big ethno news

[merchimerch]

This is a huge deal for ethnomusicologists - Standford researchers have confirmed that Thomas Edison didn't make the first sound recording - it was made by a French typesetter Eduard Scott. It was made on paper, and was probably Scott's daughter. To be fair, the recording was made to be a visual, not sound recording, so I'm not sure how exactly this fits into our historiography/teleology.

http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_8739021?source=most_viewed

Comments

NPR played it...

[thesaruswrex.livejournal.com]

Laser ran over the media about 10,000 times to scan it in. Converted the scan into sound waves. Sounds terrible, but 150 years old, isn't going to be DVD quality, that is for sure.