Interfacingwithquestions:Theunpredictabilityoflivequeriesintheworkof

‘ThousandQuestions’WinnieSoon

AarhusUniversity,Aarhus,Denmarkwsoon@cc.au.dk

Abstract.ThisarticlediscussesanartisticprojectentitledIfIwroteyoualoveletterwouldyouwriteback(andthousandsofotherquestions):apieceofsoftwarethatutilizesTwitterwebAPItoqueryquestions,drawingunpredictablequestionsinreal-timefromthedistributeddatabaseofTwitter.Itundergoestheprocessofdataqueryandmanipulation:requestingdataandreceivingresponsesinastandardizedformatthroughmathematicaloperators.Thisarticlediscussestheroleofoperatorsinwhichtheyconstitutetheunpredictabilityofqueries.Byunderstandingtheoperationalandculturallogicoflivequeries,thearticleexplorestheliveandunpredictableprocessofqueriesexecution.

Keywords:queries,API,unpredictability,operators

IntroductionLoveletters(1952),allegedlythefirstdigitalliteraryartworkwasbuiltusingtheFerrantiMarkIcomputerbyChristopherStracheyattheUniversityofManchester.ItisacomputerprogramthatemployedAlanTuring’searlydevelopedalgorithmforgeneratingrandomnumbers.Togetherwithrandomchoicesofsentencesstructures,thelovelettersweregeneratedthroughacombinationofgrammaticalrules1thatincludedadjectives,nouns,adverbsandverbs.Theresultingloveletter,asNoahWardrip-Fruinargues(2011,306),isanunpredictablemanifestationoftwohiddenelements:dataandprocesses.Wardrip-Fruinisnotinterestedintheresultedlettersassemioticandpoeticrepresentations,butmoreinthegenerativeprocessesthemselves(ibid.,306).Thisarticleexaminesthenotionofunpredictabilityinherentinexamplessuchasthis.IttakesitscuefromhowWardrip-Fruinanalyzescomputationalprocessesthatmovebeyondthemeaningoftheirrepresentationaloutput.MycollaborativeartisticprojectIfIwroteyoualoveletterwouldyouwriteback(andthousandofotherquestions)2(fromhereonreferredtoasThousandQuestions)isinspiredbythemultiplevariationsgeneratedthroughtheapplicationofsimplerules.Insteadofgeneratingloveletters,theworkThousandQuestionstakes‘questions’fromtheInternetastextand‘voices’them.

QueryinThousandQuestionsThousandQuestionsdrewthousandsofquestionsbasedonthekeysymbol—aquestionmark—fromtheTwitternetwork,translatingquestionsintextformtospeech.Theprojectemploysquery,followingthestandardandofficialTwitterAPI3format(using‘RESTSearchAPI’)thatoffersprogrammableaccesstosearchandextractTwitterdata.

Queryismostcommonlyunderstoodasalanguage.StructuredQueryLanguage(SQL)isoneofthemostpopularquerylanguages.Formainstreamrelationaldatabases,suchasOracleandMySQL,SQLisusedtocommunicatewitha

1NoahWardrip-FruindrawsreferencefromStrachey’sworktoindicatethegrammarlogicas:“My—(adj.)—(noun)—(adv.)—(verb)your—(adj.)—(noun)”(Wardrip-Fruin,2011,309).2Theprojectwasdevelopedin2012byWinnieSoonandHelenPritchard,seetheartwork’sdocumentation:http://siusoon.net/home/?p=9003See:https://dev.twitter.com/rest/reference/get/search/tweets

database.SQLcanbeexecuted,meaningthatitprovidesinstructionsforstoring,querying,andmanipulatingdata.AshokK.ChandraandDavidHareldefinethis:“[a]querylanguageisawell-definedlinguistictool,theexpressionsofwhichcorrespondtorequestsonemightwanttomakeadatabase.Witheachrequest,orquery,thereisassociatedaresponse,oranswer”(1980,156).Therefore,theexecutionofaqueryisatwo-waycommunication,botharequestandaresponse.

