Collaboration in the cloud in Flagstaff

Tierney and Christensen meet up periodically when they tour forvarious gigs, however the pair has turned to an emerging cloud-basedtechnology to collaborate on new songs.

The co-founder

He is as well the co-founder and "chief strategist" of ScratchAudio, the 1-year-old company based in Flagstaff behind thetechnology he uses to collaborate. He describes the software as aplatform designed to let artists of every stripe work with eachother from across the room or across the globe.

Sitting in front of his Apple Macbook in the lobby ofFlagstaff's business incubator, the Northern Arizona Center forEntrepreneurship and Innovation, Tierney shows with just a fewclicks how easily the innovation can connect artists.

Scratch Audio as well benefits from using the same research thatpowers Netflix when it streams TV shows and movies to computers,smart phones and other devices.

Using Microsoft's Silverlight innovation means those usingScratch Audio use some of the most up-to-date streaming mediatechnology on the planet.

It is as well means the web application is largely available toanyone with a modern computer and broadband access. The software isalso platform agnostic -- allowing Mac, PC and Unix users tocollaborate seamlessly.

The pre-revenue phase ofdevelopment

Scratch Audio is currently in the pre-revenue phase ofdevelopment, however it is in talks with a Los Angeles-based company tolicense the research, Tierney said.

The interactive software has other applications beyond musiccollaboration. The licensing being discussed with the L.A. companyis only the first bite of the apple, he says.

Raw innovation

"It is just a raw innovation," Tierney concedes. "However we do seeother applications for it... There are a lot of ways thistechnology could be used."