ste!!a gassaway: unpredictable thoughts

So today I actually visited unpredictable thoughts to check on maintaining my plugins. Lo and behold my twitter feed stopped days ago.

Tried to get everything up and running again.

Seems I’m missing some simple little detail. I’ll fix it later. Got places I have to be.

During October 26 through October 30 I was involved in a twitter performance piece. The project was concieved and organized by @Platea. @Platea is a global collective of individuals interested in the power of public art carried out in the digital megacity of social media.

Methodology : observe and let the story unfold, improvise.

It all began with my first tweet:
The woman with the blond hair put on her raincoat, took her umbrella and headed up 18th street. #fp20

This was the beginning of a surprisingly participatory performance. I’ve written a recap at @Platea. I’m planning to make a series of drawings and a book to expand the story and experience from the performance.

You can read it here.

This is a capture from my first tweet in Following Piece 2.0, a global collaborative art project as part of @Platea. I’ve written a recap of my experience participating in the project. and you can find it at : the @Platea blog.

I have been working on an online book of the project and expect to add more thoughts here and at my ARTlog. I hope you’ll check back on the project and leave your thoughts about the work. It was an exciting experience.

Are you following me?

About the project from @Plateau:

Following Piece 1.0
Forty years ago, in October 1969, artist Vito Acconci performed Following Piece. A study in the public spaces we occupy and assumptions around privacy, Acconci followed random people in Manhattan during the month and reported on their activities until they entered a private area such as an apartment or car.

Following Piece 2.0
And so, with that in mind, I thought it might be fun to do a cover of Following Piece, but to look at it specifically in the contemporary context of Twitter, a world where public/private boundaries are shifting and eroding, as once-private activities are broadcast into online public space. In the world of Twitter, the idea of following has taken on a new meaning: once an uncomfortable thought, it’s now regularly seen as a good thing to have one’s private actions followed by many strangers.

Had to share this little piece I found on the net. I know it’s from someone I follow on twitter; just can’t remember who. These are the sounds I hear in my head after the birds tweet.

Enjoy.

TwitterRadio from Mark McKeague on Vimeo.

Tags: twitter, sound, tweets, radio, video,

The Boston Globe and 140 Seconds on Twitter

In case you haven’t seen it yet, Twitter is a micro-sharing website
where you describe in 140 characters or less what you’re up to. You can
send and receive messages via SMS (text messages) on your phone,
through Twitter’s website and third-party applications such as Twitterific.
If you want to talk “with” someone on Twitter, you add @theirusername
to the front of the message and it shows up in the person’s replies
tab. This was a feature that was added several months after Twitter
first launched in 2006 based upon how people ended up actually using
the service. That’s been the consistent story for Twitter — it’s
definitely evolved beyond “I’m making an omelet for breakfast” to now
include sharing info about late breaking news, making plans with a group of cohorts, etc.

BTW, Biz Stone is a co-founder of twitter.

This is a great place to experiment in the social network space. It’s sorta like it use to be in the old days. Sorta free wheeling, unexpected, and fun.

Tags: twitter.SMS, social networks, culture, 140, technology

I’ve been a bit obsessed with technology and modern culture recently. Maybe immersed in it is more accurate. This morning I had my first real paper cup and a string communication moment in a technological space. Twitter is like a shout down a long hallway. Today I heard this call from far away. earthquake. It was like listening in the old CB [citizen band radio] days and catching something of interest in the chatter. Finding the signal through the noise.

I was watching all the tweets come in. Folks talking about their houses shaking, calling their parents, brothers, sisters. Checking in from all geographic locations. It’s an immersion into the collective. It is really an absence of oneness. There is a feeling of being just a small part of the universe.

Then when the chatter had moved on to other subjects and the most recent rise of chatter called a halt to everything – the system had been overwhelmed – I had the chance to stop, step back and look at the beauty of this interface with those known and unknown. The extension of my social sphere. I could look and see the beauty of the message as designed and displayed in the flatness of my screen. In my social browser, Flock.

It’s been an extraordinary day.

Tags: earthquake, twitter, culture, design, news, technology

Found out about the California quake watching my twitterific widget.

Tags: twitter, earthquake, california