More, or Less?

The common thread I have extracted from this weeks posts is the evolution of media to a more compact form. Presently, most communication occurs in small bits. This is through text messages and emails, news tickers, blogs :), 140-character-limit twitter posts, etc. In other words, there is less depth in the information we receive today. We are bombarded with it, but its kind of like eating a pound of penny-candy, rather than sticking to the guidelines of the food pyramid. Three well-balanced meals a day.

Prosavec's diagram interested me quite a bit. It would be interesting to make this study testing the evolution of writing style over a period of time. The question being: is the way in which we receive our information today affecting literature?

I think digitization of information itself will ultimately effect the interpretation of the written work. If you press command - f in a digitized acrobat file you can search for any word or phrase you can think of. If all media is accessible in this way, research would be change dramatically (and maybe not for good). You could cherry-pick ideas from a vast number of sources misinterpreting information that requires a full chapter of reading to fully understand. This tendency toward expediency that is aided by technology is something that is really beginning to bother me. I think we might be training society of people that are satisfied with a cursory inspection of the Truth. I think that is potential dangerous. Access to "More" can be "Less".

MIT New Media Lab

Since it looks like for most of us the idea of a library staying relevant involves technology, I would urge everyone to try to see MIT's New Media Lab. I think it opened in 2010 and was designed by Fumihiko Maki and its a really great example of a media center that has potential to be incorporated into a modern library. Its obviously much more geared toward technology and student-driven innovation, but if you can tour it (I'm not sure its open to the public, I was lucky to know someone who had access), I recommend it. I think its a good example of using technology to further information and there are some awesome things to see- robots and a ping pong table that tracks where the ball lands every time are a few of the less useful but still cool gadgets. Even if you can't see it in person, here's a great article about it, and you can glimpse it from across the river: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2010/media-lab-0304

I have also been thinking about ways in which information has been changing recently. There has been a few shakeups such as the Huffington Post being bought by AOL, the merger of Newsweek and people like Keith Olbermann going to Current TV that seem to reflect changing ways in which people view news and informative sites. Not only is it becoming more digitized, but also more consumer- and commentator-driven, which allows everyone to be a part of news and its dissemination. I'm wondering if there's a place for our library designs to incorporate personal feedback into the information...

Cut, Paste, Diagram

Since we are discussing how the library must change with transformations in information technology (at least that’s one branch among many possible discussions), we have to consider how the written word is/will be presented as visual data.  The previous post, “Illuminated Manuscript” reminded me of two projects that specifically manipulate words and the architecture of sentence making in visual forms that are both thought-provoking and unfamiliar.

Stephanie Prosavec's 'Sentence-Length' diagram of "On the Road"

A 2008 project by Stephanie Prosavec explores the potential of sentence structure as visual data.  This project is akin to the genre of data-visualization that architects employ in diagrams.  But in this case, it is relevant to the discussion of how literature might look in the future.  Her diagram of On the Road breaks down the book by sentence length and some generalized subjects.  While this makes for great American literature trivia and some attractive diagrams, does it have any value as literary information?  

For now it is a beautiful, but static, diagram.  But what if you had this visualization for every book (perhaps available as an app for your smartphone)?  And what if you wanted to see how much of a certain book or group of books focused on some key word or subject?  This would be a great tool for visually selecting literature.  If literature is to be digitized, then we can assume that the words themselves could be displayed in an unlimited variety of ways (as data, basically).  If the library of the future is not a warehouse for storing books, perhaps it could be a tool for visually sorting and arranging literature to find patterns of communication that have not been previously apparent.

Jonathon Safran Foer's, Tree of Codes.

The second project is a recently published book by Jonathan Safran Foer called, Tree of Codes.  Like Prosavec, Foer treats a novel and its architecture as data which exists beyond its original composition.  He literally cuts out selected words from an existing book to leave a completely new piece of literature.  The method of physically cutting words out of the book is telling metaphor for our contemporary treatment of written language (think cut and paste word processing).  Foer’s is an example of data extraction and parsing which is a method we might take to cut through the redundancy of written information in contemporary culture.  Regardless of metaphor, this composition is both literary and spatial, which is why it might be helpful for architects in considering future alternatives to digital media and how buildings might function to display them.

As a final thought, I find it interesting that media designers are looking at literature as visual data because it gives literature a second life (or multiple lives).  In other words, digital technology has encouraged us to explore literature beyond its original intend, to look at it structurally and spatially, and to apply to it new frameworks of organization and enjoyment.  Projects like these and the previously noted “Illuminated Manuscript” hint that libraries have potential to be optimized as centers for sifting, restructuring, and displaying literature in novel ways.

Bibliography

One more thing...I will be assembling our bibliography for our publication. I think the majority of our research was done online and I would like to ask everyone to verify the web addresses in their sources. Please make sure they are written on your sheets correctly..its easy to make a mistake when copying them over. Thanks.

Hello everybody. It was great to meet everyone last week and I'm very excited about this studio. It has a lot of potential to be a great one. Libraries have always been places that I've loved to visit..I love books and reading and this will be my first opportunity to design one. Its a type of building I have always wanted to gain a better understanding of.

Moving forward, I am also very excited to see how our compilation of precedents turns out. I think it will be a great resource that we can refer back to in the future.

I look forward to working with and getting to know everyone better. See you on Wednesday.

Illuminated Manuscript

David Small, Illuminated Manuscript, Kassel Germany, June 2002

A commissioned work for Documenta11 in Kassel, Germany, the Illuminated Manuscript explores the communicative possibilities of spatialized language in the electronic media. Combining physical interfaces with purely typographical information in a virtual environment, this piece explored new types of reading in tune with human perceptual abilities.A handbound book is set in a spartan room. Projected typography is virtually printed into the blank pages with a video projector. Sensors embedded in the pages tell the computer as the pages are turned. In addition, sonar sensors allow visitors to run their hands over and to disrupt, combine and manipulate the text on each page. The book begins with an essay on the four freedoms - freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from fear and freedom from want. Each page explores a different text on the topic of freedom.

Source: davidsmall.com/portfolio/illuminated-manuscript/