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Electronic Highways
Lost and found on the Web
It’s easy enough to lose oneself online. It also can be surprisingly easy to find oneself—in whole or part, knowingly or not.
You might be casually browsing and catch sight of yourself in a grade school photo or recognize your handwriting in a discarded shopping list. FOUND magazine collects “found stuff: love letters, birthday cards, kids' homework, to-do lists, ticket stubs, poetry on napkins, telephone bills, doodles—anything that gives a glimpse into someone else's life.” FOUND is published as a print journal with several book compilations; Web-oriented treats include the “find of the day” RSS feed and a news blog. The blog includes a “Hey, That’s Me!” section in which readers can identify the source of finds. FOUND also is on MySpace.
At Films Found in Old Cameras, a photographer collects old cameras, develops the film found within and posts the resulting photos with commentary, noting: “You are seeing them for the first time as they were lost by the photographers that took these images.” Probable years and locations are noted, but the origins of the films—some from early in the 20th century—seem destined to remain unknown. Dedicated to solving more modern mysteries, the Found Cameras and Orphan Pictures site attempts to reunite lost cameras with their owners. The site owners advise those who find a lost camera or photo card to “Email at least two photos from your found camera. Include any other details, time, location, school, etc. Share your thoughts about it.” The site can be searched by location and includes a blog and Facebook group and application. Updates about reunions are posted when cameras are claimed.
While the above sites share found items of usually unknown origin, Mortified celebrates the spirit of sharing embarrassing items oneself, perhaps lest someone else find and share them. The Mortified Project, “a comic excavation of the strange and extraordinary things we created as kids—adolescent journals, letters, poems, lyrics, home movies, stories and more,” includes live shows, books and videos . Project news is circulated via blog and MySpace.
Mortified participants make peace with their pasts. At Post Secret, peace may be elusive. Artist Frank Warren describes Post Secret as “an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard.” New secrets are posted in blog-format every Sunday and related resources include Follow-up Stories, Video Secrets and international (German, French and Spanish) sites. Several books of secrets also have been published. While some secrets are comical and some life-affirming, many also are poignant confessionals through which participants reveal truths they dare share only anonymously. Even if you never send your own secrets, you may nonetheless recognize yourself in many. Such unexpected sharing is part of what keeps the site vital.
—Nancy Babb, University Libraries