This is a solution for the modern person, who may want the feel of ambient social activity, but still be able to focus solely on their own concerns, and without any requirement for social performance.

It is a setup of bluetooth speakers installed throughout the house. They can really just be placed in the corners of rooms on the floor.

The authoring system requires some knowledge of the primary layout of houses; bedrooms, bathrooms, transfer areas (hallways, stairways), kitchens, living rooms.

Each 'episode' is pumping music to various genre's. And chatter of people at a party, with various personal dramas. The voices are mapped to specific areas of the virtual household, which are mapped based on functionality to the users house, by category. The virtual actors can move from area to area, although if large house is mapped to a small house, some rooms will have to do double duty, I e. Living room combined with family room, spare bedroom mapped to master bedroom.

Virtual actors and voice channels operate in priority, so if the main actors in a story all end up in the same room, the primary dialog will be loudest and the others more muted.

The episodes last 8 hours - they need to go at least from 10pm to 6am, to experience the change the that happens during that time, the witching hours that transform lives.

The actual user of this system can do anything. Cook. Eat. Read a book. They are not required and actually cannot interact anyways. But they are a part of the party. They don't need news about old men looking at national borders in new ways. Or discussion about when sickness will strike then next. What they want is fresh conversation, freshly generated, that they are in. And can dismiss.
-- mylodon, Oct 30 2022

Russian Doll https://www.youtube...watch?v=YHcKoAMGGvY
[mylodon, Nov 03 2022]

This is already done at museums etc, I was at an Irish pub exhibition this week and every room of the reconstructed Irish pub was filled with fiddle music and conversation but every room was empty.
-- pocmloc, Oct 30 2022


It's more about the home experience. I had a roommate once who needed the radio and the tv on at the same time to feel comfortable. It wasn't about the content, just the sound of voices and having some buzz of humanity.
-- mylodon, Oct 30 2022


Reference removed, the main aspect of Russian Doll that applies are regular long cuts of a camera moving from room to room in an expansive (?) New York apartment where multilayered grownhogs-day action is going on
-- mylodon, Oct 31 2022


//a solution for the modern person, who may want the feel of ambient social activity, but still be able to focus solely on their own concerns, and without any requirement for social performance.//

I used to long for that ... but then I turned thirty. Now I just wall-flower everywhere I go and nobody can stop me.
Solution achieved.

I think of it as people watching.
Turns out people don't want to be just watched.

<thought about that for a bit>
<decided that their discomfort is not my responsibility... and went back to doing what I've always done>

...

Profit.

One of these lives I will fully figure humans out and take over as Benevolent Planetary Sovereign. Probably not this life, but the jury is still out.

What's in a probability anyway right? Just the odds.

Well... even lives matter.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Oct 31 2022


So, a gathering for introverts? I like it.
-- whatrock, Oct 31 2022


//the main aspect of Russian Doll that applies are regular long cuts of a camera moving from room to room in an expansive (?) New York apartment where multilayered grownhogs-day action is going in//

Did you mean "going on"? What's an episode in this context? What do you mean by authoring system? What do you mean by pumping music to genres?
-- Voice, Oct 31 2022


1) yes. 2) one series of social interactions leading to a dramatic conclusion.

3) authoring system, probably just a text file read in, some audio clips for actors, and a set of mp3s to represent the background music mix

simple vertex-edge-vertex kind of situation to describe the layout of the house. (living room, door1, kitchen),(kitchen, door2, family room), etc.

a series of clips associated to each 'actor', with timecode against the entire episode taken into account.

Then you just need a list of edges and transition times, to designate where the actor are and for how long. so if benjamin runs into the bathroom at a certain time:

('benjamin', ('kitchen', 'door3','bathroom'), (12:01:001;14 - 12:01:20;00))

The system would interpolate their position between one room and another during a transition. They would end up in some random space in each room.

Since this is very half baked and goey it could also for visualization just be represented and edited in unity or some other 3d tool by agents. But I suspect the authoring interface could be very minimal, potentially reduced to a couple text files. Since exact positioning is not important only transitions and room locations.

4) pumping music is just some tunes playing in the background to add atmosphere
-- mylodon, Oct 31 2022


[+] and thank you for taking the time to explain
-- Voice, Oct 31 2022


This would just make me depressed. I feel like it would exacerbate the feeling of isolation and loneliness, that feeling of being so near yet so far from people who all sound like they're having a great time. Maybe I'm just weird, but when I go to a public place like that I'm looking for company, for someone to have a conversation with, laugh with, etc. I get really bad feelings of alienation when there's no one I know and everyone there seems to be avoing me. To feel like that in my own home is a nightmare scenario for me.
-- 21 Quest, Nov 03 2022


That's interesting - but do you listen to talk radio while driving a car? That's effectively what this is, but with a story line.
-- mylodon, Nov 03 2022


Or even podcasts.

I come from the opposite place - I spent a period of my youth going out and 'antisocializing', which is where you go someplace dark with lots of people and dance by yourself. And that was how it should have been. Of course eventually someone comes along and ruins it. Not life or anxiety, but those billy idol moments. Everything has its time.
-- mylodon, Nov 03 2022



random, halfbakery