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How To Create an Object

manok — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 19:37:59 +0000

On the upper left corner of Hypercities, click on the “Add Media” button. Clicking it shows the three types of objects that HyperCities allows: points, lines, and polygons.

A point is just a single place on a map, which can be represented by an (x,y) coordinate pair.

A line is used to trace a path. It can contain many vertices, and can be used to form shapes.

A polygon is a shape. Clicking inside a shape activates the polygon; this is the difference between a polygon and a line. Clicking inside a closed line does not activate the info bubble for that object. Clicking inside a polygon does.

Once you have chosen what kind of object you want to create and its location, you will see the “Add Media” frame on the right.

Here you can set the title of your object, timespan, license, and description of the object.

Author name is automatically filled in from the nickname you supplied when you registered. The author name can be changed individually for any object.

To set the time, you can type the year, month and date by either clicking on the fields or tabbing between them. You can also use the arrow keys to change these numbers. Typing “-” (the minus sign) toggles between “BCE” and CE (when “BCE” is not displayed). The date on the right must always be later than the date on the left; HyperCities will prevent you from entering an end date earlier than the start date, and vice versa.

The description field allows rich formatted text. To edit the HTML source, click on the “HTML” icon.

A note: many users compose the descriptive text in another program and then copy and paste the text into HyperCities. If you do this, it’s best to use a plain text editor like Notepad (Windows) or TextEdit (Mac), and do your formatting in HyperCities itself, unless you know HTML. Avoid word processing programs like Microsoft Word; Word generates HTML that look stranges when it is displayed in HyperCities. HyperCities also edits out some formatting that Word puts in, so generally, it’s best to write the text in Notepad (or TextEdit), without formatting, and use HyperCities to do the formatting. The HyperCities text editor is WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get).

Add images by clicking the “Insert/Upload Image” icon. Videos, however, must be hosted on other video websites such as YouTube, Vimeo, etc., and they can be embedded on Hypercities by copying and pasting the embed code from the hosting service.

To display base maps with your object, click on the “Select Base Map” button. This shows a list of maps that are visible in the current viewport and timespan. To select a map, just click on it. Use the “x” near the map to remove it.

If you want other objects to show up with your object, click on the “Select Other Items” button. You can use this window just like the regular collection list. Just check the items on that you want to appear.

Once you’re done, save your object by clicking “SAVE” on the lower right corner.

Click here to see how to add your object in a collection.

HyperCities Geo-Scribe receives Google Digital Humanities Research Award

David Shepard — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 19:51:45 +0000

HyperCities Geo-Scribe, a project proposal by the HyperCities team, has been selected to receive one of the first Google Digital Humanities Research Awards. Geo-Scribe will be an extension to HyperCities, a mark-up tool that brings together books and maps in a collaborative authoring environment for exploring the spatial dimensions of literature. The tool will allow users to create maps of places related to books, and each point on each map will be linked back to specific pages in the books. Users will be able to browse all books that mention a certain time and place, and to browse all the maps created by users that are linked to a specific book. Geo-Scribe emphasizes multiple mappings and multiple perspectives and will add a social, participatory component to the mapping projects that have already been undertaken by Google Book Search.

Below is a hypothetical screenshot of what the project might look like, taken from the proposal:

For more information, please see the announcement from the Official Google Blog: http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2010/07/our-commitment-to-digital-humanities.html

New Featured Collection: Election Protests in Iran + new Interview with Creator

presner — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 17:48:26 +0000

Created by Xarene Eskandar, a graduate student at UCLA, this HyperCities collection curates the “media history” of the election protests in Iran, beginning on June 13, 2009, and continuing through December. As a series of richly curated maps, the collection geo-locates and chronologically organizes more than 800 YouTube videos, Twitter feeds, Flickr photographs, and other forms of documentation. The result is the largest, day-by-day, hour-by-hour, and sometimes even minute-by-minute web documentation of the election protests in Iran.

For an overview of this project, click on the YouTube link below:

To view the collection, click on the image below. Depending on your screen width, you may want to “slide” the collection open by dragging the divider between the map and the narrative panel. You can also switch between map, earth, and satellite view in HyperCities.

Interview with Xarene Eskandar:

Tell me about the ambition/goals of the project. Why are you doing it?

Working against Iranian state media censorship, I wanted to keep track of the protests across the country and especially the capital, Tehran, to show they are not isolated events. My goal is to raise awareness of the magnitude of discontent, as well as keep a record of it due to the temporal nature of Twitter. State media either denied there were any protests, or they circulated false news that the unrest was only in northern Tehran, a well-to-do part of the city (and sympathetic to Western culture), and a few times they even claimed the opposition to be pro-government while broadcasting the protests with no audio. They also claimed all other provinces were calm, while in fact the protests were not limited to class, age or province and were wide-spread.

Why is mapping the best venue to present this work?

