GROUPTHINK: Telepresence and Agency During Live Performance

Live performers often describe "playing to the audience"as shifts in emphasis, timing and even content according to perceived audience reactions. Traditional staging allows the transmission of physiological signals through the audience's eyes, skin, odor, breathing, vocalizations and motions such as dancing, stamping and clapping, some of which are audible. The Internet and other mass media broaden access to live performance, but they efface traditional channels for "liveness,"which we specify as physiological feedback loops that bind performers and audience through shared agency. During online events, contemporary performers enjoy text and icon-based feedback, but current technology limits expression of physiological reactions by remote audiences. Looking to a future Internet of Neurons where humans and AI co-create via neurophysiological interfaces, this paper examines the possibility of reestablishing audience agency during live performance by using hemodynamic sensors while exploring the potential of AI as a creative collaborator.