Hello my dear readers. It’s been a busy past few weeks, but I won’t complain – I know we are all struggling to keep our heads above water in some way or another. I’m just thankful you’ve taken a few seconds to check on what I’m up to.
All I wanted to say is that I have bigger plans for this blog. I want to post more frequently, and more broadly. I want to post photographs and things that inspire me in research and just in everyday life.
Needless to say….my theme sucked. But with that said…I’m not willing to take the plunge to a self-hosted WordPress blog.
So, over the next few days I’m just going to be updating a few dusty corners of this site. Brightening it up. Making it a little more readable, and as a result, perhaps breathing into it a little more life.
I hope you stick with me. And you can expect to be hearing from me soon.
I leave you with a photo I took last week at a wrecking yard on the way home from Ohakune where we were lucky enough to catch the last day snowboarding of the season. It was good!
I’m well into my second day without Twitter. The thing about being cut off by Twitter, is not that I can’t tweet, or message my friends. I can get over that. It’s that I can’t keep up to date with the daily stream of information the people I follow provide me with. These links to blogs and new people of interest are indispensable, and can’t be replicated in an RSS feed etc.
What shall I do when I finally get my feed back? Do I spend days reading back on all that I’ve missed!? Do I just forget it and move on?
I have sent multiple requests to Twitter advising them of my dilemma. I’ve done this through multiple avenues…contact pages…support email addresses etc. So far, no luck at all. Haven’t heard a peep. In a desperate attempt this morning, I started a new temporary twitter account and messaged Biz Stone. Like he will ever hear me though. He receives like 1000 @reply’s per minute.
The problem here is that I was not using a separate account to message potential participants. Instead, in line with my research, studying the technologies and practices that are so finely engrained into our daily lives, I used my personal Twitter account. An account that has been active for my own personal communications since early 2007! Hopefully I hear from Twitter soon. My page is on lockdown!
I wake up this morning to my worst nightmare. My Twitter account has been suspended! WTF?
The long story is that I have been collecting relevant tweets on my RSS reader. When there are a few sitting there, I reply to them and invite the tweeps to participate in my study by chatting to me a bit. Well, after all the travel and chaos over the last few months I didn’t have 30 or 40 tweets to reply to….I had 200+.
There’s two things that could have happened here. One is that Twitter might have automatically suspended my account for too much activity in one day. That would be fair enough. I never send more than a few tweets on any given day (apart from yesterday!). The other is that someone I approached reported me, or marked my tweet as spam. If that’s the case, it’s pretty stink of them…because I’ve been super friendly and made a bunch of friends and followers through my research in these digital worlds.
Anyway. I would have normally tweeted about something like this….but I’ve been cut off! It’s an odd feeling. Look at the numbers of my followers and following. I didn’t realize how much I needed it until it was gone 
I’ve sent the obligatory request to Twitter explaining to them that I think it was in error and I want my account back please, Mr. It’s only midday in LA right now….fingers crossed they can sort me out by this afternoon. Aarg.
This is where all the traditional ethnographers I know with their tape recorders and transcripts are smiling and quietly saying “I told you so”
I think it’s necessary to begin this post on a personal note. In the month since I last wrote, my wife and I have wrapped up life in Toronto and headed back to NZ. It’s hard being back. The purpose of being in Toronto was to be close to public WiFi spots and people who use them regularly. For me to be able to use them regularly. To be near to inspirational and helpful people. A stone’s throw from New York City. Close to universities, conferences, exhibitions and academics I have been privileged enough to meet that, and lets be honest here, would probably have never responded to my email cries for help from oceans away. It’s hard being back because Toronto is a city that its citizens are proud of. I’m proud of Toronto. Determined to bring some of my T.O. back to my NZ.
With that said, NZ rules too. In the photo above, taken just this weekend, my friend Tilly and I are on top of the world. Being back means it is time to take stock of what I’ve achieved over the past year. I’ve seen my methodology change its course one hundred and eighty degrees which is awesome. Over halfway into the three years I’m funded to do this, I can finally see some progression. It has been lonely, most days I just want to quit, but it feels just that little bit more possible right now. Time to account for it all in writing eh!?
