Forum Moderators: phranque
It would be interesting to hear what others think of music on sites?
If it's a commerce site in any way, music is a big no-no, most folks shop at work where that type of activity is frowned on, music will cause your visitor to leave very fast (at the best), or get them busted (at the worst) for unauthorized web use.
If you must have music, don't play it by default, let the user choose to play it.
I leave any site that makes noise.
I can cope with the odd ping it's music it sounds so naff
Do not start the music automaticaly. Have a link "play music" or something similar. that way the user has the choice.
Heres how I implimented something like this about a year ago.
I build the page as any other page and had a text link saying "start music". When a user clicks on this a new window opens with no navigation bars, no scroll bars just a tiny pop up window, it has an image of a sterio on it and the background is the same colur as the main page. So generaly it look spretty profersional, almost looks liek a player has opened. On this tiny page I insert the .wav file and it plays. I also have the text on the player window "stop music" if this is clicked it uses a simple javascript to close the window.
It worked pretty well but what I saw was that only about 1 in 50 users actualy saw a page view for the player. so it was not generaly used a lot.
I dare say it wouldn't do any harm to try something like this but I would never start the music by default and offer it only as an option.
Example:
<body bgsound="file.mid">
If my memory is correct. :)
There is no way to predict what effect music may have on the visitor. The sound of a sax may be soothing to one person and grating to another.
And then there are the copyright issues. You can not use music that is not in the public domain. So, you will either need to compose your own, use really old stuff, or pay.
Let's see, that's 1, 2, 3 strikes. Music is out!
I speak from some experience. Only once have I felt that music played a relevant role on a site that I designed. It was done in flash/MP3, it was part of marketing a one time event, and it was to a known audience. I avoided copyright issues by composing the piece myself. And, I gave visitors a prominant way to avoid the Flash splash page.
WBF
And there is a big difference between "music" and "noise".
Jeffry
I link to a lot of sites, but I never, ever link to a page that automatically plays music. There are just toooooo many negatives.
And janetteddy, don't use midi it's noise not music.
Not all Flash is bad, but I refuse to link to pointless, painful Flash intros even if there is a "Skip Intro" option. I'll look for a real page and link to that.
OTOH a friend and I who also does environmental literacy work discussed the idea of putting quiet nature sounds on pages -- running water, wind thru trees, etc. Very soft, very unobtrusive, just a subtle reminder for people to reconnect to their feelings for nature while reading about it and looking at photos.
What do people think, and how would you implement it? Different issues than music; the point is to make it unobtrusive. And if someone can't hear it because it's too soft, that's probably not an issue.
And if someone can't hear it because it's too soft, that's probably not an issue.
I have to ask the question as to if the visitor can't hear it, why include it at all?
I agree with your general point though, which is that there are many good uses for music/sound on a website, but many visitors are 'prejuiced' against the use of music generally because of the horrendous examples of it we have all come across. I find that with sites who use music well, I don't really notice that it's there, which was maybe your point.
One final comment - one of the problems with including sound on a site is that you have no idea what else your visitor is doing while surfing your pages. They might already be listening to music, or any number of situations where even for tasteful, well implemented music, you will still have yur visitor reaching in annoyance for the 'stop' button. And if they don't find it quickly enough, then your site just blew its chance.
I literaly jumped out of my skinn and a can of juice ended up on my carpet. thats my moral for not making music start automaticaly.
And if someone can't hear it because it's too soft, that's probably not an issue.I have to ask the question as to if the visitor can't hear it, why include it at all?
I imagined setting the volume low enough that if your speakers are turned up it will still play softy. Then the sound could start automatically without annoying most visitors. If people have their speakers turned down, you might not hear the sound at all.
I too usually listen to music as I surf, so music on a web page tends to sound awful (clashing with what I have playing) and is often way too loud. Plus, since I'm already listening to something I like, the chances I'll prefer what a page plays are slim to nil.
Whether the same issues apply to soft nature backgrounds like the above, I wonder. Comments?
A good use of sound: here's an interactive flute synthesizer [homepage.mac.com]. The "Start" button plays a drum/strings background loop; mousing over the "Start" and "Stop" buttons plays percussion.
If you are going to use music (midi file) the only one instrument that seems to have a resonably sound reproduction, no matter what sound card people use is a piano.
I had to do a site which insistead on BG muic and after a lot of experimenting, we used a piece by Ravel (I think), needs to be at least 3 minutes long (in order to stop people from puking after hearing it for the 2,00000 time).
Can email if anyone wants it.
HTH
Rich
This company have a unique solution for delivering audio via the web.
http*//www.talkmethruit.com/
Shut your eyes when at the site, I think the pet dog had something to with the design :)
Rich
As with so many things on the net - its not whether or not the music would be naff, or whether it would look unprofessional - its more that it has been built into internet society that music is horrible - and i think, however well implimented, backround music will cause serious, catastrophic negative points in the minds of anyone who visits...
the same also applies, to a lesser extent to any sound, like button click sounds - it just seems that the net community are happy with things being silent, until they choose for it not to be...
personally - i would stick to that rule - no one will miss backround music, but most will notice and probably hate it...
hope that is of some help,
Harley
There are some good non-internet uses for background music and html also. I know very little about programing but can pretty much figure out whatever I need to in html and javascript. So I make a cdrom Christmas card for my family every year with html. That way I can send pictures and videos of the kids, often with background carols and recorded greetings for less than the cost of a good quality traditional card.
Also, i get tired of the same old background on my desktop. So I use html to tell it to change the picture each month, display the date and, when the cursor is passed over the date, to display a calendar. Also, when you click on the date, an embeded musical selection plays - which I enjoy when I am typing. The musical selection also changes monthly.
so, I think there are some good reasons to use background sound - but do give the listener some way to turn it off if they want to.
