intro video

Audio Tour Executive Summary

Seeking to strongly support and enrich the self-guiding visitor experience at your outdoor venue? Please click here for a live Audio Tour demo, or view a YouTube demo video, or see advantages described below for the web page-based Audio Tour.

Setting up an Audio Tour requires only that you subscribe (at no cost for non-profits) and make available your outdoor venue map. You then create scripts which are immediately shared with visitors as a geolocating Audio Tour on their GPS-enabled smartphone or tablet (laptops generally don't have GPS capability). To quick-start your Audio Tour click or copy this email address or call 732-229-5234.

You might consult the informative guidelines from the North American Alliance for Environmental Education to help your organization's decision-making regarding Audio Tour or any other program your organization might implement.

Benefits of this web page-based Audio Tour:

• Audio Tour can substitute when expert guide staff are unavailable, to assure that the visitor experience is rewarding and never inadequate.
• Audio Tour opens up opportunities to harness guide staff's creative power and expertise as they dynamically develop and evolve scripts that promote inquiry, forge connections, encourage respect, and motivate commitment during a self-guiding visitor's environmental experience.
• A visual map of the venue appears on the visitor's GPS-enabled device with a live dynamic marker that continually shows the visitor's geolocation, and also indicates the direction that the visitor is walking (or if not walking, the direction that visitor's GPS and compass-enabled device is pointed).
• Following any route taken by the visitor and with no button pressing, Audio Tour automatically provides a customized sequence of audio messages.
• Multi-lingual capability is easily scripted, with choice of language continually selectable by visitor.
• Different Audio Tour themes can be scripted, with choice of theme continually selectable by visitor.
• Audio messages are generated by the browser text-to-speech feature of any smartphone browser selected by visitor.
• Each message is associated with a precise GPS latitude and longitude at the venue and optionally the visitor's walking direction (or if not walking, the direction that visitor's device is pointed).
• Audio message scripts are easily added, deleted or updated as text by venue facilitators on any desktop computer or laptop, or smartphone or tablet. No GPS capability on the device is needed.
• Messages can be pre-recorded tracks.
• Signage and physical markers at the venue can be coordinated with an Audio Tour, most simply by initially providing a QR code for visitors to launch the Audio Tour.
• The Audio Tour cloud-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) is automatically maintained and updated, and accessed by simply calling up a web page on a smartphone or tablet. There is NO app that must be downloaded.
• There is minimal data usage on each visitor's cellular plan. Audio Tour automatically scales up to support all venue visitors at the same time.

The above features bypass disadvantages of conventional Audio Tours:

• NO extra device that is rented out by venue and must be learned by visitors
• NO verbose signage that distracts and may cause uncomfortable congestion along a path
• NO continual button-pressing or separate QR codes to hear location-specific messages
• NO separate QR codes for all the highlighted locations at a venue
• NO trying to interpret venue's static guide map to figure out one's location or direction
• NO app to download and manipulate or update
• NO Internet connectivity needed after browsing to Audio Tour web page... device can be switched to airplane mode
• NO excessive visitor cellular data plan usage
• NO expensive pre-recorded sound tracks required
• NO exclusively non-timely or generic-only messages with Audio Tour's instant-update capability

To send comments or questions click or copy this email address for or call 732-229-5234.

intro video

Audio Tour Demo

You can try the Audio Tour Demo on your smartphone or tablet at your current location, wherever you might be!

The Audio Tour Demo (find the CLICK HERE link below) has a specially-generated map for product evaluation. The Audio Tour for an actual outdoor venue instead will show that venue's map, overlaid by the visitor's location marker along with a few easy-to-use buttons.

Please first read this introduction, then CLICK HERE to launch the interactive Audio Tour Demo.

• Choose an outdoor location for your start point so you can safely roam up to 50 meters (150 feet) in any direction.
• Find the CLICK HERE link above or below to launch the Audio Tour Demo web page. Then choose your language, read the on-screen instructions, and click to review the User and Customer License Agreement.
• If you accept the Agreement, click the button I agree.
• Then please be standing at your start point location, and stay there for the few seconds until the red-colored animated bird icon appears at the START POINT label at the center of the map.
• Click to choose a theme, then click the Listen button. If it is safe to do so, move up to fifty meters away from your start point in any direction.
• Expect to hear a message whenever the bird icon is within an orange circle. If there is a darker, thicker line segment along the circle, point the back or top of your device so the bird icon points toward that line segment to hear the matching message.
• Your choice of language and theme generates a unique set of messages, indicated visually by a different set of orange circles on the map.
• You can change language or theme at any time.
• The two most recently played messages will not repeat, but can be re-activated by clicking Quiet then Listen.
• You can reset your start point to a different location by clicking the set start button at upper right, or reloading the demo web page.
• This demo has a specially-generated map for product evaluation. The Audio Tour for an actual outdoor venue instead will show that venue's map, overlaid by the visitor's location marker along with language and theme selection buttons and the Listen button.
• The edit button is NOT available for this demo. With the edit button, venue facilitators access menus to create or modify Audio Tour messages.
• After reading this information, CLICK HERE to launch the Audio Tour demo.

