IdleGlory | He had to be a genius or nothing, and since he couldn’t be creative he turned to bohemianism, eccentricity, social versatility, conquests. – Allen Ginsberg

The concept of time stamps on twitter has always frustrated me.

Not only are they akin to bullet points, or scratches on the proverbial sun-dial, these dates are by no means organized in such a shape or form that allows us to read and interpret tweets outside of their 140 character context.

Mimi Li, Artist 2009

As a literature student (and sometimes designer) the quality of the paper or style of font affects my overall reading experience. If a text was published within the 1980s deca or earlier, the cover or scattered page illustrations influence why I accept certain aspects within the story or interact with the narrative, most likely as a result of my extended-reading history with children’s stories.

Texts aimed at teenagers were rather boring so I began reading histories of medieval England, analysis of Shakespeare’s comedies or National Geographic instead.

(be) more open to incoming stimuli from the surrounding environment*.”

Twitter (or an extended note, any social network) is relevant anyways, if some time in the future no one will be able to, from an organizational and tidy method, to read these snippets of information that defines who we were at a specific time, place outside of this instant.

If I wished to read say, the very first tweet you posted on twitter, or the first tweet you posted at the beginning of month and created a data visualization from this information, it would be impossible to do so.