my usual cleaning protocol that I have discussed in the how to section.
I’m thinking these were in a barn or basement with a dirt floor for decades. I needed something more than just my usual microfiber cloth and distilled water bottle. I gathered a dish with warm water and Dawn dish soap. I figured if it gentle enough to clean up cute wildlife after an oil spill it should be safe on my records. I grabbed my microfiber cloth and a magic eraser that is also a non-abrasive sponge.
I got the idea for the magic eraser from my video gaming interest. A lot of times when restoring a console people will take magic erasers to the outside plastic housing. Old consoles are often scuffed, may have markings from a permanent marker, and are always coated in dust and dirt. With some gaming consoles where the plastic is textured or maybe very shiny, rubbing too hard will remove the texture or strip the shine. With this thought, I acted carefully in my use. I found these at a dollar store and I like that these are not your typical magic eraser. The other side is a regular nonabrasive sponge. I opted for this because if I hit an area that is particularly troublesome and I need to scrub a little harder I won’t somehow hurt the shellac.
I cleared off a microwave cart to a make workstation with my records and above supplies. I positioned it directly next to my sink. On the floor, a few feet away I have a towel spread open to dry records on.
The Process:
Here is what I did to all ten sides. In some instances, I did this twice.
I initially tilt the disc under the faucet getting it wet but being careful not to get the label wet.
Then I placed the wet disc on my microwave cart.
Next, I dipped the microfiber cloth in my bowl of soapy water and scrubbed within the grooves of the record.
I did the same thing with the sponge side.
Then I very cautiously and lightly used the magic eraser side.
Then rinse and maybe repeat. Sometimes you can’t tell if you need to repeat the process until most of the water has dried. When the disc is wet it just looks black. Once it starts drying you can see if there are any dirt splotches still there.
My drying process was this. After my final rinse, I took a dish towel and to the best of my ability I wiped away the water. Because there are so many grooves where there may still be water I let it sit out to dry on a towel for about 30 minutes to an hour. Once dry I put them in archive papers and poly sleeves. I’m always sure that they are dry before putting them in archival materials. This avoids mildew and mold growth.
Results:
They cleaned up wonderfully. I may now do this with all my new 78s now. I realized after I uploaded the audio that I forgot to tweak the equalization settings. Other than that they sounded great. I was especially pleased with my most challenging disc, the Coon-Sanders disc. I’m very happy that I could save all ten sides! I’ll go back to the store in a few more weeks and ask to buy more muddy records. You can hear them on my YouTube channel! Here are the exact links so you don’t have to hunt through my uploads.
It was forty years ago this year that NASA sent their Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 probes into space. It was to be a five-year mission to collect color photos and other data to learn about where we as humans have never gone. It has been easy for me to get stuck in my computer chair for days on end exploring this subject all over the internet and in my school library. There is something so profound about this exploration. There is so much of the universe and life we have yet to understand. As I stare at the photos and findings I always think of a line from Hamlet from act 1 scene 5 “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy”.
As someone who really loves the story of sound technology the aspect of the Voyager probes that most captures my imagination is the “golden records”. Each probe had a record mounted on the outside of it made of gold plated copper.
Astronomer, Carl Sagan led the project.
The disc was entitled “The Sounds of Earth”.
Should intelligent life from other places in the universe come into contact with this the probes they can play what is a snapshot of life on Earth in 1977. NASA called it “…a kind of time capsule, intended to communicate a story of our world to extraterrestrials” (“The Golden Record”). There is a stylus that comes with the disc.
The disc contains both sounds of our existence and images of it. It is possible for records to contain images. There was even a piece of ill-fated consumer technology from the early 1980s developed by RCA, the Capacitance Electronic Disc. It was a phonographic like disc which used a stylus to play back media. If you have never heard of it here is the Wikipedia link and also do a YouTube search. There are some interesting videos containing old advertisements and information on the actual mechanics of the device.
Below is an image of the gold plated aluminum cover that uses symbols to explain how to play the record. It keeps the disc safe. The NASA website explains the symbolic instructions. The first grouping of symbols in the top left corner uses binary code to explain the proper speed of the record and where the stylus is placed. Underneath this is a diagram demonstrating the location of our sun. The top right images tell about the video. The images depict the waveform, that 512 vertical lines complete an image, and that the first image should be a perfect circle. The bottom right image shows the two lowest states of the hydrogen atom. The vertical lines depict the spinning of the proton and electron and “The transition time from one state to the other provides the fundamental clock reference used in all the cover diagrams and decoded pictures” (“The Golden Record” 2017).
Here is the explanation that NASA released.
