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From: mclaren Subject: WWW and microtonality -- Well, I just had my first experience surfing the WWW for 4 hours straight at the local library. What a mess. People...it's fifty times *worse* than I ever imagined. Here are the hard numbers: Tried 6 search engines: Alta Vista, Yahoo, HotBot, Lycos, Magellan, Accufind. Searched for the word "microtonality." Defaults only. Worst result: 6 hits. (Accufind.) "Best" result: 168 hits (HotBot). Ah, but those 168 "hits" are deceptive, kiddlies... Of all those 168 "hits," exactly 4 URLs led to useful websites: the Piet Oostrum's site, the JIN Store, Zia's site, and the Mills microtonal discography/ bibliography. Every other "hit" led either to wild garbage-- including some truly amazing wackiness about Every other "hit" led either to wild garbage-- including some truly amazing wackiness about "quantified astrological fields"--or irrelevant fragments (someone somewhere thought it would be a smart idea to spatter bits and pieces of microtonal CD reviews and miscellaneous e-mail from the Mills tuning forum across the web by turning them into hhtp links, and the end result is positively hallucinogenic), or dead "404 -- FILE NOT FOUND" messages. (Also plenty of 403s, same difference.) Artificial intelligence has never impressed me, and 40 years of LISP code seems to have produced a truly monogoloid spate of WWW search engines, all of them deeply & desperately & unspeakably *bad* at finding anything in the way of useful info. Plus, fraud. HotBot clearly ups its number of "hits" by including all dead URLs in its list. (Other Plus, fraud. HotBot clearly ups its number of "hits" by including all dead URLs in its list. (Other search engines appear to weed 'em out.) Thus, while HotBot scored the largest number of "hits" in a search for the word "microtonality," it does so at the cost of including vast numbers of 404 URLs. Roughly 25% of all the HotBot hits were dead URLs. Every link to the Harry Partch Society 404'd, every link to CERN 404'd. Attempts to find the new URLs failed in every case. Gave up. Even worse, *no* WWW search engine turned up a basic list of elementary info you'd want to find out if you were a micro- tonalist just starting out: Namely, what kind of non-12 tunings exist? How is microtonal music being made? Where is it being made? What's the history of non-12 tuning? Where is it being made? What's the history of non-12 tuning? Why is microtonal music being made? This is truly impressive. These are the BASIC questions any microtonal beginner would ask, and answers to 'em are *nowhere* available on the web. -- So let's see what we've got here: [1] The WWW is a swirling maelstrom of junk littered with dumb-and-dumber search engines and non-stop 404s. About 98% of the search "hits" on the word "microtonality" turned up pure garbage--essays by grad students about burning pianos that happen to mention the word "microtonality," random dissociated fragments of Mills Tuning Forum e-mail someone pasted into the dissociated fragments of Mills Tuning Forum e-mail someone pasted into the web...last and best, innumerable LINK NOT FOUND dead ends. [2] None of this so-called "information" on "microtonality" had much to do with microtonality, with the exception of Manuel Op de Coul's discography and the Mills bibliography. The typical "hit" on an Alta Vista or Yahoo list was something like "Post Modern Notation And Its Implications For Tutti-Fruiti Ice Cream" with the word "microtonal" squirreled away somewhere in the body of the text for snob appeal. [3] There is no single web page anywhere, at any time, in any way that offers any kind of general introduction to microtonality for the beginner. There is also no single kind of general introduction to microtonality for the beginner. There is also no single web page anywhere that offers any kind of *context* for people who know something about microtonality and want to know more. Ideally, we should have 3 levels of web pages about microtonality: (1) BEGINNERS START HERE. (2) IF YOU KNOW SOMETHING ABOUT MICROTONALITY AND WANT TO KNOW MORE, START HERE. (3) EXPERTS ONLY--ADVANCED TOPICS IN MICROTONALITY. In effect, there is zero useful information available about microtonality on the web. [4] Because most of the URLs blow out with 404s, it's incredibly frustrating--almost *no one* seems to be bright enough to realize that all URLs very quickly fry & die as the Internet addressing scheme is changed to accomodate the explosive growth of the the Internet addressing scheme is changed to accomodate the explosive growth of the web....therefore, the most sensible thing to do is assume the URLs are DOA and include a snail mail address for each URL (all of which will be 404 soon anyway). -- So my worst nightmares turned out to be *mild* in comparison with the truth. I already knew the Internet was a chaotic mess of bad info and gossip, but I'd assumed there was at least *a little* smidgen of useful information hidden away somewhere, available to extremely persistent web surfers. Silly me. Turns out the WWW is a vast whirlwind of junkthink, misinformation, snobtalk, gossip, rumors, fantasy and nonsense. The web's democratic, all right--just like the incurable rumors, fantasy and nonsense. The web's democratic, all right--just like the incurable ward at Bellevue. There's no context for anything, no way to make sense of any information, no place for beginners to start, no way to sort out garbage misinformation from solid