The ubiquitous nature of communication in computer networks, firmly manifested in the Internet era, provided a context for the introduction of different collaborative tools widely accepted by the on-line community, such as textual chats, white boards, shared editors, video conference systems, shared spaces for the exchange of multimedia documents or even simple e-mail based collaborative systems.

Music today is more ubiquitous, accessible, and democratized than ever. Thanks to technologies such as high-end home studios, audio compression, and digital distribution, music now surrounds us in everyday life, almost every piece of music is a few minutes of download away, and almost any western musician, novice or expert, can compose, perform and distribute their music directly to their listeners from their home studios. But at the same time these technologies lead to some concerning social effects on the culture of consuming and creating music. Although music is available for more people, in more locations, and for longer periods of time, most listeners experience it in an incidental, unengaged, or utilitarian manner. On the creation side, home studios promote private and isolated practice of music making where hardly any musical instruments or even musicians are needed, and where the value of live

In this paper we describe "The Public Sound Objects" project and its context. This project, which is currently under development, approaches Internet collaborative music performance, going beyond most common paradigms where the network is mainly used as a channel to provide a connection between performative spaces. The system will provide an on-line public performance space where people can be found participating in an ongoing collaborative sonic event. The users connected to this installation control a server side synthesis engine through a web-based interface. The resulting "Sound Objects" form a sonic piece that is then streamed back to each user. The user takes the role of a performer and his contribution has a direct and unique influence on the overall resulting soundscape. This ongoing event is also played back at the installation for a live audience, with added contextual elements such as sound spacialization and metaphorical visual representations of current participants.

Informed by a proposed theoretical framework for the field of interconnected musical networks (Weinberg 2005), I describe a set of local musical networks that utilise novel gestural controllers for interdependent collaborative performance. The paper begins by contextualising developments in the field of musical networks in correlation with development of technological innovations, leading to the utilisations of gestural controllers in local musical networks. This introduction leads to the definition and categorisation of theoretical and practical approaches for the design of local gestural networks, addressing motivations, social strategies, network architectures, musical content, and control software and hardware. Based on this theoretical framework I describe the evolution of four local musical networks that utilise newly developed gestural controllers, titled ‘Squeezables’, ‘Musical Fireflies’, ‘Beatbugs ’ and ‘Voice Patterns’. The paper discusses the design and development process of these projects and ends with a comparative analysis of the networks and controllers based on conceptual and practical criteria. 1.

PCRP (Parameter Controlled Remote Performance) is a new method to play music together on the Internet despite high delay. In many musical forms, the score of the piece is known beforehand. PCRP measures the deviations of the players from the given score and describes them as parameters. The parameters, which are transmitted instead of the audio data itself, are used on the opposite side of the network to control the synthesis of the score. We implemented a PCRP system for piano duo. The system analyzes and transmits tempo, dynamics, and articulation parameters to assure synchronization of the players and give the users control over tempo, dynamics, and articulation. An evaluation of the system was performed with pianists. The evaluation showed that musical interaction with PCRP is possible at higher latencies than related approaches. 1.