Theuseofthetermlivequeriesinthisarticledoesnotsimplyfocusonanydatabasemodelsortheirtechnicalstructuresbehind.Livequeriesincludeallkindsofwaysthatinquiredatafromadatabase/structureddocumentthroughatechnologicalanddistributednetwork.Itisastructuredformat,allowingdataexchangebetweensites,platformsandapplicationsinreal-time.Datacanbespecificallyselected,filtered,generated,sentandcollectedfromanenormousdatabankthatisoperatedcontinuouslyandacrosscontinents.TakingTwitterasanexample,itusesarelationaldatabasesuchasMySQLandgraduallymovestoaNoSQLdatabase,suchasCassandraandGizzard,becauseNoSQLcanhandlemassivedataandsupportbetterforatime-criticalquery(Metz2014).Technicallyspeaking,aquerycaninterfacewitharelationaldatabasesystemorNoSQLdatabasesystem.

RunningawebApplicationProgrammingInterface(API)isregardedasoneofthequeryforms.ItiswidelyunderstoodthatawebAPIisaninterface.Itisatechnicalstandardandspecificationthatisusedforcommunicationbetweenapplicationsorprograms(Cramer&Fuller,2008).Inmyproject,ThousandQuestionsforinstance,theuseofTwitterAPIisaninterfacebetweentheartworkandtheTwitterplatform.

Withthe“risingvaluesofAPIs”andwithmanybigandsmallcompaniesprovidingAPIsthatextractvalueoutoftheavailabledata,itisclaimedthatofferinganAPIcreates“newbusinessopportunities”,enhances“existingproducts,systems,andoperations”,anddevelops“innovativebusinessmodels”(Mason&Mckendrick2015).Inparallel,thecritiquesofAPIsinjournalarticleshavebeenincreasingseeninacademia.Forexample,togetherwithCarolinGerllitz,AnneHelmondanalyzesthe“likeseconomy”inFacebookviatheirFacebookAPI(2013).Helmond,inanotherpublication,arguesthatthepoliticsofdataflowsinwebplatformshavebeentransformedfromopenstandardstoproprietaryAPIs(2015,22).Likewise,TainaBuchersuggeststhatAPIsexhibitcontrolandfreedomthroughherexaminationoftheTwitterAPI(2012,2013).InadditionaltothewidelyavailablewebAPIsmentionedsofar,DavidBerrydiscusseshowtheuseofspecializedandprivateAPIsexposesomeoftherelationsbetweencompanieslikeMicrosoftandthepoliticaleconomyofsoftwaredevelopment(2011,70-1).AninvestigationoftheseAPIssuggeststhattheyexist“asdatasourcesandasobjectsofstudythatcanbehistoricized,analyzed,critique,etc.”(Helmond2012,n.p).Inotherwords,studyingAPIqueriesenablesabetterunderstandingofdifferentplatformsandthepoliticsofdatacirculationassociatedwithcontemporarycomputationalculture.

ByusingtheTwitterAPI,thequeryinThousandQuestionswaswrittenwithvariouscriteriaandconditionsofdataextractionaspartofthelargerqueryrequest.Thisincludescontentsearchthatcomprisesofaquestionmark(?)andwheretweetsmustbeinEnglishlanguage.Inaddition,thereturnedqueryoutputonlyincudes50results(tweets)perrequestandtheyareregardedas‘recenttweets’bytheprogram.Aquerystatement,likethis,consistsofmultipleparameters.

ForthelatestdevelopmentofThousandQuestions(2016),thenewlyaddedvisualcomponentincludesthereturnedquestionsandascreendisplaysonlyonecharacterperframeuntilalltheremainingcharactersareshown(SeeFigure1).UsingApple’stexttospeechfeature,anAustralianwoman’svoiceisheard,speakingall50tweetsoneaftertheother.Theprogramrepeatedlyposesquestions,alongsideotherparameters,toTwitter’ssocialmediaplatformoncetheartworkfinishesdisplayingandspeakingallthependingtweets.Therefore,theexperienceofsuchlivequeriesresultsfrominteractionsbetweendifferentmachines4-anongoingrequestandresponsethatisbothoperational,culturalandsocial.Theworkmakesapparentqueryprocessingbyshowingthelatencyandthetemporalaspectofgettingquestionedtweetsandspeakingunansweredquestionsthroughanaudio-visualexperience.Theprojectismeanttobeanendlessprocessofqueryprocessing,inwhichtemporalityisexpressedthroughthedisplayoftheunderscoresymbol

4TheuseofmachinesherereferstothemachinethatrunsThousandQuestions,Twitter’smachines,andalsothosesocialmachinesthatincontactwiththeTwitterplatform.