The reason I’m here today though, is to begin posting more broadly. While this site must remain central to my PhD work, I feel like it’s time to begin writing a little further afield. After all, I’m not a technologist, nor do I particularly want to be 0ne. I’m a social scientist. A geographer, an urbanist, fascinated by cities, art, architecture, literature, photography, design and exploring the ways that our social lives collide in amongst it all. I want to start thinking more generally about my surroundings. When I was an undergraduate student, I published a blog called ‘Imagining the City‘. Maybe I should rename this site that, or at least give it some kind of a title other than my name…How boring.
Anyways, in line with expanding on what I think about here I present to you below some beautiful imaginations of Auckland in 2100 AD by students of the Media Design School. I came across them via Andy Hudson-Smith’s Digital Urban blog. It’s worth checking out more of them on the school’s Vimeo page, but I’ve embedded my favorites below. I’ve always said that we need to just make the most out of where we are now. I’ve never really spent that much time worrying about tomorrow. If these don’t challenge one to begin thinking about their city in new ways I don’t know what will. It’s the kind of stuff we frequently see applied to Los Angeles or New York City in film, but right here at home. Eerie visions of deserted streets and crumbled, overgrown Sky Towers. Rad. Choice work MDS students! What a great assignment. Especially check out Ravi’s wrecked Harbour Bridge (the third video).
The moment I was first inspired to pursue research on public WiFi came during my undergraduate studies. Writing an essay on geography and technology, my lazy trawling through Google Scholar results led me to a Master’s thesis, Unwiring New York, by Andrea Zoltanetzky (evidently, it’s not clickable as a document anymore. Weird). She wrote of how one could be on Bryant Park’s WiFi network without ever having stepped foot in the park. WiFi didn’t conform to traditional spatial boundaries. This fascinated the budding geographer inside me.
My interest with WiFi and mobile technologies continued into graduate studies. Here I discovered theory and methodological traditions that were beginning to think of city spaces as relational and layered; comprised of bodies and networks and things and flows of information. What’s more, ‘public space’ became a confusing term at best. Especially due to the conditions presented by these wireless technologies. To use a mobile phone or WiFi network, one must me firmly located in physical space, yet, the possibilities of also being connected elsewhere were seemingly infinite.
It was only when I began my doctoral research though, that I began to realize exactly how invisible these spaces were. For a social researcher, an ethnographer, whatever, this presented some unique challenges. My initial plan was basically to hang out in WiFi networks and spot people on laptops. I’d be able to chat to them about their experiences and how their use of the WiFi fitted into their daily life, perhaps, how it might change the way they negotiate the city and it’s public/private spaces. I wanted to gain a more nuanced understanding of personal experiences with technology, rather than conduct a generic survey of 100 or 1000 participants. Since every experience in space was unique, just following the lives of a handful of people would be more than enough.
The thing is, I couldn’t find them! I would sit for hours at coffee shops and public WiFi hotspots and only observe a handful of users. This problem seemed to be shared by others doing social research on WiFi – spots with few or no people to ‘observe’. Access to Wireless Toronto’s network statistics whilst hanging out in WiFi spots revealed to me that the number of connected users according to the statistics never matched up with the number of people I could see out in the park or cafe.
That’s when I realized I was going about things entirely the wrong way. Rather than find people in physical public spaces, I began to find them online. If you read this blog, then you see where I am going. An online ethnography, at least, an ethnography that was initiated by online participant observation quickly revealed the use of free WiFi across the globe in millions more spots than it would have ever been possible for me to sit and physically observe.
People weren’t only using WiFi from their laptops, that’s so 2005!…they were logging on from mobile phones, PDAs and an array of other portable devices! Recent research confirmed that iPhones and mobile devices were popular for logging onto free WiFi networks (even when paid 3G or mobile data was an option)….This was a pleasant surprise given that many of my peers snark at the prospect of free WiFi as they consume gigabyte’s of costly mobile data.
…And finally I could see. Right at this moment I am in Bryant Park. The first time I visited here I scanned the seating arrangements for laptops. When there were few or none, I just accepted it. Now my eyes see differently. I see the people perusing their iPhones and Blackberries, the groups of friends and the old dude reading the newspaper. I see the groundskeepers and the women in the great white tent preparing for Fashion Week. I know now it’s about more than what my eyes can see and these people can’t be discounted as wireless users or not, public or private. Some may not ever go online (or lack the means to do so). Some will sit online for hours. Others might connect just long enough to upload a latest Twitpic. Either way, free/open WiFi is far from everywhere. Even here, in New York, you can’t just log on from every street corner as some writers might lead you to believe. Public space is both as alive as ever, and as confused and contested as ever and understanding it necessitates the researcher’s presence both on and offline.
