This app lets you visualize the WiFi signals pulsing around you
We all inherently understand that there are various types of electric signals bouncing around us at all times, but since we can't see them, their existence is easy to forget.
But a new iPad app created by Richard Vijgen, called Architecture of Radio, visualizes the overlapping signals that envelop us - from cell towers, WiFi routers, and even satellites flying overhead.
The app, at the moment, is site-specific to an installation in Germany. It uses GPS to get the user's location then finds nearby cell towers using OpenCellID, and has been custom-programmed to map the WiFi routers and Ethernet cables in the exhibition space. It also uses OpenCellID to predict any satellites that might pass overhead.
The app then uses this data to visualize the signals swirling around the exhibition-goers, showing what the project's website refers to as the "infosphere" that we all live in now.
The result, which you can see in the video below, is both beautiful and slightly disturbing, but above all it serves as a reminder of how integrated the digital world has become into our bodily, physical world.