Creative tagging and linking can turn a strong post into a profound message. I’ve noticed that most tags link readers to other pieces of writing, which serves the Web 2.0 ethic that promotes connecting one piece of knowledge with another. But what about linking to images? I rarely see this, but it could be a profound gesture and a potential for a new art medium.
For example, what if someone republishes a passage by Susan Sontag in a post, and then tags her words with the images she contemplates in her writing? This might be a basic function of “image-tagging,” literally illustrating Sontag’s ideas. But we could be more indirect with this tagging, and perhaps link to images that have nothing to do with Sontag’s words. Instead, one could link to images associated with the way one feels about Sontag. In this way, a linking would become more of a portrait, expressing the perception of the blogger and not just the words in the post.
One of President Bush’s speeches might make another meaningful subject matter for a linking. A blogger could publish his exact words, i.e. “Good morning. This week, millions of Americans gather with loved ones for Christmas,” and insert a tag to, oh maybe, the image of orphans.
The post could exists as this:
“Good morning. This week, millions of Americans gather with loved ones for Christmas.”
The gesture would be about debunking the buzz words and empty language that frequent political speeches. Not a very strong concept in this linking, but it’s something to be worked on. I’ll try another soon.
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January 4, 2009 at 3:17 am
Hiroshi Sunairi
Interesting! Then, we contenplate on the connection of word and image. However, people should somehow notified that they will see images from titles or there should be some kind of manifestation. Maybe the title of links could be somehow used to discribe that it is an art form, otherwise people may dismiss as lightly as they often skim through web search actions. When is is intended for people to pay attention, this could be a great form of art.
January 4, 2009 at 7:13 am
william danger tran
interesting idea. the idea of tagging political copy brings to mind stephen colbert’s segment “the word,” which itself finds its roots in the chorus of classical greek plays. these ancient choruses served the purpose of providing the audience with additional information or emotion to supplement the heroes on stage, much as colbert’s pithy everyman headlines undermine the ribald buffoonery of colbert as pundit. the danger with this, though, is that the counterpoint offered along with the official “point” is only as effective as its author. there is, in this sense, very little room for subtlety or interpretation. take your example of bush’s monologue. the resultant dialogue created by tagging runs the danger of becoming just as pedantic and hollow by simply tagging an ironic image of starving orphans. conversely, another author could tag a picture of a marine saluting a flag as an eagle soars above, a tear misting his aquiline eye. i much prefer your idea of abstract tagging, in which an author can reference multisensory data, making what was once a dry text into a synesthetic experience. the abstraction leaves much more room for exploration, and self-discovery. now only if we could get those smell-o-phones working.
January 8, 2009 at 6:41 pm
Mark Dery
Drive-by thoughts: If purely illustrative, an image should be embedded in the post, to save the reader the time and tendon-wear of clicking through to it. If, on the other hand, the image is ironic (SUCK.com pioneered the ironic *textual* link—the online equivalent of David Foster Wallace’s tongue-in-cheek footnotes—back in the ’90s), then the one-click distance between text (the blog post) and subtext (the text/image you’re linking to) literalizes the critical distance, which is of course the essence of irony (the gap between apparent reality and metatextual truth). I like this idea of visual free-association—linking to images you associate with the idea under discussion. But as the other Tran, above, notes, there’s always the danger that such a device could be used hamfistedly. Then, too, images are reader-friendly texts, so open-ended that a reader might easily take away a meaning contrary to the one you’d intended…if you’d intended any, beyond ineffable something-or-other. As well, there’s the very real problem that images are too often imprecise conveyors of meaning. Example: I would never have known the gang of kids you linked to were orphans if you hadn’t told me. Married to Bush’s words, the image reads as a feel-good, gift-card evocation of pre-school hijinx. Or something like that. FYI, the Web’s awash in blogs that consist of *nothing but* images, with little or no commentary. You might give them the hairy eyeball.
September 20, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Jue
Hi Audrey, thanks for letting me know your thoughts on my blog post. Your post is very interesting, but I wonder if your ideas (image-linking, subjective contextual linking) aren’t already being done widely on the web and in the blogosphere –and in fact, in an even richer way than you describe. Consider the irony and misdirection inherent in the practice of rickrolling, or the way the Slate news writers will often eschew a literal description of the news they’re referring to in favor of a pithier, often sarcastic or witty one. What WOULD be pretty cool is your idea of taking existing texts (e.g. Sontag) and recontextualizing them using hyperlinks…that has the potential to create a piece of profound ‘e-installation art’ of sorts.