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1000 Small (Heavy) Things by Haberley Mead
January 9th, 2008 11:16 AMYep, this is the first time I think I've done a Task on a whim. I was busy buying the week's goods from WH Smith's - magazines, newspaper, pepper spray (you never know, do you?) - when I came across the stationery stand. Now, me being me, a lot of things were running through my head while I was looking at this, including such thoughts as
"Do I need anything new from here before I go back to uni?",
"I wonder if any of this could help me with SF0 tasks...", and
"If I push this stand across the floor, would it still be stationery?"
Immediately, a lightbulb flashed in my head and I acted on one of these thoughts. Then the security told me off for trying to rearrange the shop, so I bought 1000 paperclips instead. Yes, I understand they're not heavy, but that's not a complete requirement of the Task.
I realise that writing a long, rambling proof like mine on the subject of paperclips would result in people chewing their own ears off out of sheer boredom, so I won't go on too much about it. The simple fact of the matter is that I bought myself a grand of paperclips, and then sat in the public library with them for two hours, linking them all together. Two whole hours, putting one paperclip onto the end of another and so forth. OUCH.
Doing this in front of the Enquiries desk was an interesting move, as I got no end of strange looks and the chance to spread the good word of SF0 while I was at it. The latter was mainly when people came up and asked me what the hell I was doing, then leaving a few moments later looking back at me as though I was a total nut. But me, a nut? All I was doing was making a 1000-strong chain of paperclips to satisfy the needs of a task set to me over the Internet by total strangers! What's wrong with that?
By the time I had finished, I realised that this was a lot longer than I had thought, and had to get a random bystander to help me hold it out for the camera. Unfortunately, I was still in the Library at this point and Security told me that I wasn't allowed to spread out a 30-foot long metal chain at ankle length inside a public building. They're no fun. So I took it outside instead, and tried to get agood shot of it there. It had... mixed results, as you can see below. I then left it in front of the Library, spelling out 'SF0.org' in shiny, paperclippy letters. Maybe, just maybe, it'll inspire someone's curiosity enough to join... doubt it.
Stationery
What to buy, what to buy... (Sadly I'm working on a student budget, so I probably can't afford anything!)
woah.
Okaaayy... that 200 over the chairs and another 200 on the tables... this is gonna be longer than i thought...
Finished!
There we are - 1000 paperclips, linked end to end!
Sorry if you can't see it
The line actually goes from one end of this wall to the other - by my reckoning that's about 30 feet!
SF0.org
Sorry if you can't see it - nighttime plus flash plus grey things on a grey background makes for no seeing...
15 vote(s)
Optical Dave
5
Tøm
5
Augustus deCorbeau
5
Ian Kizu-Blair
5
Meta tron
5
K!
5
JTony Loves Brains
5
Charlie Fish
5
susy derkins
5
Adam
5
Burn Unit
5
Sushin
5
mattgt
5
Tricia Tanaka
5
Hope Murphy
Terms
(none yet)13 comment(s)
1000 paperclip long chain?
That gets my vote.
The last picture's kind of hard to see in the preview, but at full resolution it seemed pretty clear to me.
Snaps to being a total nut (in a quiet non-disruptive sort of way) a public library.
Thanks a lot guys.
Just working on changing that last pic now so you can see it a bit easier.
I vote for acting out puns.
Also, your chain is a labour of love if not especially dramatic to look at.
I think this is cool! And I'm sure you got the heaviest paper clips available...
Advice from ADD girl. Pleading for me to read the whole thing will only work once. If you want me to read a lot of words, you must insert images or my attention wand...
wanna go ride bikes?
Paperclips are heavy for a small object, so I totally think they count. Linking them up together is cool because it's something you can do with paperclips that you can't do with a lot of other small objects, and because it's not in the task description. Interacting with strangers and librarians during your task and sharing that story is cool.
