Envision this. . . As you look across the stadium at the next Superbowl or Olympics, everyone reaches into their pockets and purses. They pull out their mobile devices and open up a web page. At this point, each person is given a unique set of graphical controls - they just appear on the screen regardless of device or platform. Yes, the iPhones are friends with the android phones, blackberries, palmOS, iPads, and laptops. All is right with the world. . .

Timidly at first, but with greater and greater zeal, people touch their screens. Sound comes out from over the loudspeakers. Each person initiates and has an effect on the audio for the entire stadium. As people start to get what is happening and the performance builds to a deafening roar with individual inputs, the lights and sound goes out. In the dim colorful glow of each device, the centralized sound gives way to a chirping sound coming from the individual device. A chirping around the entire stadium becomes evident like a wash of cicadas or tree frogs. You look up across the stadium to your fellow performers and start to see colorful patterns emerge. The individual screens are used like pixels lighting up the faces of their holders. The patterns become slow motion video, coordinated by a server in the cloud. Each performer/audience member is overcome by the collaborative experience of such an event and vows to support open source projects of experimental music and digital media for the remainder of their collectively enriched lives.

This experience is possible. I'm working on a piece as you read this. HTML5/Rails can solve the issues of cross platform GUIs, coordination and distribution of instruments, and communication to and from many instrument nodes all over the world. All kinds of net art can become inclusive and performative.

Are you excited? I am.

Superbowl Coordinators, Olympic Committee. . . I'm waiting!

Distributed Performance with HTML5 and Rails