For those unfamiliar with the visual landscape of Tehran, I found HC an interesting platform to map a visual narrative of the videos and photographs to locations. The videos and photographs assist in showing the scale of the protests in terms of bodies present (which are always reported in much smaller numbers in the news) and the area they occupy.

How do you hope people will interact with your project?

Because of the control of state media, the provinces are isolated from each other and from Tehran; news doesn’t travel fast, and it is especially slower when online resources are shut down. Mapping all cities was a daunting task and in the end I am only focusing on Tehran, so at this point I would like to have other cities mapped (which is more difficult to do after the fact, than following the events as they unravel). If the visual information becomes widespread, it can be used to boost morale. Seeing the reach and occurrence of the protests is far more powerful than reading and hearing scattered information about them.

Do you have any plans to continue it or add more layers of info?

Absolutely. There are many levels of information to any mapping project. I am working with Professor Johanna Drucker (UCLA, Information Studies) on creating a qualitative layer of information. For example, how is the space of anxiety in the hours leading to definite confrontation formed by the collective emotions amassed in the area? How do the spaces of the two sides of a conflict intersect? etc.

Does it go beyond digital curation (ie, to analysis/interpretation of the events)?

Placing the information in chronological order and analyzing them for accuracy of date and time has led to a third project: studying protest slogans. I’ve been comparing slogans (chants and written signage) to make sure, for example, the Quds Day protest videos were 2009, not 2008. While fact-checking I noticed how the slogans shape the momentum of the masses, and also how media changes the slogans. What the protesters chant is not always necessarily aimed at the coup government, but is a message for Western media, to show the true intent and beliefs of the people. Another facet to the language of opposition during this time has been an increase of new poetry blogs, as well as a switch to poetry on existing blogs to avoid censorship and imprisonment. Iran has a terrible record of imprisoning and torturing bloggers (Hoder is still in prison and Omidreza Mirsayafi was killed 19 March 2009). Sylère Lotringer brought to my attention that this was also happening with the Stasi in Berlin, so definitely a project worth investigating. Right now, the project is primarily in text and in its very early stages.

Keeping a detailed track of the events over the past few months has also shown how the students–who are the primary forces of the protests–have become more organized, smarter and mature in countering the government’s moves to crush them, physically and digitally. It has also revealed the different shifts of alliances and loyalties among people (ethnically, as well as class and age), police, coup forces, etc. It is very exciting to witness the emergence.

Mobile Media Tours of HiFi a Resounding Success

presner — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 05:15:27 +0000

The mobile media tours of LA’s Historic Filipinotown (HiFi) were a resounding success with the participation of scores of students, community activists, politicians, and members of the general public exploring the history of HiFi. Participants followed the pathways of four immigrants through different periods in HiFi’s history on GPS-enabled Nokia Tablets and in an authentic Jeepney, a refurbished transport jeep from WWII. The content was produced by Pdub youth, who worked with Public Matters, the Pilipino Workers’ Center, UCLA’s REMAP, and HyperCities, to produce the digital media tours. Check out the videos below and click here for a news story about the event.

Mobile Media Tours of Historic Filipinotown Launch Sept 26th

presner — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 01:03:11 +0000

On Sat. Sept. 26 we are launching a series of four Mobile Media Guides to Los Angeles’ Historic Filipinotown. This is the culmination of Public Matters’ first year of Pdub Productions, our collaboration with The Pilipino Workers Center, HyperCities, Remap L.A, USC, local youth and community members. And we have quite the event to wrap it up.

There are free walking tours btwn. 1-6 and then a big Barrio Fiesta fundraising party that evening at the Pilipino Workers Center, 153 Glendale Blvd.

Tour-goers will use GPS-enabled Nokia tablets to access audio, photos and maps that bring to life immigrant perspectives and time periods. Each guide features one central figure of the period but is augmented by many other personal stories of life in Historic Filipinotown or Los Angeles during the time period: a Filipino “Fountain Pen Boy” (1898-1945), a Filipino Farm Worker (1945-1965), a Latina Teen (1965- 2002), and a Filipina Caregiver (2002-present).

Highlights of the day include:

* High-tech meets history: Free Mobile Hi Fi Immigrant Guides Walking Tours from 1-6 pm

* A jeepney returns to the U.S.: The world premiere of the Pilipino Workers Center Jeepney. It will be our largest piece of “mobile media” and actually will be tricked out to play the guides.

* Celebrity Jeepney Tour: led by L.A. City Council President Eric Garcetti at 1 pm.

* A Barrio Fiesta fundraiser: from 6:30-9:30 including food, performances, music, an outdoor screening of the youth videos from the project, a raffle, and more.

* Illustrations of jeepney parts by Emmy-winning animator and Simpsons Assistant Director Jess Espanola. Proceeds will keep the jeepney running!

* Jeepney T-Shirts

* Pdub Productions Youth Media Screening: at the Barrio Fiesta

To make reservations and purchase tickets and for the most complete and up-to-date event into, visit our event blog: www.hypercities.com/pdub.