Many cities around the U.S. use a microphone-powered system known as ShotSpotter to help law enforcement detect the location of gunshots. In Chicago, for example, the controversial program was implemented a little over six years ago, then turned off on September 22 when the contract expired.
A study found that the app had unintended consequences like slowing police response times to 911 calls and causing them to arrive on scene later. Meanwhile, a number of shooting deaths in Chicago neighborhoods where ShotSpotter was turned off have given rise to calls for it to be installed again.
For Riley Walz, who utilizes digital tools and apps to illuminate our tenuous relationship with technology and information, the security system inspired a different a type of data collection—what Walz calls “culture surveillance.”
Bop Spotter is a real-time collector of songs played by passersby in San Francisco’s Mission District. Installed inside a box high up on a pole, a phone runs Shazam nonstop. The music discovery app allows the user to look up an artist and song title by simply recording a few seconds of sound.
Solar powered with a microphone pointing down on the street, the phone pings every few minutes, detecting music and automatically integrating the tunes into a diverse and ever-growing playlist on the Bop Spotter site. So far, more than 1,400 songs have been collected, ranging from rock to hip top to meditation sounds.
Walz shrewdly taps into the nature and prevalence of surveillance, questioning its efficacy and who notices or consents. In the case of Bop Spotter—just like its influence ShotSpotter—no one does. “But it’s not about catching criminals,” Walz says. “It’s about catching vibes.”
In addition to this project, Walz has also created apps that generate random routes for runners, tested Twitter’s blue-check verification process, and built an archive of global newspaper front pages. Explore more on his website.
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