While I find the use of symbols interesting I am unsure about how they would be interpreted by other intelligent life forms. Humans on Earth and our various subcultures have attributed meanings to these hieroglyphics and created the systems they represent. We have very much created our world and conceptions of it with our minds. What if there are other intelligent life forms out there that possess a different way of processing and interpreting information? They could be a developed and flourishing society. For the sake of argument maybe they are even humanoid in appearance and possess a similar brain structure. They too have built their own conceptions and world like us, but not like us. In their societies, they likely have their own systems. They have their own representations of numeric systems and have created their own symbols and meanings for things and ideas. I am unsure the ease of which our systems and hieroglyphics would translate and be understood. Though the laws of nature are established and do not change, the ways in which we draw and represent something like mathematics, DNA, or an atom may be completely different. I realize that all we know is humanity’s representations and symbols but are they communicable to beings that are not part of humanity? The symbolic directions inscribed on the gold plated aluminum cover seem very much like the old idea from seafaring days of putting a note into a glass bottle and maybe someone out there will find it and be able to read it.
There are many places online to experience what is on those discs. Here are five sites to peruse.
For general information regarding Voyager and the discs, the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory website is the fist site to recommend. The images and video tab has particularly astounding content.
The “pale blue dot” image juxtaposed with Carl Sagan’s writing.
I find the “Pale Blue Dot” images very moving. There is also a section dedicated to the golden records. It is there that you can see very detailed images of the disc, see images included on the disc, and hear what is on the disc.
I am unsure of the origins of this website. It seems it was created for people to experience the data on the Voyager golden discs. It appears to be a mid to late 1990s relic still in existence. I am certain of this because of the plain and sparse text based layout. The other reason why I am confident in this assessment is the file types used to hear the audio. Your listing experiences are either uncompressed wave files or real audio player files.
Though the presentation, layout, and functionality are very dated in 2017 the best use is to explore all the analog photos that were on the Voyager discs. I have not yet found another website that lets me look at all these photos. The photos show how we look at numbers and mathematics, our knowledge of cellular division and reproduction, humans, insects, animals, plant life, the things humans do, and where we live. Ultimately all these images would provide a snapshot of Earth and the forms of life inhabiting it if other intelligent life should discover the Voyager probes. There is something very captivating about holding on to this thought while looking at these images.
This MIT website was designed for the sole purpose of playing Voyager’s audio. There is not much to say about it. It lives up to its intended purpose.
The Library of Congress and archive.org are great places to search for documents and files regarding Voyager. There were many interesting things at the Library of Congress. There are documents showing Carl Sagan’s correspondence with Alan Lomax, a man who was many things but for the sake of this context a folklorist and ethnomusicologist. These documents discuss what musical selections should be included to showcase the diversity of cultures on Earth. There is also a draft essay explaining the goals of the interstellar records and an audio clip of Sagan reading his famed “pale blue dot” quote.
Though it is not properly Voyager related by searching “Carl Sagan” you get to see many of his personal notes and documentations through the years. Being able to look into his student notebooks was a fascinating glimpse as to how he processes and analyzes information.
My most interesting find at archive.org was an official NASA News report. The entire release can be read. The best part of that document was the letter from President Carter. This letter is currently floating in space with the records at present. Here is that letter.
The NASA audio section lets you hear the audio from the discs and the audio from the control room during Voyager 1 launch. Beyond Voyager this section lets you listen to NASA cassette tapes from the 1980s. These were obviously uploaded in a state of decay, but have some pretty interesting news and are interesting historical documentation telling what NASA was doing and finding during the decade.
There are many other places to explore online these have just been my favorite finds. Right now these records are floating in interstellar space. Maybe one day they will be discovered by lives that are not human. With all the planets and galaxies in existence the probability of us being all there is seems unlikely.
This image comes from the NASA website. It is from a section on the Pioneer mission. The same image was on the Voyager plaques. I used this as it could explain the symbols you see.
It would be nice to think that those records could one day echo. After all, I learned from a 2007 editorial by Timothy Ferris, a creator of the discs that they were dedicated to “To the makers of music — all worlds, all times” (Ferris A, 2007). He surprised me in that editorial. The discs that now capture our imaginations were created in quiet secrecy because they were worried that it would be a frivolity. NASA was worried that Congress would think that the record was a waste of money and tried to quietly work on the project. They were creative with their press photos and took photos from the opposite side of the location of where the record was bolted.
Now they are viewed as a snapshot of humanity. Though the images and sounds of our cultures have changed in the past forty years I think there is something that transcends space and time that was captured within this project. It is a story of who we are, what we are, what we do, what we see, our entire small short lifespan on one analog disc floating far from the “pale blue dot” which we call home. There is something very powerful about that thought…
All images come from NASA.
