projects

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    creeper

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      STALK IN A BOX
      
      

      on some late night internet search this semester, i found this past actlab project. i wanted to do something similarly individual but not as nice. in class discussion this semester, the ubiquity of social networking, the impact of technological change on interpersonal communication, and the changing nature of privacy were topics we touched on again and again. in my third project, i applied my talent and tenacity at internet stalking to our class discussions.

      i made dioramas for individual members of our class based on information i could discover about them on the internet. although i did extensive research on all 18 officially enrolled weird science students, i was only able to complete 6 dioramas. i gifted each diorama to its subject after explaining my particular sources of inspiration. i have described each diorama below using initials to avoid unnecessarily adding to anyone's google trail.

      
      
      image of jaime's diorama here

      there was quite a bit of information about j.c. online--i read his blog, his myspace, and several months of facebook postings, as well as articles about his professional filmmaking work. in reading his blog and facebook history, was struck by the way he uses links to web content of various kinds--videos, music, articles and quotes--to express emotions and opinions. i imagined him building a physical sculpture out of albums, dvds, and other physical media. the background is photos of his fridge and bookshelf (i have never been to j.c.'s home or interacted with him outside of class.)

      
      
      

      k.k. was rather difficult to track down on social networking sites. one of the few pieces of publicly accessible information on her is a listing on her high school's website with her gpa (to 7 decimals!) and activities. i tracked down the myspace profiles of several people who participated in the same high school activities as k. k. and cross-referenced their full names on facebook to find k. k.'s facebook profile (she uses her last initial in place of her last name, making it difficult to search.) i discovered that she lives at a co-op with several of my friends. in the diorama, i depicted her engaging in typical co-op behavior--that is, smoking weed on an ugly couch. the smoke coming from her pipe spells out her high school gpa.

      
      
      

      c.c. facebook profile is private and googleable information on him is sparse. i found a blog authored by his friend mike, on which i found several pictures of c.c. from mike's 21st birthday celebrations and learned that mike recently had his appendix out. ut's directory yielded c.c.'s middle initial, which eventually led to a blog he wrote during a semester spent in prague. part of the curriculum in prague included a classroom visit from vera chytilova, one of my favorite directors. i created a scene of c.c. anesthetizing mike with alcohol in order to remove his appendix as an offering to the vera chytilova shrine on his wall.
      
      
      a satisfied recipient

      
      
      image of matthew's diorama here

      m.r. has an extremely common first and last name combination. using information from the u.t. directory, i was able to track down listings from his old career as an event d.j. and a myspace profile that didn't appear to have been updated since he was in high school. the myspace account had several pictures from homecoming and prom with a woman who i assumed was his girlfriend at the time. m.r.'s diorama depicted my imaginary conception of their first sexual intercourse, on the dance floor after a wedding he d.j.'ed.

      
      
      

      while i am facebook friends and even gchat contacts with a.g., we are new acquaintances and there is not an abundance of information about him on the internet. i found multiple cycling-related links from his facebook and accounts on bike-related sites and listened to songs posted on myspace from a past band as well as his current electronic music project. a.g.'s diorama was about origins; i imagined him as an infant, captivated by a spinning bike-wheel mobile. the walls of his nursery are papered with waveforms drawn from samples he recently downloaded from a sound database.

      
      
      image of ricky's diorama here

      r.c., like m.r., has an extremely common name. however, i was unable to find the slightest trace of him online. in fact, i could not even remember what he looked like or what his actlab projects had been. in my sleep-deprived diorama-building state, this led me to doubt his very existence. his failure to show up for final presentations only strengthened my theory. this diorama continues the clay figure/golem motif from the others, seated in front of an array of google results indicating 2,960,000 for his first and last name in combination.