info. Among other gems I encountered an essay which discussed Thaddeus Cahill's trautonium (I like it! Cahill did *not* invent the trautonium, he invented the telharmonium, a totally different instrument from a totally different era). Ah, but best of all: I searched the WWW for the word "tuning" & got 20 websites about "tuning your server" but not *one* *single* *website* about microtonality. Impressive, eh? All told, the experience of surfing the web in quest of information about microtonality was like being beaten by 12 dwarfs with baseball in quest of information about microtonality was like being beaten by 12 dwarfs with baseball bats underwater while blindfolded on LSD. Utter, raving, wild chaos. No way to make sense of anything. No context. No place to start. No reliable info (except for Manuel's web pages and few scraps of the Mills Tuning Forum placed on the web but wayyyyyy out of context and thus incomprehensible to anyone likely to read 'em). -- If I were a beginner looking for info on microtonality, what would I find by searching the world wide web? [1] Huge amounts of information about industrial music, pomo music theory, computer music, some mystifying references to a guy named Harry Partch all of which lead to dead URLs that give "404 -- file not found" messages. Harry Partch all of which lead to dead URLs that give "404 -- file not found" messages. Weird fragments about some guy named Haverstick who made a CD, a couple of files about how to tune your guitar *to 12-tet*, and--best of all--plenty of references to university music courses on 20th century music, all of which mention microtonality as something a couple of European guys did back in the 1920s. Riiiiiiiight. This is good. We're really doing well here, people. If I were a beginner searching for info on microtonalty...after surfing the web for a couple three hours I'd run screaming back to the 12-tet conservatory, where at least *some* hard info on *something* would be available. at least *some* hard info on *something* would be available. -- Between all the hundreds of dead-end 404 URLs and the lengthy essays on "notational implications of MIDI" (nary a mention of microtonality) and the odd "quantified astrological field" references (another of my favorite "hits" from a search for the word "microtonality"), if I were a microtnal beginner searching the web, after about 3 or 4 hours I'd be ready for some heavy-duty electroconvulsive therapy. Alas, one thing I would *NOT* be ready to do after surfing the WWW in search of useful info on microtonality, is: contact *any* of the major microtonal organizations (JIN, *any* of the major microtonal organizations (JIN, Frog Peak, Artifact Records, Pointless Music, ReR, BHPS, Xenharmonikon, ReR Quarterly, Boston Microtonal Society, AFMM, etc.) or be equipped to understand even the most elementary basic fundamental concepts of microtonality. -- So it's one huge incredible mess out there. Far worse than I ever imagined. The web is not "the nervous system of the human race," it's a giant dumpster full of out-of-date astrology ads and ungrammatical essays. Not only will beginners wind up baffled by their attempts to find info on microtonality, but they'll probably get the impression that [A] there *isn't* any useful info but they'll probably get the impression that [A] there *isn't* any useful info on microtonality, it's just a chaotic jumble of gibberish; [B] somebody named Harry Partch did something in connection with microtonality, but he's obviously not worth bothering with because no info is available about him; [C] contemporary microtonality is mostly about pomo music theory with a smattering of industrial music, feedback guitar techniques, and "post-classic" pop music; [D] the most important microtonalists in music history are: Glenn Branca, the Velvet Underground, Brian Eno and Gavin Bryars. -- Wow. What can I say? Wow. What can I say? Just...Wow. -- Okay. So here's this giant mess...what do we do about it? First: you people need to LEARN HOW TO DESIGN A WEBSITE. Let's start at the beginning. All search engines seem to operate by chewing on the cumulative text of a website and tallying up the total number of times your search word is mentioned. The first 25 words or so of a website are typically digested into a tag line that serves as the search listing. So what is the most important part of any website? *THE FIRST 25 WORDS.* Hello. Anyone there??? Hello. Anyone there??? When you design your website you *must* do the following: [1] ALWAYS strip off mail header garbage if it's a re-post linked to the WWW. Otherwise the listing will show up as incomprehensible stuff like BDHJ110101-10112@#128999198.111 What the hell is that??? If you surfed to Alta Vista and your "hits" were a bunch of listings like 1. 8989283.292#9202002=JJKDBD 2.===!~~~*(988.2392983DJDJDM.DLLL 3.&**@_)WWJWJ/WWW9989.2929298@ZOB would *you* bother to read these "hits"? Of course you wouldn't, you can't even tell what the hell is *in* these websites. [2] BOIL DOWN THE ESSENCE OF YOUR WEBSITE TO 25 WORDS OR LESS. THEN START WITH THOSE [2] BOIL DOWN THE ESSENCE OF YOUR WEBSITE TO 25 WORDS OR LESS. THEN START WITH THOSE 25 WORDS, pure and simple. I can't begin to count the number of websites whose Yahoo or Alta Vista or HotBot listing started off something like this: "Hi, Jo Blow Here, this is my attempt at doing a website which...." WRONG!!! If the website is about microtonal notation for traditional instruments, here is how your website should look: MICROTONAL NOTATION

