Our digital identities are intangible things, occupying virtual space as we trawl around online, they’re our “second self” in the words of cybrog anthropologist Amber Case, our low-tech cyborg alter egos. It’s an identity that, while intangible, gets ported around with us on our portable electronic devices able to be summoned at the swipe of a touchscreen.But how do you quantify this digital trail? Can it only be measured in terms of bytes or ghostly electronic remnants left behind by our online activities? IDENTITÄT from Berlin-based design practice Studio NAND aims to give some physical presence to this virtual data by visualizing personal raw data sets from 100,000 people to create a “gestalt of digital identity” for the users.By analyzing raw data sets using custom tools—which ranged from music interests via Last.fm to shopping habits via Amazon, Twitter feeds and search habits—they created 3D sculptures by running the information through a software cocktail of Processing, toxiclibs, and Sunflow. They then 3D printed the results in plaster to create what they call “an abstract physical snapshot in time of the permanent changing digital identity,” which look like strange digital fossils, physical traces of our virtual habits.
[via 3ders.org]Photos Matthias Steffen@stewart23rd
Advertisement
