The 3.2 gigapixel Global Selfie mosaic, hosted by GigaPan, was made with 36,422 individual images that were posted to social media sites on or around Earth Day, April 22, 2014. (via NASA)
LOS ANGELES — It’s the end of selfies as we know it. Dearest selfie fanatics, this will be my last story for the Hyperallergic selfie column; after one year of chronicling the selfie’s rise to fame, we collectively decided to let this investigation go off into the netherlands of internet data trails. I want to tell you that this is definitely not the end of my writing about selfies; please do stay in touch! To wrap up the Hyperallergic selfie column, I’m making this a selfie celebration with more selfies than ever before, paired with a concise collection of this week’s most notable selfie news.
NASA had a similar idea with its selfie to end all selfies. Earth becomes a mirror reflecting back a selection of selfie shooters who occupy space on it. A total of 50,000 people submitted their selfies; NASA selected 36,422 to become a part of this global selfie mosaic. As I zoomed through this collection, however, I noticed that the locations on Earth didn’t align with the selfie shooters’ locations. Perhaps because we are constantly traveling, and henceforth becoming increasingly connected as a global culture, the actual location is becoming less important. In this way, selfie location is always optional, and more about a way to connect with others — and to stay connected. The selfie is a way to visually communicate; its specific intentions and intended recipients are up to the one who snaps the picture — unless that same picture ends up on the very public internet, as I suspect this “add a kid selfie” of a woman in the dressing room with her young son likely did.
Read the full story here: http://hyperallergic.com/128473/the-last-selfie/