To send comments or questions click or copy this email address for or call 732-229-5234.

intro video

ANJEE 2021 Winter Conference Field Experience (February 2021)

This ANJEE field experience at Jackson Woods Park in Long Branch will acquaint you with the Geolocating Audio Tour webpage-based application for smart devices, and demonstrate how Audio Tour can enhance the experience of self-guiding visitors at your outdoor venue.

Weather is predicted to be clear but cold during our 90-minute outdoor session. We will be social distancing with masks per ANJEE. Wear comfortable layers of outerwear, and sturdy shoes that will accommodate some wet trail areas. And be sure to bring your smartphone or cellular-capable tablet. Headphones are optional.

For your trip to Long Branch I suggest browsing on your smartphone to https://nearbyreality.com/jwp/ to launch your favorite GPS app showing precise directions to Jackson Woods parking lot where we will meet. The parking lot entrance is on your right traveling southbound on Ocean Blvd south of Atlantic Ave and before Avenel Blvd. Turn right into the driveway with the Jackson Woods Park sign.

Jackson Woods, where settlement dates back at least to the mid 1800's, combines a small pond, wetlands marsh, creek, deciduous forest, and varieties of wildlife that reflect its proximity to the Atlantic Ocean and Long Branch Beach a short distance away.

At the start we will all browse to https://nearbyreality.com/jacksonwoods/ and confirm that the Audio Tour is functioning on everyone's smart device. If not, we will check your device settings that enable geolocation and device orientation access for your browser, and also confirm your ringer is switched on for listening.

Since an ANJEE field experience represents professional development for informal and classroom environmental educators, we will be thinking about ways that an Audio Tour might enhance environmental teaching and learning. Could it work as a prompting tool for a classroom teacher leading a tour? What are its opportunities to empower the self-guiding family or group collaborative learning experiences? Can an Audio Tour be demographically inclusive? How can Audio Tour content (1) engage visitors in inquiry and investigation; (2) challenge visitor environmental literacy; (3) promote biodiversity consciousness-raising; (4) forge connections with the immediate surroundings; (5) encourage behavior that respects, protects and defends the environment; (6) shape attitudes, motivations, and commitment regarding environmental issues? Your comments, suggestions and analysis of Audio Tour will be appreciated.

FYI, from anywhere using your smartphone or PC or Mac you can browse to https://nearbyreality.com/jacksonwoods/ to view the park trail map. However you must be in-person at Jackson Woods Park to experience the Audio Tour audio messages and location-tracking. General information about Audio Tour is at https://nearbyreality.com/ website.

From Jackson Woods it is a short walk or car ride east to the Atlantic Ocean and many miles of accessible beach. There will be time after the ANJEE event for attendees to explore on their own the off-season ecology of the beach, and also perhaps do takeout from one of Long Branch's 100+ restaurants to complete the day. If you have extra time before the event you might do breakfast/brunch takeout from popular Amy's Omelette House at the mini-mall across Avenel Blvd. just south of the Jackson Woods parking lot and the garden apartment complex.

My somewhat dated but still accurate Long Branch Beach map is at: https://nearbytv.com/Long_Branch_beach_map/ which is linked from http://longbranchbeach.com/ website. Boardwalk restrooms are locked for the off-season except for the restroom at Laird Street at the boardwalk which remains open and has adjacent parking on Laird St.

If you would like to try editing Audio Tour scripts from your home or work, contact Phil for a website URL, login and password. This access is standardly available to the designated facilitator for a venue's Audio Tour.

Please contact Phil Falcone pffalcone@gmail.com or nearbyrealitytour@gmail.com or 732-229-5234 with any questions or concerns, and also to share your reflections about Audio Tour. I look forward to Audio Touring with you at Jackson Woods Park.

intro video

Audio Tour Development Timeline

Since its September 2019 introduction at ANJEE's Fall Conference, Audio Tour has reached foundational targets for robust design and efficient user-friendly features. Since then, additional milestones have been reached, with further improvements still anticipated. Most recent software revision date is noted on-screen when Audio Tour is launched.

Below is the Audio Tour Development Timeline going backwards to November 2019, including updates and future goals.

