... because I wanted to draw my entire facebook feed on a brown paper towel roll. Of course, that thing is pretty dang long, and I didn't make it nearly as far as I wanted. It took several hours--and if I had several hours more, I'd continue until I reached the end of my feed. (What does the end of your facebook feed look like, anyway?) Here are the pics of my progress so far!
The project was satisfying in three ways. First of all--most of us don't really read our facebook feed--we just skim it for the parts that catch our eye. This project made me have to read every single word, and it's amazing how much detail I've missed when just skimming casually.
Second, I like the analogy of our facebook feeds being disposable, kind of like a paper towel roll. We only usually read a friend's status update once before letting it pass into obscurity. Friendships on facebook can be equally disposable, especially if the facebook relationship has no real one to back it up.
Thirdly, I thought it was interesting to take something that is pretty impersonal (its a quick typed message to everyone you know) and convert it to something painstakingly handmade (more like a handwritten letter).
A side note: I discovered that there are many tendencies in informal typed language (such as no uppercase at beginnings of sentences, emoticons, and excessive punctuation) which are far more rare in handwritten language. I found out that when people use several exclamation points or word repetitions, they often use five. I don't know why, but five just seems to be the number people gravitate to.
Of course my sample pool is hardly representative--mostly social dancers and college students :P
Best,
Tam
Wow!
ReplyDelete