It is nothing new to note that Twitter documents our culture – news, hot topics, points of interest, and how and where we are spending our lives. This happens to be so much so that the Library of Congress is archiving Twitter conversations, organized through the infamous hashtag (you can read a previous post on this here).
Now, we can see this very idea visually. Mashable posted a great article showing how Eric Fischer created a map out of 10,000 geotagged tweets, showing the flow of people throughout New York City. He began tracking each path with one geotagged tweet and ending with the next geotagged tweet. The finished product is quite an amazing visual, if you ask me.
So what does this say about Twitter, and other popular social media tools, and how it plays a part in the 21st century?
It says that people want to connect and engage with one another. They want to be heard – and to be answered in return. They want to say where they are going and where they have been – and form a deeper relationship with those of similar interest. Social media has been the perfect platform to allow people to do so.
I think that Fischer’s map is a great representation of social media’s presence within today’s culture and how people are spending their time. What do you think that this map says?
"The project lays out around 10,000 geotagged tweets and 30,000 point-to-point trips in cities like New York City to plot the flow of people in terms of favored paths. In his map of NYC, seen above, there is a huge ink blot lining Broadway; as we’ve long suspected, it looks like the busy avenue is the backbone of the city."- via Mashable's blog article "Map of 10,000 Tweets Shows New York City at Work"