for traditional acoustic instruments.

This website contains the following specific information:

.. This website would show up on a Yahoo search list as This website would show up on a Yahoo search list as 1. MICROTONAL NOTATION for traditional instruments. This website contains the following.... and this is *exactly* the way you want it to show up, because this tells a websurfing visitor *precisely* what is in your website as clearly and simply and succintly as possible. -- Here is how NOT to design the same website: (Big huge graphic that takes 5 minutes to download and tells the websurfer nothing-- hey....how about a picture of me? Yeah! That'll do!)

This is JOE BLOW'S WEBSITE designed with PageMill version 3.01. This web page was last updated on (blah-blah woof-woof). If you have any new information or corrections, please e-mail (myaddress@swarb.gink.zoid)

please e-mail (myaddress@swarb.gink.zoid)

Fancy interactive JAVA program

Dead URL

This web page is a first stab at an attempt to describe a meta-theory involving certain aspects of microtonal notation which... -- This would show up in a Yahoo or Alta Vista or HotBot search list as: "This is JOE BLOW'S WEBSITE designed with PageMill version 3.01. This web page was last updated on (blah-blah woof-woof). If you have any new information or corrections, please e-mail (myaddress@swarb.gink.zoid)" -- Guess what? It's impossible to tell what this web page Guess what? It's impossible to tell what this web page is *about* by looking at the Yahoo listing. Good job! -- Second important point: When you design a web page, *forget* about fancy graphics. After a half hour of websurfing I learned the hard way that Netscape downloads text first--then goes back to fill in graphics. So as soon as the text fills in I learned to click on STOP. This kills the graphics downloads and lets me scroll through the body of the webpage to see if there's any useful content there (usually not). The alternative is to sit around for 10 minutes reading Aristotle's "Rhetoric" (my constant companion) while a useless picture of something or someone creeps across (my constant companion) while a useless picture of something or someone creeps across the screen like a mailman with Parkinson's. Here's a hint, people: Graphics are garbage. They're content-free. Sound files are garbage. They take wayyyyy too long to download, last only a few seconds, are wayyyyy too low-fi, and most computers won't be set up to play 'em anyway. JAVA programs never run. DEC is always upgrading JAVA, so the bottom line is that all JAVA interpreters are beta (if not alpha) code and they all crash and burn, no exception. -- So the second thing you need to know when you folks design web pages is: leave out the graphics, don't bother with sound files, forget about fancy interactive animations, kiss off the JAVA programs. forget about fancy interactive animations, kiss off the JAVA programs. As a websurfer I want one thing and one thing only: content. Also content. And by the way, did I mention content? That means text, text, more text, and even *more* text. It means BE CONCISE. It means TELL 'EM WHAT YOU'RE GONNA TELL 'EM, TELL 'EM, THEN TELL 'EM WHAT YOU TOLD 'EM. AT* fill the damn background of your web pages with fancy patterns. This makes the web page *unreadable.* Also, please do *NOT* do something tricky like making your text fluorescent green against a picture of a black starry sky scanned from a Hubble satellite photo. Any sensible user will click on STOP long before the background graphic downloads... Any sensible user will click on STOP long before the background graphic downloads... Which leaves the hapless reader with unreadable fluorescent green text against a gray background. Ai caramba! -- Here are 3 horrible examples of what I'm talking about: [1] "

