An Artist For Our Times: Ryder Ripps is an artist who you should know about. His medium of choice is the Internet: in 2009 he started InternetArchaeology.org, which, as the site’s mission statement explains, “seeks to explore, recover, archive and showcase the graphic artifacts found within earlier Internet Culture…the chief purpose of Internet Archaeology is to preserve these artifacts and acknowledge their importance in understanding the beginnings and birth of an Internet culture.” Ripps is constantly putting out new projects and works (many of which involve Facebook) that explore the strange world that is the Internet. As Ripps explains in an interview with L Magazine, “Facebook is sort of our everything. All the most important things, the things which truly define character — what we like who we have sex with, what we do — is what Facebook is attempting to mirror. I’m interested in the ways we emote through a computer and the ephemera left behind in the process.” Check out the rest of the interview and keep an eye on all of his Internet art projects.
History Lesson: Brush up on your meme history and check out this compilation of all of the most popular memes from the past three years courtesy of urlesque.
Tumblr of the Day: Short shorts wearing, beard growing, PBR drinking, all around cool guy. I’m talking about your dad. Dads Are The Original Hipster
Goodbye Friendster: Mark you calendars. On May 31, 2011 Friendster will delete all registered user data, which includes all photos, blogs, comments, groups, etc. They are encouraging people to get the Friendster Exporter’ app to export and save all of this precious stuff. This data wiping is all part of a site redesign, which will apparently “complement your existing online presence in other social networking sites.” If anyone is still even using Friendster, I guess we’ll see if the new site is any better. TechCrunch
Video of the Day: Jersey Shore à la Oscar Wilde.
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