François Pachet

I am interested why some temporal phenomena such as music, games, videos, novels, and conversations, have the ability to attract and sustain our attention. What is it that makes music "interesting"? That makes some novels pageturners? What makes movie hits? Certain conversations exciting? I address these questions in the domain of entertainment, music in particular, from various viewpoints: Design, i.e. how to design appealing interactive software; Experimental psychology, i.e. how to model our attention system, and Machine-learning: How to design algorithms that learn like us, with us. The applications of these models developed range from new Electronic Music Distribution schemes to interactive 3D music listening environments. IN particular, I explore the notion of "reflexive systems", i.e. systems in which the user is confronted to a representation of himself with which he/she can play interactively.

The Music Browser application addresses large-scale music browsing using content-based access methods. The Music Browser tries to learn user-specific taxonomies and initiates browsing interactions with the user that help him find interesting, unknown titles.
 The Continuator is a system that proposes a novel form of musical interaction with users. By learning continuously the musical "style" of the user, the system initiates musical dialogues that are increasingly consistent and appealing. My current interests are now focusing on reflexive content creation, and music composition in particular.

Pachet, F. "Content Management for Electronic Music Distribution: the Real Issues", Communications of the ACM, April 2003.