Two CD reviews

DMB5561719@aol.com

Sat, 1 Apr 95 17:49:18-0800

Message sorted by [date][thread][subject] [author] Next messages John H. Chalmers: "Another post from McLaren"

Previous message: John H. Chalmers "Post from Brian" In tuning digest I never see enough reviews In tuning digest I never see enough reviews of microtonal rcordsings. Here is my contribution, a few things I haven't seen anywhere else. (etc.) -- That was the verbatim text of the start of an actual web page. First, look at the uninformative header: "Two CD reviews." What KIND of CDs? Second: look at all the header junk. Who cares about the internet adress, who cares about the date? Post that crud--if you have to--at the *end* of the website, *not* the first couple of lines. Third: look at all the garbage! "Messages sorted by..." "Next message..." "Previous message..." Totally content-free! sorted by..." "Next message..." "Previous message..." Totally content-free! And even in the body of the website we get vaguely worded mush that tells the average person nothing: "In tuning digest I never see enough reviews of microtona recordings. Here is my contribution, a few things I haven't..." yadda-yadda-yadda. Imagine it--10 lines of text, and the web surfer *still* doesn't have the faintest idea WHAT THE HELL THIS WEB PAGE IS SPECIFICALLY ABOUT. -- Horrible example 2: check out Zusaan Kali Fasteau's web page. She's a fine performer, an innovative microtonalist, etc., etc., okay, fine, she's peachy-keen 'n dandy, love her music, she's the etc., etc., okay, fine, she's peachy-keen 'n dandy, love her music, she's the greatest thing since squeezed cheese. Fine. But the very first thing on her web page is a *monster* graphic that takes 10 minutes to download. I clicked STOP, dumped the graphic, aborted the web page and scooted. ZKF offers a perfect example of how *not* to design a web page. CONTENT FIRST, and superfluous glitz later (if at all). Put your graphics at the *end* of the web page, if you must include them at all. And as for scanned photos of yourselves--people, I hate to let you in on a little secret here, but nobody cares what you look like. "On the Internet, no one knows you're a dog" nobody cares what you look like. "On the Internet, no one knows you're a dog" as the cartoon goes. Content is what matters on the web. Pure distilled info. Everything else is piffle. -- Third horrible example: Wendy Carlos put up a web page with a mail box. Never got around to reading it. Wendy is a genius, a wonderful person, a superb musician, yadda-yadda-yadda. But her web site is a *disaster.* The background is some textured Mayan hieroglyphic something-or-other, and it is just plain *impossible* to make out black text against it. At first, I thought I had eye trouble. -- At first, I thought I had eye trouble. -- Here's the bottom line: Dark black text against a light uniform background is highly readable. Anything else is probably UNreadable. Stick to *dark black text* against a *light uniform background.* -- Okay. That takes care of basics. Common sense should have told you all of this, but apparently these revelations come as a startling epiphany to those of you who design web pages. This leaves the issue of content. Clearly none of you are capable of putting together a concise comprehensive web page that introduces beginners to the fundamental elmentary terms and ideas page that introduces beginners to the fundamental elmentary terms and ideas of microtonality. Clearly none of you are able or willing to design a web page that gives oodles 'n oodles of snail mail addresses of places like the JIN and the British Harry Partch Society and Frog Peak and ReR and Pointless Music and the Electronic Music Foundation. Clearly none of you other than Manuel are able or willing to design a web page that contains titles of basic essential references like Mandelbaum's thesis, Partch's Genesis of a Music, Blackwood's Structure of Recognizable Diatonic Tunings, Darreg's Xenharmonic Bulletins, Bosanquet's book, and the Corpus Microtonale score library, and the addresses at which Bosanquet's book, and the Corpus Microtonale score library, and the addresses at which to get these documents. (Snail mail--remember, all URLs go 404 within a couple of months nowadays.) -- So, obviously, as usual, I'll have to do it. Amazing. Just amazing. You people have got enough collective brainpower and knowledge about microtonality to move Mars out of its orbit, and after 3 years you *still* haven't put even a single minimally adequate microtonal web page anywhere in the world where beginners can find basic necessary info on microtonality. What's that? Oh. Sorry. Did I wake you folks up? Never mind, go back to sleep. It's nothing. --mclaren