Just because you can’t see it, doesn’t mean that it’s not there. (is that a saying of some kind?)
the point on the map this post is coming at you from
A bunch of Twitter third party applications already contain information on user location, but it is about to get a lot more interesting as Twitter prepare to release an API that can include latitude and longitude in every tweet. The feature will be optional, and of course, there will undoubtedly be cries over privacy concerns, but it’s set to make the Twitter service a lot more interesting (if not, even more exploitable by companies seeking to advertise location-based etc).
My PhD project has been experimenting with ways of using tweets and twitpics as a means of understanding human lives as they are performed in public spaces, both digitally and physically. While it has its limitations, an online style ethnography, approaching participants in this way through social media allows for a far wider range of spaces to be explored. Rather than sitting in a WiFi park or cafe approaching users with laptops, I have been chatting to users on iPhones and PDAs, on beaches, up mountains, and in back alleys all using open WiFi as a means to get online…sometimes for an instant, sometimes for an entire day. There is no way that my measly PhD budget would have ever permitted that kind of travel physically! I think that the culture of Twitter allows for some urgency in responses too. Twitter users are far more likely to ‘tweet’ back quickly compared to sending an email or Facebook message for example.
Additionally, the photograph itself provides an entry point into a discussion with participants concerning their personal experience of the place they discovered WiFi and the image often hints at their surroundings. Sometimes these hoptspots are open public spaces that encourage gathering of WiFi users and non-users alike. Other times the web connection is a welcome, albeit unexpected encounter. In either case, my research has been most interested in the immediate surroundings….the physical space the WiFi was being used, the potential space facilitated by access to digital realms, and how these spaces might alter the ways people move about and engage with their urban surroundings.
Access to location coordinates would provide the opportunity for a far more rich set of data. Geographers love maps graphs and all manner of illustration. Location specific data might add another dimension to my understanding of public space. Taking an image of a space that is often out of context….and associating it with a definite point – on a map. Imagine that…I could have some maps in my dissertation!
In an earlier post I mentioned cafes switching off their free WiFi in an attempt to avoid ‘wireless squatters’, particularly at peak times. I encountered this personally for the first time at a Panera Bread in Santa Monica in March this year:
Off topic, but I’ve just noticed that the above sign totally contradicts the Panera Bread page I linked to above that proudly proclaims:
“Yep, it’s free. Just sit down, open up your laptop and you’re ready to go. Send an email as you munch a warm bagel. Read the news as you sip a latte. It’s a nice alternative to the office, isn’t it? Please relax, do what you need to do, and enjoy our Wi-Fi. It’s free all day long.”
It’s funny, because it is something that was written about four years ago, but the Wall Street Journal recently published an article documenting New York City cafes that have begun to restrict WiFi usage at certain times (or in some cases, all together!).
Blaming the economic downturn, the WSJ article suggests that idle workers, perhaps unemployed, with more time on their hands are sitting for hours without substantial purchase and preventing other legitimate cafe patrons from sitting and socialising in cafes. The author, Erica Alini, spoke with cafe patrons and owners about the line between usefulness and abusing complimentary WiFi. The general response seemed to be that WiFi users in cafes isolate themselves from their surroundings and prevent conversation (and consumption) from taking place.
At Café Grumpy in Chelsea, Ty-Lör Boring, a 32-year-old chef, says he often uses his laptop at coffee shops, but loves it when there are none around because, then, people talk to one another.
“You can isolate yourself behind a laptop,” he says, “but look at this place: Almost everyone is having a conversation.”
This view is supported by others who have blogged about the WSJ article:
I once had a strange experience in a cafe in San Francisco called Jumpin’ Java which is located on Noe Street (between Market and 14th). Jumpin’ Java has Wi-Fi, decent coffee and good snacks, so I decided it would be a good place to meet a friend I had not seen in a long time. When we arrived, we were shocked to see that nearly everyone in the cafe was working on a laptop, each person occupying one table. There was no conversation at all in this cafe (which accurately fits the term “zombie cafe”). It was as silent as a library. Some customers even had their headphones to increase the isolation and screen out the real world. The ones who did not have headphones gave us dirty looks because we were talking and laughing. I never went back.
