From Urban Street conference in Talinn

1. Spa$al storytelling in hybrid
ecosystems
Kai Pata
Tallinn University, Center for Educa$onal Technology

2. What is a story?
• If we say Story we usually think of the
common conceptualiza$on of sequen$al
narra$ves as representa$ons created by
authors.
• What if we look at stories and narra$ve
prac$ces in spa$al terms?

3. Hybrid ecosystem

4. Hybrid ecosystem
• Ecosystems are dynamic, emergent and
responsive.
• Ecosystems allow diversity and heterogeneity
of members who interact.
• In ecosystems autonomous self‐direc$ng
agents adapt themselves to the ecosystem
causing self‐organiza$on, and they co‐adapt as
a result of mutual interac$on.

5. We narrate ourselves into the world
We no$ce different perspec$ves

6. We are hybrid beings
• We may well describe ourselves as hybrid beings
extending ourselves to the world through
narra$ve ac$ons in order to mediate our
interac$ons with the world.
• Place is a temporary extension of ourselves in the
moment of our interac$on with the world.
• Place is a self‐hybridiza$on with the World as
part of eco‐cogni$ve chance‐seeking.

7. Accumulated chances
We store eco‐cogni$ve chances to the hybrid
ecosystem and use community chances for
naviga$on

8. Spa$al storytelling
• Spa$ally we can look at places as n‐
dimensional meaning‐, ac$on‐ and geospaces.
Embedding feelings to places

9. “Narra$ve ecology” experiment
• Within one month each par$cipant took
pictures in the city space, signifying places as
personal perspec$ves.
• The final story was distributed across different
soPware loca$ons, geographical and meaning‐
places.
• Each par$cipant became aware of these
emergent narra$ves through the friendfeed
connec$ons and mashed tag channels.

10. Individual storytellers would act largely as autonomous
agents, aligning their narra$ves according to story
prototypes that they perceive

11. Ontobrands as story prototypes
PERCEIVED STORIES TAGSPACE OF STORIES
STORYLINE AS A INVASION
TRAJECTORY
SUSTAINABLE ECOLOGY
MESSAGE
ATTRACTOR BASINS OF STORIES

12. Humans as ants in hybrid ecosystem –
narra$ve swarming
• Space with dynamically embedded meanings
(eg. spoken narra$ves, movement) entails
ac$on poten$als.
• The spa$al view to storytelling focuses on the
places in conceptual space that serve as
a^ractors for community’s s$gmergic ac$on.

13. Individual search
Detect the signal
Dis$nguishing Previous disturbance
feature experience
No$cing a story
Detec$ng a^ractor Analogy Selected no$cing
object
Feedback loop
Following the from the
signal trail environment
Visibility
Collec$ng and Collabora$ng,
Wri$ng narra$ve,
leaving signal trail cloning the
mashing, tagging,
story
geo‐tagging Abduc$on
Increasing a^ractor Modifying the signal
New
concentra$on story
Expanding, transla$ng, interpre$ng

14. Swarming phenomena in city space
Some swarming ac$ons took place around perceived stories as
a^ractor areas in space – many storytellers were autonomously
contribu$ng to the emerging shared stories.

15. Poten$al of spa$al storytelling
• The experimental
results indicated that
enac$on with the
geographical
dimensions of
narrated places was
less frequent than
could be expected.
Places are powerful triggers

16. Places evoke personal stories
Day two
Day one
Day three

17. Ac$on may follow in places

18. Interac$ons with places
• People rather interact with the emo$onal
dimensions of the places in hybrid ecosystem.
• But emo$onal dimensions cannot be mapped
yet while we interact with geographical
loca$ons.
• Interac$on in geographical loca$ons is rare
because the density of accumulated contents
is low.