The most constructive way we can audition borderline micro-repetition is by recognising it as a conflation of meso-repetitions, a compression of everyday time units. This subsequent squeezing of perception creates a kind of nervousness and discomfort that accompanies listening to highly repetitive sounds.

Practice is a method of meditation on the subject - that of a perceiving subject immersed and emerging from a network of circular relations. Therefore, the modes of the loop network must also be considered as modes of practice. Practice is thinking and acting through a problem rather than about it.

Being in place is representable as a focus on the circulation networks operating withon a place, or field of observation. After all, we create a space for place by being. The hypothesis is that as acoustic subjects we both emerge from and are held in place (immersed in) a network of circular processes.

Broadly speaking, within the scope of this project, this network of circular modes is the loop network. Each of the modes works to place us within a dominant observation focus, and consequently, a delimited form of subjectivity.

Association is a fundamental relationship between structures in a system. Hence its place in oscillation. In the terminology of complex systems theory, especially autopoiesis, I would regard association as a type of structural coupling.

Types of association as relevant to soundscape composition are

• to aspects of other soundscapes from aspects of the current
• to acousmatic and/or concrete aspects of sound streams.  For example, tonal textural or ¨pure" (read schizophonic)  acoustic association
• to other perceptual modes or fields of observation within the same soundscape.  For example, micro structural aspects extrapolated from a mesolevel prior impetus.  Think of this as spatial or temporal zooming

An example application would be to take a soundscape recording, choose a given sound or aspect of that recording, then using synthesis and further recording attempt to recreate a synthetic morphology between the holism of the soundscape recording and the specificity of the given focus. 

The basic goal of the composition project is to take stereo and binaural location based recordings, including listening walks, and using a multi channel diffusion and processing system, compose for outer/inner association.  Dispersion is not intended as an algorithmic, realistic recreation of acoustic space, but as an inner/outer associative exploration of the acoustic place.  This is the place of the original recordings and the place of the emergent composition or virtual world unfolding from distortions and emphases of aspects of the recordings.
Part of the rationale in such a system of composition is to explore aspects of the soundscape I might otherwise miss details of or not hear.  It is a systemic process of augmented listening, and in being so, is designed to increase analytical listening capacity and furthermore increase acoustic awareness (by extrapolating from experiment to everyday perceptual exercise - from micro system to macro-system the exercise of faculties results in increased ability).

The current taxonomy can be viewed as a pretty, relative weighted index here. Otherwise, you can follow the ongoing explanation of taxonomy terms by clicking here.  

I've realised that whilst it's all very well and good to talk about taxonomy this and taxonomy that, just providing you with an index and no explanation is a tad unfair. So, also starting today, I'll be introducing individual taxonomy terms with a brief explanation of their relevance and significance.

Since I have to begin somewhere, and I want to get there via this taxonomy, I'll start with the obvious; an important step in any research praxis. That is, I'll start searching. As far as the internet goes, as a public space and circle of distribution and consumption, the most accessable search for me remains Google. I won't envangelise; it's enough for now to say that it's built into my browser on the toolbar. If my taxonomy is to stand as an effective and sytemic method of organisation, then it needs to be helpful in atucally finding and organising content. So, starting from today, I'll be routinely searching the web using a combination of the varying lingual forms of "sound" and one or more of the child taxonomy terms.

The aim is to collect a database of recordings of acoustic phenomena whilst in Korea.  It is my hope to link these samples to a map driven interface.  The samples are to be collected according to interests in aspects of place, cultural identity, and most importantly, reflection or illustration of the modes of the loop network.To this end, the field recordings are primarily a series of phonographic studies.  They are also to be used as the basis for extended composition experiments using mulitchannel techniques to trace the differing modes of the loop network as present in an individual recording. 

The thesis of looplog is made up of the combined books of the modes of the loop network.  These modes can be considered

• modes of practice of an acoustic/soundscape artist
• schema of classification of the soundscape and acoustic phenomena observable within the soundscape (domains of observation)
• aspects of place responsible for the production of the soundscape
• modes of being of the listening subject

The modes of the loop network can also be considered a taxonomy for organising and indexing existing research undertaken on acoustic ecology.