Encryption and the Vocoder

vocoder: This is the sound of computerrock

In my previous work/research on the human voice and the way it's transmitted via electrical means I stumbled upon the vocoder. The vocoder is a method of speech resynthesis, it is used and overused in pop music today. What fascinated me the most is the fact that the Vocoder was initially developed to send encyphered messages during world war 2. The vocoder is not the only piece of wartime equipment that has made its way into pop music, but the fact that it is used for improvement or alteration of the human voice is what seperates it from the rest.

encryption and the vocoder.

The SIGSALY Speech encypherment system

From the idea of sending encrypted messages in sound also came the fascination of using sound as a carrier for other media. As I have done earlier with my wikileaks radio project.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_Datasette

I want to investigate the possibilities of modern DSP and using the radio to distribute content.

distribution and radio.

encryption in music.

Questions:

I am not sure whether speech encypherment is too specific.

Works that use some form of DSP(noise) to convey some kind message besides the noise itself

are missunderstood most of the time because of the overwhelming nature of noise. how to work around these limitations or be more clear.

I am not so sure if I want to do a project that explains encryption in a playful manner.

Workplan:

Reading on cryptography in speech signals, and cryptography in general.

Begin November: using a small test setup, to try and test if I can use the radio signal to distribute a text file.

Bibliography:

Douglas Kahn & Gregory Whitehead(Wireless imagination)

Bonnie Jo Dopp (Numerology and Cryptography in the Music of Lili Boulanger: The Hidden Program in "Clairières dans le ciel")

Eric Sams (Music and Cipher)

Eric Sams (Elgar's Cipher Letter to Dorabella)

Stephen D. Houston (The Archaeology of Communication Technologies)

http://www.nsa.gov/about/cryptologic_heritage/center_crypt_history/publications/sigsaly_story.shtml

Herbert Eimert: Epitaph für Aikichi Kuboyama 1/3

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