When I made this, it was a lovely swf, but I couldn’t upload it here as swf doesn’t meet security guidelines. What you see instead is an animated gif, which has sucked out most of the quality……
When I made this, it was a lovely swf, but I couldn’t upload it here as swf doesn’t meet security guidelines. What you see instead is an animated gif, which has sucked out most of the quality……
#1 by Damien DeBarra on October 17th, 2009
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Could you embed it somewhere else at put the link here?
#2 by jen on October 18th, 2009
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interesting Ali – no individual screenshot stays put long enough to make much sense, and as a whole piece I find the flickering screens quite fractured and disturbing, and difficult to look at. For those reasons I interpret this as a dystopic artefact, even though the screenshots themselves (representing your digital life?) are mostly quite innocuous or even perhaps positive. Is it a commentary on information overload?
#3 by alip on October 18th, 2009
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Yes, the piece is very much about information overload. The screenshots come from places I regularly visit to get information, to do my job or just to socialise and have fun and for the most part are pretty innocuous, but the overall effect is that of a fragmented digital llife. I originally started out with a montage of desks from my office and the number of screens we all have on them, all so we can better process whatever it is we process. Those screens were the starting point for this because I spend so much time at work, but the different sizes and viewing angles made getting the screen shots onto them quite difficult.
#4 by alip on October 18th, 2009
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@Damien – I tried a couple of different places (and a number of different formats), but had the same problem. But the animated gif does the job and still conveys the message I wanted the piece to.
#5 by Nicola Osborne on October 18th, 2009
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Ali, I agree with Jen that this gives a great sense of information overload. I am viewing it right now with an additional (phone) screen to one side, 6 tabs of my browser open, Tweetdeck on the go etc. and very much relate to that sense of trying to navigate multiple flows of data.
I was at a talk by an academic the other day talking about the web and suggesting that a single Google search might return more information – perhaps more directly relevant interesting information – than, 50 years ago, you would have encountered in your entire academic career. It’s a startling thought and one that makes me really question what the tools of mediating digital space are and should be in order to provide the access we want with a coherent way of being part of the information flow.
#6 by silvanad on October 19th, 2009
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Really good visual of information overload. It needs no supporting words. I think even if you don’t get that it is information overload, it has the effect of giving you information overload.
#7 by Tony McNeill on October 19th, 2009
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I feel like David Bowie in that scene from Nicholas Roeg’s The Man who fell to Earth … Great visual that still works well as an animated gif. I dd something on Flash and ended up exported to avi and uploading to YouTube
#8 by sian on October 19th, 2009
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Great one Ali. It seems to me that the dystopic interpretation comes from the regimented layout of the screens, rather than necessarily from the digital life-world being represented. Something in Nicola’s vision of ‘multiple flows’ – flicking between tabs on the screen, across laptop, desktop and mobile device – somehow puts the individual at the centre of all this information overload and implies maybe a more positive, even joyful immersion in technology. It’d be interesting to see you ‘do a Silvana’ and construct a utopian equivalent to this one! (It’s OK, I know you don’t have time : ) )
#9 by billb on October 19th, 2009
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What a coincidence! I’ve just counted my open Firefox tabs and they are 23, as many as the different web pages you used for your Flash/Gif. I suppose that tabbed browsing is to blame for our feeling of information overload. Before that you wouldn’t be able to have 23 instances of your browser running without draining your system memory.
Nice, straightforward and effective artefact, that works just as well as a Gif.
#10 by lesleyf on October 21st, 2009
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I’m thinking mega multi-tasking and what a complete and utter nightmare it is. Keeping track of how many windows I have open and what they are doing and what I;m doing with them …. I can really lose the plot. for me this video is tops…I just hope my interpretation matches your meaning lol.
#11 by alip on October 21st, 2009
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@ Lesley – Actually you’re not far off – it’s partly down to that whole serendipitous browsing thing where you start on one task, hit a link, go somewhere else, remember a falf finished job you have to pick up on etc etc etc. Before you know it you’ve (or rather I’ve) got windows and applications open everywhere, lots of tabs, maybe a couple of half finished emails…. to actually get back to my desktop before the end of the workday is very, very rare.