Slightly anticlimactic due to trouble seeing the result of the chain. If you have a preview function on your camera, detecting that while you're still onsite gives you a chance to think up another way to display it. For example, what if you corralled five strangers to stand in a line holding the chain, or if you attached colored feathers in a few places and dangled it from a balconey.
I have to disagree with the complaints about the final picture. Blowing it up to full resolution (by clicking on it) it is completely clear what you have done. The SF0.org is beautifully laid out.
I say near perfect completion (with the very, very minor exception of forgetting the slash through the zero... just because people seeing it won't know it isn't an oh). Rongo-squared's suggestions are all good ones, but I don't see anything wrong with the image you have. Nicely done!
Great task, great documentation. Vote.
Normally I wouldn't comment, but since you asked...
I'm even newer to this game than you are, so here's a box -full- of salt shakers. :) Like, really *large* salt shakers. Overflowing with salt. Okay, you get the idea. :)
To me, the best tasks (and best completions of tasks) involve:
* original work,
* effort, and
* other people.
Linking paperclips is not very original for me, which is not the end of what you did. You then moved onto a design/shape/etc, is. Spelling out "SF0" is not a bad baseline to get a sense of scale, but I'd prefer to see something more original. For this, you have my sympathy: I'm *terrible* at coming up with original ideas. It's not like I'm looking for something Epic and Groundbreaking and Earth-Shattering. For instance, the first thought that popped to mind was "oooh, tinsel for a tree". :) (Hardly a tour de force of breathtakingly insightful artistic vision *snerk* but then again, we can't take ourselves -too- seriously.)
Effort: 2 hours of linking, followed by deployment? Okay, got this. :)
Involves people: well, interacting with librarians who say "no, don't put that in here" doesn't qualify for me. Deploying the paper clips in a space that people would appreciate would qualify. For smaller scales, asking people a question about the task would qualify. (Hmm, a task proposal I submitted fails in this regard. I should fix that.)
Naturally, the documentation has to reveal all of this, which I think can be very hard. I'm terrible at documenting things.
So I feel like you're 90% there. I like the core idea, and where it's going, and I definitely approve of the enthusiasm. Woot! But I'm looking for something else to be added to this. You have the luxury of not having to play the gedankenspiel of "What would I do with a chain of a thousand paper clips?"; you get to do it in real life. :)
Caveat: I'm a fairly conservative judge. I'm totally the type of person who'd rate the Mona Lisa as a 9 out of 10. :) So just because I am a Somewhatgrouchy Bunnydragon doesn't mean you should take me too seriously; listen to rongorongo instead. :)
Seriously, thanks for the comments, it's always nice to know why people like/dislike/scream in rage about the different Tasks, and you've all offered up a load of advice. I'll keep it in mind for my next ones - especially Bunny Dragon, you've left quite a mark on this discussion :)
My only comment: stop asking for comments. You're a big boy now, just be awesome. If you're not getting much, it must not be awesome enough.*
Sometimes silence (followed by a flood of votes, flags, or ... well, nothing) speaks volumes.
This coming from the Longest. Comment. Writer. Evar.
*shall I demonstrate this with an equation? Here's one, which, like so many others, I made up out of thin frickin air
A = v-f/t (∂P/w)
Awesome equals (votes - flags) divided by (time since post in days) multiplied by (the delta of other Praxes per week since start of era).
Thus a task's awesomeness is measurable in impact relative to the creative output of the era where greater awesomeness is likely to rise even if it would otherwise be buried by an enormous glut of high speed praxis. Praxis that retains awesomeness-gathering ability throughout an era and beyond is clearly more awesome. Exceedingly awesome praxis may also have an impact on the aggregate delta of the era's praxes as one spectacular task completion may inspire others or cause several other new players to enter the game and thereby increase the praxis delta rate within an era. For a proof to do that while Still acquiring votes is a particular sign of Awesome. Safe to say, bring the awesome, the comments will follow.
Almost no vote for this cos of the whole lack of seeing the last pic, but obstructing library staff swung it.