Exploring distributed co-listening experiences through tempo-based interactions with Queue Player

As music streaming libraries continually grow, finding meaningful ways to revisit, reflect on, and share these collections over time—both individually and socially—becomes increasingly important. Queue Player is a network of four domestic music players that allow for synchronous distributed co-listening across geographical distance and for the long-term exploration of the collective music listening histories among four close friends. Queue Player leverages tempo metadata (i.e., beats per minute) as the cornerstone of its interaction design, enabling users to explore an ever-changing queue of songs from their collective pasts shaped by tempos steadily tapped out on their respective device. While the four Queue Players exist in real, highly finished physical form, this video offers an artistic explanation and user scenario of their outer and inner workings, drawing on stop motion, collage, and zine aesthetics to emphasize the reflective, temporal, material and subtly evolving conceptual qualities shaping the design of this system.