Invention: Smile for the Computer

Dedicated computer users sometimes tend to have unnaturally drab faces. This is the “Not Face.”

https://news.osu.edu/news/2016/03/28/notface/

http://www.npr.org/2016/04/03/472859124/we-all-know-the-not-face-now-we-have-a-name-for-it

Those with a Not Face may feel good or even bad inside. However, the electronically driven crowd is not communicating as good they should be; too many Not Faces everywhere.

I know this because some of the darkest times I went through, I had a smile on my face, all the while I was feeling miserable inside. Thus, there is a difference between smiling and feeling good.  Emotions come mostly from the inside. Smiling faces are superficial, and really only just muscles contracting according to cultural norm, or just plain conditioning.

Appearance is only skin deep, such that computer programmers should work on helping to condition people with dreary, "Not Faces" and to give them superficial help, and in addition to that probably make good money on it.

As an aside: Why muscle builders have neglected, to my knowledge, working on their facial muscles for the sake of giving themselves a smile is surprising.

The ultimate moneymaker idea is that someday faces meet the gym using a facial exercise program.

Computer Teaches Musical Improv

All the best bands, bands of all kinds and music embrace improvisation in some form, from Miles Davis to Led Zeppelin to jam bands. Visit my Pandora.com site and compare the how live albums sound compare to studio albums. http://www.pandora.com/profile/craig.hamilton.newletters

I have observed, Rock Smith, a computer program, that teaches players how to copy exactly certain songs note for note. I suggest a musical program that teaches students to improvise on electronic instruments, like training wheels for a bike.

For instance, if you wanted to learn a jazz standard, such as one from the Real Book, there could be one aspect that could recognize mild scalar variations in play for the head of the song. A change in a note here or there in the head would improve one’s score.

Similarly, there could also be many ways for the computer to gauge features such as soloing, and accompaniment, other than the head.


1.  Chording

2.  Rhythmic syncopation

3.  Pentatonic scales

4.  Arpeggios

5.  Modal soloing

6.  Key changes

7.  Lack of originality penalty

8.  Chromatic movements

9.  Combos that include kinds 1 through 8

The potentials are incredibly vast.  There is more than this.  Maybe another program might teach musical theory to practice before actually playing an improvised note.

In order for the computer to play along with the gamester, software engineers and musicians could piece together semi-original desired song parts, essentially jazz karaoke, that the computer could arrange for the purpose of algorithm play along, meaning that the computer would play semi-original music that would fit nicely with the musicians play. For instance, a computer could piece together perhaps 20, maybe 100, different versions of a song on the fly.