(_),indicatingthewaitingoftheprogramforthenextqueryexecution.Thisexperienceofwaitingisunpredictableintwodimensions:indicatingboththetimeofqueryprocessingandthecontentof“unansweredqueries”(ELC32016).

Figure1.AscreengrabofthevisualpartofThousandQuestions

MathematicaloperatorsTheunpredictabilityofquerycanbeexaminedthroughcomputerexecution:whatitdoesandmeanswhenaqueryisbeingexecuted?MyanalysishereisorientedtowardsamoresystemicandmaterialistapproachtounderstandtheoperationalaspectofhowqueriesinteractwiththeTwitterplatformusingtheexampleofThousandQuestions.

Atthemateriallevel,aqueryemploysset-likeoperationstolinkortogroupdatatogether.Inthisway,thequeryisaboutbringingtheirrelationtothefore.IdiscusshowdatabringthingsintorelationusingthecaseoflivequeriesinThousandQuestions.Theoperationismainlyfocusedondataselectionandretrieval,butnotondataupdateordeletionthroughcode.Suchoperationsandrelationsarenecessarytounderstandhowdataisreturneddifferently,andhencefurtherunfoldingtheunpredictabilityofdatarelationsthroughlivequeries.

Aqueryisbasedonvariousmathematicaloperatorsthatspecifyarequest.Figure2-5showstherequestedquery(fromThousandQuestionstoTwitter)andtheexcerptofthereturnedquery(fromTwittertoThousandQuestions)thatwasexecutedonMarch16,2016at10.45a.m.Inaddition,Figure4-5showsthetwoqueriesthathaderasedthesemanticaspectofdatasoastoemphasizetheoperatorsthatareinvolvedinqueryexecution.

Toexplain,mostofthefrequentoperatorsfoundare‘=’,‘+’and‘-‘,withtheoccasionaloperator‘&’inthereturnedquery.The‘=’operatorreferstothelistofspecifiedwordsthatareusedtoconstructthequery.InFigure2,thelistismorethanjustaquestionmark(thisisindicatedas%3F–theURLencodingcharacter5),butacombinationofwordsandcharactersthatrequestTwittertofilterspecificwordsandcharactersout6fromitsdatabasesearch.‘-RT’indicatestheremovalofretweets.Inotherwords,themathematicaloperatorsplayanimportantroletomakeinclusionandexclusionofdata,identifyingwhatdatashouldbegroupedtogetherornot.Byhavingthemandatoryparameterof‘query’or‘q’(asindicatedinFigure2-3)andthe‘=’operator,parameters,operatorsandlistofvalues(thewordsandcharacters)constituteaninstructiontoTwitter:thelistofwordsandcharactersbelongtothe‘query’parameter.

Additionally,byhavingthe‘+’and‘-‘operators,complexityincreasesbyaddingmorethanonewordorcharactersfordataprocessing.Theoperator‘+’referstoaddingdifferentwordswhiletheoperator‘-’referstoremovingcertain

5See:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percent-encoding6TheblurredpartsofFigure3and4arethewordsaboutracialslurs,incitementsofracismandsexualviolence.IntheworkofThousandQuestions,wehavefilteredoutalistofthesewords.

words.Thetwoseemtocontradicteachotherbutfunctionquitedifferently.Theoperator‘+’isalsousedtoseparatedifferentwords,whiletheoperator‘-‘isusedinsteadtosignalthefunctionofremovalsuchthatTwitterknowswhatarethewordsthatithastopayattention.TheseareallcomplyingwiththequeryoperatorsthatarespecifiedintheTwitterspecification7.Toputsimply,aquery,suchas‘?+hello+-world’meanstosearchfortweetswithaquestionmarkandtheword‘hello’,butremovetheword‘world’.Thequeryparameterandthecorrespondingvaluesarefixed,meaningthatthequeryisexecutedwiththesamerequirementandrequestlogiceverytime.Althoughtheconditionisthesame,theresultofthequeryexecutioneventsisunpredictable-resultsaredifferentandaresubjectedtowhatdataisavailableatboththecurrentmomentandoverthepastsevendays8.