References
Bui, Lily. “Infinite Voyager.” Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Accessed April 11, 2017. http://web.mit.edu/lilybui/www/.
Ferris, Timothy. “The Mix Tape of the Gods.” The New York Times (New York), September 5, 2007, A.
Lomax, Alan, and Carl Sagan. Letter to Alan Lomax Regarding the Voyager Golden Record. June 6, 1977. Manuscript/Mixed Material. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, Accessed April 11, 2017. https://www.loc.gov/item/cosmos000113/.
“NASA Audio Collection.” Internet Archive. Accessed April 11, 2017. https://archive.org/details/nasaaudiocollection?&sort=-downloads&page=4.
“NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS) 19770079863: Voyager Will Carry Earth Sounds Record : NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS).” Internet Archive. Last modified July 27, 2016. https://archive.org/details/NASA_NTRS_Archive_19770079863.
Sagan, Carl. Carl Sagan’s University of Chicago notebook. to 1956, ca. 1955. Manuscript/Mixed Material. Retrieved from the Library of Congress. Accessed April 11, 2017. https://www.loc.gov/item/cosmos000010/.
Sagan, Carl. For Future Time and Beings: Draft Essay. 1978. Manuscript/Mixed Material. Retrieved from the Library of Congress. Accessed April 11, 2017. https://www.loc.gov/item/cosmos000040/.
Sagan, Carl. The Pale Blue Dot: Short Recording. Audio. Retrieved from the Library of Congress. Accessed April 11, 2017. https://www.loc.gov/item/cosmos000110/.
“The Golden Record.” NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory California Institute of Technology. Accessed March 6, 2017. http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/spacecraft/goldenrec.html.
“Voyager 1.” Internet Archive. Last modified February 29, 2011. https://archive.org/details/Voyager1.
“Voyager Golden Record.” Re-lab.net. Accessed March 6, 2017. http://re-lab.net/welcome/.
Like promised I have made a better “how to” section. I was inspired by an article I read at the Library of Congress. I have really enjoyed reading Mike Ashenfelder’s blog. Ashenfelder writes about digital preservation and has worked as a technical writer. In January his post was on keeping cultural memory safe. If you would like to read it here is a link.
It is important to remember where we have been. There are great lessons to be garnered from preserving and studying past media formats and the voices on them. Collecting and preserving records is fun. It has been an enjoyable hobby of mine for many years. If you have an interest and wish to do the same my only advice is…go for it. I made the “how to” section in a voice representing what I wish others could have told me when I was first starting out. Those experiences will go there. I should rather say that those mistakes will go there as the Oscar Wilde quote “Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes” seems quite relevant. I’ve made some mistakes along the way and will continue to.
I see each record as a curiosity to experience past or imagined events. However, I do not think every time, place, sentiment, and song is good or something to be condoned. Nonetheless, the work should be preserved because it is art and art is a reflection of a society. I am simply the keeper of time and archivist of where humanity has been.
I have chosen to use YouTube as an open source platform for people to walk into and experience the past. YouTube and this website are used by myself to create an interactive museum exhibit. This is your intended experience. I have allowed on my YouTube settings page to let others embed videos on their social media sites and blogs. I would be remiss if I did not ask for you upon sharing to please act with responsibility and tact. Please do not use these recordings to promote politics, ideologies, nationhood, or anything else. Simply share a song, thought, or curiosity with a friend or a loved one. Simply share a smile or memory. My deepest held belief and code of ethics that I live by is…above all be kind to all living beings. It is with this thought that I interact with others every day. With this content…some of it discussing delicate subjects…I ask that you please do the same. I do not wish to step on anyone’s first amendment right. Although we may call it a right it should not be called that. It is a responsibility to be wielded with thoughtfulness and respect. Please have respect for your world and all who inhabit it…especially with my work.
I don’t know if I ever explained the origin of the name of this website. It comes from my hope that humanity persists despite humans and the things we do. That we may be able to look back on these recordings one day in a world where we are no longer divided by social constructs such as nationality, politics, race, religion, gender, and any other fathomable construct. It may be an idealized future but if we can discipline our brains to move past our fears of beings who have lives that are different from our own…fail to understand…or see as a threat maybe it could be an achievable future…perhaps anything is possible.
Every human has prejudices or other ways of life which it in most instances irrationally or illogically fears, but we need to move past these things for humanity to survive. If we can we may learn great lessons and new perspectives from all the cultures inhabiting our world. Each one of us possesses some goodness to offer our world to make it better if we take the time to be aware of our surroundings and develop our minds and skills. If we can not make this leap…this piece may be our outcome…
Please act responsibly with my work. Everything we do has ramifications and ripples.
Sound For A Future Generation 