While I totally agree that WiFi users spread themselves unnecessarily across more than one seat and may stay for long periods of time without additional purchase, I’m not sure we can make the argument that they are being any less social. You see, the person quietly sipping on their latte as they flick through a magazine, or even the business meeting taking place on the opposite table may be socialising and interacting with their surroundings – so too is the WiFi user. Most WiFi users I have observed in cafes and public spaces are in fact aware of what’s going on around them. Just like ‘offline’ cafe patrons, the WiFi user smiles and agrees to loan someone a spare chair, or grins as the gentleman behind them makes a funny remark. In the majority of cases, these people have chosen to connect from public locations for a reason.
Moreover, the WiFi user is connected in ways the offline cafe patrons are not. They can (as I regularly do) engage in multiple conversations simultaneously, with friends and strangers alike. The WiFi connection opens new possibilities for learning about the immediate surroundings, or of breaking news elsewhere. While it may seem less (anti?) social to be fixed to a glowing screen, I think we should be wary.
I’m not suggesting it’s better to be in public online or offline. Rather, just reminding us of the possibility for being somewhere in-between the two. As our social lives are increasingly complicated by the intersection of digital and physical spaces, public and private – there’s a need to think carefully about what this means for our understandings of life in public. Is one more public than the other? What about those who are less mobile? Is reading a paper copy of the New York Times acceptable in public, but accessing, commenting on, and twittering about the same online article amongst hundreds of others not? What activities we are and aren’t permitted to do from public places will undoubtedly strongly influence the future public life in the 21st century.
I used to read a lot about ‘what is the public?’ – Now I can’t stop thinking about ‘where is the public?’
Hurried WiFi use between meetings at Yonge-Dundas Square, Toronto, July, 2009
Today I was informed by a WiFi user who I discovered through my Twitter research (thanks @ccano) of Barnes & Noble’s move towards offering free WiFi access in all of their stores. Previously a fee was charged for access through AT&T much like the case of Starbucks. At first I dismissed the news story as just another retailer publicising the addition of WiFi to their stores. After all, we all know that offering free WiFi is an affordable way of attracting and catering for customers – Independent cafes have been doing so for years. However, after visiting the Barnes & Noble page advertising the addition of WiFi I was struck by the use of language.
“We have always wanted our stores to feel like home—a place where people can relax, explore and connect with ideas and each other at their leisure. So it is only natural that, in today’s world, we want our customers to enjoy complimentary Wi-Fi. You can explore the world the way you always have at Barnes & Noble with the technology that connects us to the world today.”
In today’s technologically driven world where being online plays such an important role in our lives, it is often argued that the use of certain technologies in public can be disrupting to social life; People talking on their mobile phones are disengaged from the public life around them – iPod users are tuning out of the conversations on the bus – Cafe patrons on laptops barely take the time to look up and acknowledge their server or surroundings.
While I’m aware it is advertising hyperbole coming from one of the worlds major corporations, but the text struck a chord with me – WiFi use is indeed part of our lives, not disconnecting us from the world around us, rather, connecting us to our world as we know it. As I read it I was sitting as I so often do conducting observations at Yonge-Dundas Square, a major free public WiFi spot in Toronto. Barnes & Noble are acknowledging the ways offering WiFi allows people to “connect with ideas and eath other” through a “technology that connects us to the world“.
It’s a pleasant thought, as I sit here watching people on laptops or glancing back and forth between their friends, surroundings and their iPhone displays. Although to me, the observer in physical public space, these actions may seem disengaged or unhealthy for maintaining a vibrant public realm, perhaps to them, the WiFi presents the opportunity for being connected to others and really taking part in their world around them. Simple observations or even interviews don’t let me the researcher into that world. Well, not as much as I’d like to be. Turning to Twitter and beginning to think about online ethnographies is helping me get there.
In a world where my conceptial theoretical understandings tell me the digital cannot be separated from the physical, and public not kept neatly aside of private. In a world where my practical real life experiences tell me that being in a city space can be invisibly (to some) online as much as visibly (physically) present – I’m becoming increasingly aware that where methodology takes place is important. When seeking to understand spatial practices as the geographer does – place indeed makes a difference to methodology.
I promise I’ll keep thinking this through more. Heck – I’m just glad I broke a month of ill health and silence on this blog.
