Shengyi Lee

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CellYouAre Sheng Yi Lee 342621 Parallel Fields

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THESIS

What if we need a new home to accommodate our new lifestyle in the age of the Internet, where information is so readily accessible - and at the same time, some of us make our lives accessible to others from the comfort of our own abode, by exposing ourselves over a medium that doesn’t require actual, real time, physical exposure.

Take YouTube “celebrities” for example; in the virtual realm of the www they consciously, willingly provide us with accounts of their daily lives, their thoughts, etc..

Even through Facebook, FourSquare and such social media platforms we constantly update others about what we’re eating, whether we’re tired from work, or even where we are, with precise global locations.

Some even check-in when they are home.

This raises the question - why is it that in the real world we are less likely to expose this much about ourselves, when the potential opportunities and dangers of doing so are no more nor less than flashing our lives on the Internet? And how would we feel if our homes no longer provided us the shelter we find comfort in; what if all barriers to the external environment were lost? What if the notions of inside and outside are completely blurred, and all that remains between us is our information?

PROPOSAL

I propose a dwelling that is informed by our dependency on wireless networks and the way connections over social media are beginning to precede those in the physical world. The glorification of the mobile phone -or the social gadget- comes in hand with the rise of social media. It is the infill to the continuum of events in our lives, the few minutes of escape from a dull moment .

This dwelling is then the infill to the darker alleys of the urban built environment: the #hashtag to the wasted spaces in the city. Reduce the scale in question: wireless technology is then the infill to the darker corners of our living spaces.

The dwelling will act as a social media platform in itself.

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Virtual walls are ones that we build and rebuild through constant evaluation of our personal boundaries. Within a virtual social network we tend to be more self-centred, manipulating our identities to our own satisfaction. Look at my perfect life on Instagram; read about my personal problems on Facebook. Whilst you float around internet space the spotlight is on you; what do you have to offer today? These interstitial spaces of reflection belong to everybody and nobody. They are both outside and inside.

All we depend on is the little screen in the palm of our hand, and the message we want to deliver to the world today.

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