Viral Time

https://elputnam.github.io/ViralTime/

I have been reading Aesthetic Programming Winnie Soon and Geoff Cox and this sketch is inspired by the “thobber” exercise in chapter three. They frame the exercise as a means of temperoral operations and computation: “We usually encounter the ubiquitous spinning icon while loading or streaming. It shows that a certain operation is in progress, but what exactly is happening, and how long this will take, is not at all clear. There is no indication of progress or status as is the case with a progress bar, for instance. We see the icon spinning, but it explains little about what goes on in the background or about timespan” (ch. 3, section 3: Infinite loops). When creating this sketch, I was trying to find a way to encapsulate time during the COVID-19 pandemic, which has taken on a different feel. Time is glitchy.