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Comment on Show HN: JamKazam – Play Music with Others Online and in Real-timeparent

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If you look at university research papers that have studied this domain, and if you look at first-hand experience of watching musicians play with different amounts of latency, they can tolerate just a little latency. From research and experience, we'd say 0 to 20ms of one-way latency between musicians yields a tight session we'd label as "green". This is like playing in the same room. In the 20ms to about 35ms range, you start really feeling/hearing the latency more, but it's still manageable and can yield a fun and productive session. Somewhere up in the 35-40ms range and greater, it gets increasingly sloppy until it's just not fun or worth it . These are general rules of thumb. It also depends on the tempo and the level of precision required. And some musicians are more or less sensitive to it. But if you consider the speed of sound, playing with 20ms of latency is like playing while sitting 20 feet away from someone on a stage or in a room.

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