Figure2.ArequestedqueryinThousandQuestions

Figure3.AnexcerptofthereturnedqueryinThousandQuestions

Figure4TheerasureofthedatacontentoftherequestedqueryinFigure1

Figure5.TheerasureofthedatacontentofthereturnedqueryinFigure2

ThereareotherlogicsthatalsoconstitutetheindexingalgorithmandsortingofTwitter’sdatabase.AlthoughTwitterdoesnotpublishthisinformationoritsimplementationlogic,itisimportantbecausetheoperatorscontributetotherelationandgroupingofdataforalmosteverylogic.Forexample,thepreviouslymentionedcondition–thepastsevendaysoftherecenttweet,the‘day’criteriaispartofthealgorithmiclogicthatfiltersoutwhichdataisstoredbeyondsevendays.Toimplement‘thepastsevendays’,themachinehasnoideawhatthepastsevendaysmeanslogicallyandmathematicallyunlessaninstructionstatestosubtractthecurrentdate.Suchsubtracteddatadefinesthescopeofthetime,therebythedateparameteriswithinaspecificrangeforqueryprocessingonTwitter.Assuch,othermathematicaloperatorsmightalsousespecifiedcriteria.Acaseinpointisrelationaloperators,including‘==’,‘>’,‘<’,‘!=’,‘>=’,‘<=’thatstandfor“equality”,“greaterthan”,“lessthan”,“inequality”,“greaterthanorequalto”,“lessthanorequalto”,respectively.Theyarecalledrelationaloperators9becausethereisalwaysarelation—acomparison—betweentwoentities(Meysenburg2014,44-5).Byusingdifferentoperators,thealgorithmisabletoact—exclude,specifyandsortdata—inavarietyofways,bringingtherelationtothefore,andhencetodirectlyimpactwhatdatatoprocess.Therefore,livequeriescompriseofoperatorsthatact,inwhichadatarelationisestablishedthroughqueryexecution.

7Seehttps://dev.twitter.com/rest/public/search8AccordingtoTwitterwebAPIspecification,TwitterwillreturncurrentandthepastsevendaysdatabyusingRESTAPItosearchforspecificdata.Seehttps://dev.twitter.com/rest/public/search.9Seehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_operator

Thecombinationofdataandtheirrelationsareonlyspecifictoaparticularqueryataparticulartime.ThenextexecutionproducesdifferentdatarelationshipsduetothedynamicsoftheTwitterplatform.Theresultsoflivequeriesthusaresomethingthatcannotrepeatedlybegenerated.

Indeed,thelogicofthe‘pastsevendays’isjustpartofmanyotherblackboxedcriteriathatremainunknowntothepublic.Butforanycriteriainaquery,usingdifferentoperatorsfordataselectionareinevitable.Moreimportantly,sameoperatorsbringdifferentdataintorelationforeveryqueryexecutionasinthecaseofThousandQuestions.Whilerunningthesoftware,thesamequeryisexecutedtofetchnewdatathatmatchesthestatedcriteria.Thus,theoutputdataispresentedasjustasnapshotoftheTwitterdatabase.Althoughthequeryexecutionisdeterministicforeverycomputeriteration,thereisa“constantinjection”ofnewdataintotheTwitterdatabasethatchangesthesystemdynamics(Hayles1990,159-60).

N.KatherineHaylesobservesthatexpansionofinformationisincreasinglycommonincontemporaryculturewhereinformationisinterwovenwithtechnologiesandsociallandscapes(Hayles,1990,xiii).BydrawinguponRobertShaw,Haylesdiscussesachaoticmodelinwhichdataisaddedfromexternalinputsas“information”.Inphysicalsystems,suchexternalinputscouldbethoughtofheat–somethingthatproduces“randomfluctuation”(ibid.,159-169).InlivequeriesinTwitter,tweetscanbeunderstoodas“randomfluctuations”too,inwhichfluctuations/eventsexistatthe“microscopic”levelthatleadsto“macroscopicchaos”(ibid.,160).Addingupallthemicroscopicevents—by“constantinjectionofnewinformation”—intothemacroscopicsystem,suchamplifyingfluctuationsreconfiguretheprocessingofdata,resultinginthemacroscopicchaosofoutputdata,inwhichthe“chaoticcelebratesunpredictability,seeingitasasourceofnewinformation”(Hayles1991,8).

Oneoftheimportantconceptsaboutachaoticsystemisscaling,yetretainingthesamepropertiesatalllevels.Fractalgeometryinmathematics,forexample,demonstratesthecomplexrelationshipbetweenmicroscopicpartsandthewhole,sharingthesamealgorithmsthatgeneratefractals.The“complexformscharacterizedbymultipleorinfinitelevelsofself-similarity”(Hayles1990,288).Thisscalingleveldemonstratestheincrementaldifferencethat“shiftsthefocustocomplexirregularforms”(ibid.,210).Eachlevelisinter-relatedthattogethershapetheform.

Consideringhowlivequeriesareconceivedintermsoffractalgeometry,eachiterationofqueryexecutionsharesthesamedeterministicproperties.Operatorsbringdatatogetherbyrestrictingandspecifyingcriteria;hence,anewsetofreturneddatawouldformanewrelation.Suchanewrelationcanbeunderstoodbothfromasystemandculturalperspectives.Yetscalingincontemporarycomputationalculturedoesnotmeanexactlythesameasfractalgeometryinphysicalscience,butrathertoexpandandtakeintotheconsiderationoftheworldonhowitisrepresentedatmultiplescales.AsHaylestooexplains,theworld“isrichinunpredictableevolutions,fullofcomplexformsandturbulentflows,characterizedbynonlinearrelationsbetweencauseandeffects,andfracturedintomultiple-lengthscales”(1999,8).Thetemporalrelationofdataistheresultofcontemporarycomputationalculture,whichisdynamicallychangingandunpredictable.Suchatemporalrelationisderivedfromasetofdeterministicoperatorsthatgeneraterelationsinbothtechnicalandculturalsenses.Livequeriesarenotonlyobservedinartisticpracticesofcourse,butalsoinmanydailysituations,suchassearchingthingsontheInternet.Therelationistemporalbecauseeveryexecutiongeneratesadifferentsetofdatafromitsdatabasethatisbeingupdatedanddataisbeingstored,andthatissubjectedtothereal-timeandcontemporaryconditions.Inphysicalscience,fractalgeometryforexample,weunderstoodtherelationshipbetweenchaosandunpredictabilitywheresimpledeterministicsystemscanpossiblyproduceunpredictableresults.

Bydrawinguponthenotionofmacroscopicchaos,Iherebyfurtherextendthenotionofunpredictabilitybydrawingattentiontotheagencyofoperatorsthatproduceunpredictablerelationsasoutputdata.Insummary,operatorsactupon,andbeyond,achaoticsystemthatincludestheprocessofspecifying,sortingandexcludingdata.Furthermore,executingqueriesrequiretheoperatorsthatbringdataintoatemporalrelationthatsharesimilarfluctuations.Iarguethatquerygeneratesatemporalrelationinthecontextoflivequeriesexecution.Alltheselecteddatameetcertainpre-programmedcriteriabutbroughttogetherinamutatingrelationthatentailsdeterministicbutalsounpredictablemattersforeveryqueryexecution.

NotesTheartworkThousandQuestionswasacollaborationwithHelenPritchard.ItwasfirstexhibitedaspartoftheMicrowaveInternationalNewMediaFestivalinHongKong(2012),aspartofDigitalFutures,attheVictoriaandAlbertMuseum(2013),presentedintheresearchworkshopArtisticResearchatKunsthalAarhus(2015),andmostrecentlypublishedintheElectronicLiteratureCollection,Vol.3(2016).Thewebsiteoftheworkcanbefoundathttp://siusoon.net/home/?p=900.

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