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Story: Couple
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Person 1 (UK)
Person 2 (US)

Map Insights Conclusions The Data
  • This map is zoomed out to reflect the literal distance that the couple covered over the month.

  • The two live in the USA and the UK, but spent much of the month in other countries on work trips and on holiday together.

  • The number of messages that they exchange decreases when they're together and increases as they separate. Week Three is the week that they are together.

  • The couple are together for a week starting from Day 13.

    • The Questions Long-Distance Raises

    What does long-distance mean in a time where asynchronous multi-channel communication is the norm? Is "long-distance" an obsolete concept?

    Could distance allow the potential to learn more about yourself and your conversation habits? Does this couple's digital pattern of contact mimic their offline ways of communicating? Do devices give us the space to communicate better, more intentionally?

    Or are our online modes of communication mere shadows of the richer in-person alternatives?

    Dealing with the Data

    This couple's data was extra tricky to work with. One reason was because they were constantly changing timezones due to traveling. For simplicity's sake, all of the times in this map are in GMT, or London's timezone. It also affects their location map, making it seem that they're further away from each other in the week that they spend together.

    The two also communicated with each other using Skype. That data didn't make it into the total count because of how messy and unreliable it was.