Queue Player: Investigating Distributed Co-Listening Experiences for Social Connection across Space, Time, and Tempo

We describe the design and deployment of Queue Player, four networked domestic music players that combine music listening histories of close friends to explore new potentialities for interacting with this shared archive. We deployed the Queue Players with four close friends living in separate homes for six weeks. Our goals are to (i) explore how this system might enable co-listening experiences that foster social presence, interaction, and reflection and (ii) empirically explore conceptual propositions related to slow technology. Findings revealed that, after overcoming initial frictions, Queue Player became integrated in participants’ lives and triggered a range of social interactions and reflections on past life experiences. They also showed that Queue Player provoked questions on the benefits and limits of data capturing one's life history as well as the role and pace of technology in everyday life at home. Findings are interpreted to present opportunities for future HCI research and practice.