PING PONG REMIX

PING PONG REMIX

PingPong Remix is a cross cultural music marathon that went on during the week of Swedish Radio’s Musikhjälpen event the benefit of refugees, December 2008.

Artists from all over the world contributed with sounds, beats, vocals and melodies, remixed each other’s work, and created amazing music.

Ping Pong Remix was created as part of a project called “Mass Media” at the Interaction Design Master at Malmö University, in December 2008. The project was done by Åste Laberg, Rob Nero and Anders PJ

HOW IT WORKS

PingPong Remix is a cross cultural music marathon that took place during the week of Swedish Radio’s Musikhjälpen event for the benefit of refugees, December 2008.

The concept is centered arround the website www.pingpongremix.com, where all up- and download of sounds and remixes happens.

“Sounds” are everything which has not been edited or mixed yet - basic sound bites from all over the world that can be used when making a song. Sounds can for instance be beats, ambience, city sounds, spoken word or a single instrument track.

“Remixes” are everything that has been edited, remixed and refined to make it more suited for listening. If a song needs a little extra to be just right, just download it and add some extra layers to it, then upload it as a new version.

DEVELOPMENT PROCESS

We wanted to create something that would not only be understood by designers and artists, but something that would engage a broader audience. This meant that we focused on ideas that utilized collaboration and true involvement of people, and not just isolated installations.

PingPong Remix stood out as the idea that  not only involved people through various media, but also did so in an experimental way, relying heavily on the actions of the users choosing to get involved.

It also builds on the idea of equal exchange between people from all over the world, getting away from the typical “us and them” perspective of helping refugees.

The website was coded from scratch in a couple of weeks, a very impressive accomplishment given the framework of the project.

MEDIA COVERAGE

Throughout the event’s two weeks, the website got 149 sounds, 29 remixes and 99 profiles. People from 26 countries visited the site, with a total of 2307 visits.

Ping Pong Remix received a lot of attention on Swedish Radio’s live broadcast on P3 and Din Gata. Åste Laberg was interviewed in the live studio and their website gave very prominent real estate to Ping Pong Remix.

In addition to the radio we used personal network, e-mails, Facebook, Twitter and Myspace to generate attention.

At the end of the event we had 3 local music producers go through the final 29 remixes, and choose the top 3 remixes, which they announced and played on national radio.