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Got a nice tip from Jason Sundram (thanks!) as a followup to the screensaver theme:

@mariuswatz websaver awe.sm/5daM6 is a great way to use a processing.js sketch as a screensaver. Here’s mine: viz.runningwithdata.com/boids/

— Jason Sundram (@jsundram) January 28, 2012

Websaver runs on MacOS and allows the user to specify a web page to load when the screensaver is active. And since it uses Safari to render the HTML (I assume), you can use HTML5 and Processing.js to run computational sketches on that web page.

It’s a nice hack to enable easy development of screensavers based on open web standards, without having to worry about interaction with the OS etc. In fact, it’s nearly as good as my Google Chrome screensaver idea, minus an app store etc.

While preparing for teaching a course in data tracking I was very happy to discover the excellent Unfolding library for making interactive maps in Processing. Unfolding makes it possible to create just about any kind of tile-based mapping application with a minimum of code, simple map drawing typically coming in <20 lines. It's perfect for visualizing FourSquare, OpenPaths, GeoRSS or any other kind of geo-based data. Now if I could only figure out how to control the timing of the map tweening, right now it feels more like jump cuts than smooth pans.

Here are three examples showing a simple map display and two demos using geo data from OpenPaths in CSV format: 20120127_unfolding_map_examples.zip

Update: The lecture notes about infoviz and self-ethnography are online on Scribd, it’s basically the same lecture as two years ago.

After posting my Screensaver Culture presentation yesterday it was blogged on Creative Applications by Greg Smith and I’ve gotten quite a few responses on Twitter. Some of the comments are on point and some are just funny.

Below is a more or less complete list. In summary, the arguments are roughly as follows:

• “Screensavers are outdated / unnecessary.” Well, yes. But that has never meant much in terms of deciding whether a cultural phenomenom succeeds or is banished to the Wasteland of Forgotten Memes. Tamagotchis or animated GIFs, anyone? 90% of all iPhone / Android apps are unnecessary for everyday living, yet the smartphone app culture is a runaway train.
• “Developing screensavers is currently way too hard.” I share this sentiment and suspect it to the main culprit along with its corollary: “Installing screensavers is too hard / scary / likely to mess with the rest of my computer.”
• “It’s impossible to improve on flying toasters.” This terrifying thought is exactly why I would suggest screensavers need revisiting.

In conclusion: Between being tricky to develop and just as tricky to install and successfully use, screensavers stand no chance of recovering ground as a cultural phenomenom. Despite their close link to the app culture that is currently dominating our lives, screensavers (aka “ambient software”) will get no love.

This might not seem like such a terrible loss, but I still posit that ambient data gadgets with possible integration to web / mobile apps would’ve been a great usage scenario. There are some ways this could still happen:

• Microsoft and Apple realize the lost potential and relaunch their screensaver frameworks complete with app stores for screensavers. (Unlikely.)
• Google develops a screensaver mode for Chrome as part of their Chrome apps initiative and allows sales of screensavers through the Chrome app store. (Entirely possible if a little optimistic. My favorite option by far, though. Google, are you listening?)
• In both these scenarios, new screensavers would be based on HTML5 with WebGL, allowing them to be cross-platform and based on open standards. Because you all understand that proprietary is stupid, right?

A sad footnote: I had to uninstall the brilliant Briblo screensaver after realizing it was interfering with the taskbar on Windows 7. So I’m back to the ever popular blank screen, like so much of the world population.

Read the rest of this entry »

Update: After this was posted it got blogged on Creative Applications and I’ve received quite a few responses via Twitter. See the separate post “Screensaver Culture – Twitter responds” for a summary, as well as some further thoughts on the demise of the screensaver.

• Your task is to come up with a concept for a screensaver that is both suitable to the screensaver format and updated to a 2012 understanding of interaction design. We are looking for ideas that go beyond the traditional screensaver format, or which reinvent that format by applying design thinking to a field full of visual cliche.
• Two general directions are suggested (but not required):
  1. Ambient data gadgets – screensavers as data aggregators and visualizers.
  2. Computational graphics – parametric visuals.
• If your idea is too ambitious to realize in a 3-day time frame we want to see convincing screen mockups of how the screensaver would work. But we would rather see a real demo that’s rough around the edges than a slick Photoshop sketch. You must submit at least one Processing sketch illustrating part of your screensaver’s functionality.

• Yuji Adachi: Briblo – Lego style screensaver
• Twistori, visualization of tweets with certain keywords
• Smashing Magazine: Screensavers – Best Of (2007)
• Kuler Screensaver showing latest Adobe Kuler color palettes
• SETI @ Home distributed computing screensaver
• Scott Draves: Electric Sheep, massively distributed fractal image generator
• Twingly, blogosphere visualization
• Terence M. Welsh (Really Slick) – OpenGL 3D screensavers
• Stefan Trifan: Weather, City
• GeocodEarth, Flickr, GeoRSS mashup

• Files from “Processing Toolbox” session Jan 13:
  20120113 AHO Processing Toolbox
• Files from morning, Jan 12:
  20120112 processing intro – sketches 02

Just a quickie to provide a link to the files for today’s Processing intro workshop:
AHO Processing intro.zip.

I stupidly forgot to bring my USB stick, so please download from here. Also, download Processing 1.5.1 if you don’t have it on your computer.

I have uploaded the introductory lecture from Monday to Scribd, as seen above. The list of suggestions for possible data sources and comments on possible challenges are at the very end of the document. The visualization examples I used in the lecture are listed below.

In the section on self-ethnography I made rather heavy use of Nicholas Felton’s Feltron Report as a valuable reference. Please see his web site for more information on that project, you can even purchase hardcopies of the report for your own pleasure.

• Bill Cheswick: Internet Mapping Project
• Ben Fry: HapMap
• Martin Wattenberg: Shape of Song
• Moritz Stefaner: Map Your Moves
• SmartMoney.com: Map of the Market
• Marcos Weskamp: Newsmap
• Manuel Lima: Visual Complexity
• David McCandless: Billion-dollar-o-gram (see also his excellent TED Talk)
• OKCupid blog: Statistics from online dating
• Simon Elvins: Silent London

• Nicholas Felton: Feltron Annual Report
• RescueTime
• Drinkingdiary.com
• dailydiarycom
• last.fm
• Daytum
• your.flowingdata.com

The next two weeks I am teaching a workshop in Information Visualization and Self-Ethnography for the Interaction Design course at AHO. I’ll be posting links and resources here on the blog in the next few days.

Required Reading

• Gary Wolf: The Data-Driven Life (NYTimes.com)
• Shawn Allen: Introduction to Information Visualization course at SVA
• Wikipedia: Lifelog

Data collecting tools

• Daytum
• your.flowingdata
• RescueTime
• FourSquare
• Last.fm (music)
• MoodTracker (too medicine-specific?)
• EverNote
• Mindjet MindManager (commercial)