NYU ITP, Fall 2021, Thursdays 3:30pm-6:00 pm, Sept 2-Oct 14
Instructor: Nicole He (she/her)
Email: nicole.he [at] nyu.edu
Office Hours: Sundays, 1-4 pm by appointment, book here. Please edit the event description to say whether you want to meet in person at ITP or via Zoom. If you want to meet in person, please book it at least a day in advance.
Homework: Submit homework here. Due before class starts.
Discord: The link to join the class Discord will be sent via email.
Computers are able to understand human speech better than ever before, but voice technology is still mostly used for practical purposes, like playing music, smart home control, or customer service phone trees. What else can we experience in the very weird, yet intuitive act of talking out loud to machines?
The goal of this course is to give students the technical ability to build modern voice controlled apps and the space to design creative uses for them. Students will be encouraged to examine and play with the ways in which this emerging field is still broken and strange. We will develop interactions, games, performances, artworks or apps exploring the unique experience of human and computer conversation.
Students will learn how to use text-to-speech and speech-to-text technologies, voice assistant devices, generative text techniques, open speech APIs, Node.js, and conversational UI design. There will be weekly assignments leading up to a final project. ICM or comparable programming experience required.
| Part | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Homeworks (4) | 40% |
| Attendance and Participation | 35% |
| Final | 25% |
You are expected to show up on time for every class. Being regularly late will affect your grade. If you are going to be late or absent (for emergencies only), email me in advance. Having more than one unexcused absence is grounds for failure.
You are expected to talk not only with computers, but also with each other.
It’s important that you participate in class discussions and give thoughtful feedback to your classmates when they show their work. Your perspective is meaningful — especially with this experimental subject matter — since we are all learning together.
This year we’re also moving reading discussions to Discord, rather than having to post about them on blogs or talk about them during class time. Your participation in these Discord media discussions will also count towards your grade.
There will be four weekly homework assignments and a final project.
Most weeks, there will be a creative/technical assignment and a reading (or podcast to listen to or game to play). You will submit a link to your creative assignment via a Google form before class starts. In lieu of writing reflections in a blog post (which you are welcome to do if you want to!), we’ll be discussing the readings etc. in the class Discord asynchronously throughout the week.
Plagiarism is presenting someone else’s work as though it were your own. More specifically, plagiarism is to present as your own: A sequence of words quoted without quotation marks from another writer or a paraphrased passage from another writer’s work or facts, ideas or images composed by someone else.
The core of the educational experience at the Tisch School of the Arts is the creation of original academic and artistic work by students for the critical review of faculty members. It is therefore of the utmost importance that students at all times provide their instructors with an accurate sense of their current abilities and knowledge in order to receive appropriate constructive criticism and advice. Any attempt to evade that essential, transparent transaction between instructor and student through plagiarism or cheating is educationally self-defeating and a grave violation of Tisch School of the Arts community standards. For all the details on plagiarism, please refer to page 10 of the Tisch School of the Arts, Policies and Procedures Handbook, which can be found online at: http://students.tisch.nyu.edu/page/home.html
Please feel free to make suggestions to your instructor about ways in which this class could become more accessible to you. Academic accommodations are available for students with documented disabilities. Please contact the Moses Center for Students with Disabilities at 212 998-4980 for further information.
Your health and safety are a priority at NYU. If you experience any health or mental health issues during this course, we encourage you to utilize the support services of the 24/7 NYU Wellness Exchange 212-443-9999. Also, all students who may require an academic accommodation due to a qualified disability, physical or mental, please register with the Moses Center 212-998-4980. Please let your instructor know if you need help connecting to these resources.