• Provide a more hands-free experience to control the Audio Tour by physically bumping device when it is less accessible, perhaps in visitor's pocket.
• Improve accuracy of GPS tracking along a venue's trail map by adding algorithms that detect and offset GPS drift of +- 3 meters.
• Infer visitor direction (indicated by location marker on map) by using visitor's movement reported by device, when device orientation data is absent or misleading or can be improved.
• Facilitate tech-savvy HS students collaborating with younger students to publish and update their learning and writings about the environment within an Audio Tour.
• Provide a publishing opportunity for elementary students to share their learning and writings about the environment in an Audio Tour.
• Integrate PayPal e-commerce for Audio Tour subscription and hourly services payments.
• Display on-screen text and graphics that are associated with each audio message.
• Make available the Start Listening button while editing to preview text-to-speech audio of the currently editing message.
• Revise Audio Tour menu button labels as requested by focus group feedback.
• Work with focus groups to modify Audio Tour features and content based on on-site testing of Audio Tour prototypes.
• Collaborate with stakeholders including historical society and landmark site friends-of groups to prototype a multi-themed Audio Tour for a city's planned historic walking path.
• Collaborate with stakeholders including environmental advocates and friends-of group to develop a multi-themed Audio Tour for a city's park.
• Monitor ongoing R&D and applications for AI-enhanced text-to-speech promising near-human realism for synthesized voices as demonstrated with avatar broadcast news presenters.
• Build a coalition of groups and leaders to seek formal approval from a city government to implement multiple Audio Tours and test DEI capabilities.
• Submit grant application for Mosaic (Environmental) Movement Infrastructure RFP 2020Oct30.
• Acquire Fractured Atlas (NYC) as nonprofit fiscal sponsor to obtain tax-deductible grants and donations for Geolocating Audio Tour project.
• Connect with a city green team, environmental commission and friends group to plan Audio Tour at local park, including drawing of first-ever trail map.
• Improve marker accuracy on return to web page.
• Power-saving when not on web page.
• Demo map longitude (horizontal) scale corrected, now accurate.
• Message circle overlays on venue maps made less obtrusive.
• Map response to user pan-zoom gestures improved.
• Terms and translations for license agreement refined.
• Corrected Android direction-pointing error.
• Added feature for hosts to create markers while walking along a path, for trail-mapping.
• Performance improvements in response to user actions.
• Ongoing maintenance for bug fixes.
• Improve screen performance so only the map pans-zooms, not other parts of screen.
• Revise database assignments to more efficiently service all hosts.
• Restructure data flow among software modules for better security and maintainability.
• Add pulldowns to improve audio message editing efficiency for hosts.
• Simplify displayed buttons so Audio Tour is easier and clearer to use.
• Re-program buttons to be visible only when needed.
• Fully implement editing features for hosts, including displaying real-time updates.
• Shift all host data to databases to improve core software maintainability and performance.
• Improve response of messages playing during Audio Tour.
• Refine user device GPS data access and processing.
• Implement desktop capability.
• Improve Android functionality.
• Add license and disclaimer as clickthrough for use of Audio Tour.
• Add pan-zoom capability for user to manipulate map display.
• Enhance location marker on map to show direction that device is pointing.

Following are planned additional capabilities for the evolving Audio Tour product:

• Plan for AI enhancement of text-to-speech parameters such as voice styles, volume, emotional tone, intonation, emphasis, inflection, rate, pitch and pitch range, contour, pacing.
• Research Artificial Intelligence (AI) engineering using neural networks, fuzzy logic, and machine learning (ML).
• Adjust details on map as user zooms betweem wide perspective and more close-in perspective, to boost readability.
• Develop more natural-sounding text-to-speech using a browser's sophisticated voice-type, pitch, contour, pause, rate and volume controls.
• Add cross-referencing indexes such as a venue attractions list that can link to particular locations on map or access related information.
• Integrate into Audio Tour the stand-alone webpage product that launches user's favorite GPS app on smartphone with directions from user's current location to the precise GPS location of a venue entrance.

To send comments or questions click or copy this email address for or call 732-229-5234.

Perched on the shoulders of humankind's giants of media history, and built with modern technology of design, coding, feedback and debugging, the Audio Tour project pursues its somewhat serendipitous trajectory, much like Audio Tour's self-guiding and awe-directed venue visitors. Audio Tour developers, and visitors exploring unfamiliar outdoor spaces, alike might identify with the inspiration below.

In her poem LET IT GO, poet Danna Faulds mindfully navigates to achieve certainty amidst uncertainty.

Let go of the ways you thought life
would unfold; the holding of plans
or dreams or expectations – Let it
all go. Save your strength to swim
with the tide. The choice to fight
what is here before you now will
only result in struggle, fear, and
desperate attempts to flee from the
very energy you long for. Let go.
Let it all go and flow with the grace
that washes through your days whether
you receive it gently or with all your
quills raised to defend against invaders.
Take this on faith; the mind may never
find the explanations that it seeks, but
you will move forward nonetheless.
Let go, and the wave’s crest will carry
you to unknown shores, beyond your
wildest dreams or destinations. Let it
all go and find the place of rest and
peace, and certain transformation.

©2002 by Danna Faulds
Published in her book
Go In and In: Poems from the Heart of Yoga