Feeling somewhat guilty that at the moment physical interaction (or lack of it) is almost secondary to the visualization.

We’re all networked objects, with many intentional and circumstantial relationships. Social networks and family trees and buddy lists render these connections visually, functionally. In the context of relationships I find maintaining these all very boring, even stressful at times. In contrast to curating these objects–and I’m specifically thinking of jam sessions I’ve been in–there’s something effortless and refreshing when interactions spontaneously, subconsciously occur. Coincidences that feel planned. Steven Strogatz’s Sync: The Emerging Science of Spontaneous Order (which surfaced during research and fits well with my desire to read more non-fiction) explores the possibility of a subtly emerging order in seemingly chaotic moments. Like fireflies synchronously blinking, or a women’s dorm simultaneously menstruating, do humans develop other more subtle networks based in synchronous behavior, due to proximity, shared experiences?

Specifically can heartbeat be shown to respond to the dynamics of a crowd? If not can we still make it pretty…

I’m finding the need to abstract the “network” away from the specifics of XBee/Bluetooth/802.blah. I guess that once you can visualize and discern the dynamics of the network, that’s when you can start playing around with factors that can tease, manipulate it.