In my “20th Century Theory and Analysis” class, we spend a bit of time talking about digital audio recording. To demonstrate the idea of a single bit in a WAV file, I show them this picture of a half-tone photo up close. I tell them that each bit in a recording is like a single dot in a newspaper photo. When you look at the photo up close, it doesn’t really make sense, much like how a single bit (1/44,100 of a second) doesn’t tell you much at all about what you’re hearing. You need to see how the dots/bits relate to the other, nearby dots/bits. You need to have more context.

I gradually zoom out of the photo above. As I do, you can see the dots making a little more sense. It slowly becomes clear that they are looking at a photo of a face. A little more zooming out and they can see that it’s my horrible face. When I go out all the way it finally becomes clear that they’ve been looking at a picture of me, bored in a hotel room and taking selfies in the make-up mirror: