04.04.12 Nate Larson & Marni Shindelman: Geolocations: Martitimes

We use publicly available embedded geotag information in Twitter updates to track the locations of user posts and make photographs to mark the location in the real world. Each of these photographs is taken on the site of the update and paired with the originating text. Our act of making a photograph anchors and memorializes the ephemeral online data in the real world and also probes the expectations of privacy surrounding social networks.

Twitter estimates there are over 50 million tweets daily, creating a new level of digital noise. Clive Thompson uses the term ambient awareness to describe this incessant online contact in his New York Times article, “Brave New World of Digital Intimacy.” According to Thompson, “It is. . . very much like being physically near someone and picking up on his mood through the little things he does — body language, sighs, stray comments— out of the corner of your eye.” Our collaborative work is a means for situating this virtual communication in the physical realm. We imagine ourselves as virtual flâneurs, ethnographers of the Internet, exploring cities 140 characters at a time through the lives of others.

UNBSJ:

  1. Geolocation: Civil Unrest, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  2. Geolocation: Gue Yakin Bisa, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  3. Geolocation: Gun Shot 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  4. Geolocation: I Know You Are Scared, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  5. Geolocation: Lost My Dad, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  6. Geolocation: Worth the Wait, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  7. Geolocation: Fucksakes, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  8. Geolocation: Daddy Will, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”

Market Square:

  1. Geolocation: Doing a Twitter, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  2. Geolocation: Embracing the Future, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  3. Geolocation: Freaking It, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  4. Geolocation: Friendships Lost, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  5. Geolocation: Girl in Mirror, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  6. Geolocation: Her Heart and Mine, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  7. Geolocation: Home at Anthony’s, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  8. Geolocation: Last Person on Twitter, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  9. Geolocation: Money Pigs, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  10. Geolocation: Starting to Panic, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  11. Geolocation: Swing Shift, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  12. Geolocation: The Witches Lair, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  13. Geolocation: Total Douchebag, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  14. Geolocation: Twitter Thing as Job, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”
  15. Geolocation: Whatever I Wanted, 2011, Archival Inkjet Print, 19” x 13”

Feature Image, Nate Larson & Marni Shindelman: Geolocations, 2012