Phantom Terrains

phantomterrains.com

60 points·deevus··4 comments

This reminds me of a similar (but visual) project done several years ago, called "Light Painting WiFi" [0], which has popped on HN more than once, most recently in April [1].

Are there any city-wide (or larger) WiFi maps available anywhere? We well know that Google and several other companies have been collecting WAP data en masse for many years, but I don't think I've ever seen much done with the data publicly aside from a handful of this sort of small-scale art project.

Are the data considered too valuable or too controversial by the collectors (cartographers?) to publish openly?

0. http://www.nearfield.org/2011/02/wifi-light-painting

1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7581253

Well, there's the Mozilla Location Service (MLS) 1), mentioned before 2) which has a completely open API. Of course, coverage is still rather spotty in places.

1) https://location.services.mozilla.com/

2) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8525148

Why hearing aids and not an iPhone?

I was wondering the same thing, but I think that a part of the project is exploring the concept that perhaps one day prostheses will no longer just bring those who need them up to parity with the rest of the population, but will instead extend them past the natural capabilities of a human. Technologically the creators could've recorded these sounds with an iPhone, but the message would've been different.

They're exploring the same space as Neil Harbisson's Eyeborg project [0] and John Scalzi's book Lock In [1].

[0] http://mashable.com/2013/06/01/eyeborg/

[1] http://www.avclub.com/review/john-scalzis-lock-crams-big-ide...

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