#alwayson is a series of text pieces by Trevor H Smith, this being the second.
“forget where you are, life is about where you were.”
“just as we impart meaning to events by telling them to ourselves and to others, so we are constantly imparting cohesiveness and coherence to our lives by enacting a life story in our actions. Seen from this standpoint, we are not just tellers of a story, nor are we something told. We are a telling.”[1]
This is as close as she gets to her idea of heaven.
She feels more real, more truthful, more conscious.
She feels sociable to the point of gregariousness.
She feels authentic.
“Snap a photo with your iPhone, then choose a filter to transform the look and feel of the shot into a memory”[2]
With the ‘Shortcut to nostalgia’ filter, users can take a photograph and immediately reminisce about how great it was when they took the photograph.
She is better looking here; everyone is. Why would anyone take a photograph of themselves that showed anything but their best side? She is still young, but she feels younger in these photographs than she has ever felt, she looks younger and more attractive than she does in the last of those analogue photographs that were taken a decade ago.
Everything is filtered.
Back then, you jumped when the needle skipped the groove or the tape deck chewed your cassette, now we’re falling over ourselves to download the latest filter that replicates the failures of an outdated technology. Reality is no longer grey; it is filtered; over-saturated, and everything seems so much more real now.
She would never dream of publishing an image before filtering; filters help capture the mood of the moment in a much easier way than say, waiting for the right light. There’s even a filter called 1977 – the year she was born.
The technological error, formerly denied by the manufacturer, becomes something else, as it finally emerges as part of the established language of popular culture and is commoditised, leading to a glitch-based fashion style which is reproducible, standardised and automated by software.
By absorbing Glitch into its own language, the socio-economic system renders impotent the power of glitch to critique contemporary consumer culture.
“It is no longer a break from a flow within a technology, but instead a form of craft. For many critical artists, it is considered no longer a glitch, but a filter that consists of a preset and/or default: what was once a glitch is now a new commodity.”[3]
Glitches and filters nonetheless continue to redefine our expectations of the digital medium.
She is funnier, more considerate towards her friends, and more helpful than she ever was.
She is a better person.
“While an inner self may be present, it can never be entirely known to the individual, and so, through narrated living, the individual creates, as much as discovers, the self.”
I used to pretend to be someone I wasn’t, that’s not a bad thing though – I was pretending to be the kind of person I aspired to be. But here I really am the person that I always wanted to be; that I knew I was. Here I am a project; a story I’m telling as I write it.
Look at my profile and you will find the real me.
“you can effortlessly share anything. You can customize everything.”[4]
Originality is over-rated. I mostly use found imagery from other people’s pages. Their images sum me up in ways that I never could. My homepage tells visitors, instantly and precisely, exactly who I am.
“It’s a fast, beautiful and fun way to share your photos with friends and family.”[5]
Instant nostalgia helps her hurry through the present into the future: where she can share images and revel in how great things were.
The ‘Return to pain’ filter projects the user from the present moment into a future time where they are able to reminisce about the present moment as if it were a cherished memory.
By replicating a malfunction, this filter allows you to prepare today’s experiences for their inevitable transition into memories.
Her memories keep her youthful. If they go then everything is lost.
Her idea of heaven is the memory of being locked in an eternal first kiss.
[1] Charles Guignon, On Being Authentic, Routledge, 2004, p127
[3] Menkman, R ‘The Glitch Moment(um)’, INK, Amsterdam, (2011) p55
