THE INTERACTION AND THE INTERFACES DESIGN EXPERIENCES: SEMIOTICS AND METACOMMUNICATION IN THE DIGITAL AUDIO WORKSTATIONS

Abstract

The paper raises some problems related to the conception of interfaces for Digital Audio Workstations (DAWs). The theoretical approach uses the concept of semiosis and the three phases of the experience from Peirce’s Semiotics. The thesis of the metacommunication presented by Semiotics Engineering is also studied and refers to the singularity of the dialogue between designers and users. As a consequence, different strategies of communication are required, taking into account that their conversation takes place in an asynchronic time. The DAWs Sonar (CakeWalk, 2010) and GarageBand (Apple, 2013) were elected as empirical corpus because their projects aim to balance the performance of the system with the intuitions and memory abilities under different cultural, technical, affective archetypes of their potential users: people with singular expectations about the sound recorder device. One believes that design conceptions, beyond pursuing new functionalities, could try to offer the DAW’s users possibilities of exploration of the system inside its regular performances. Thus, the composer would be invited to rethink their methods of musical creation and non-assumed singularities of listening.