On the Language of Internet Memes

• Glitch as Poetry
• This image was grabbed from here on 10.25.2012:
  
• It is part of a transcription of a conference I was involved in on 9.18.2012, which dealt with pedagogical practices regarding new media art.
• The transcription has been generated by Youtube’s transcribing tool and it is somewhat inaccurate.
• What was actually said is (in spanish): “El glitch, es error, es errar, es desviar, es rastrear, es encontrar, es aprender” (the glitch is error, is to be errant, is to deviate, is to trace, is to find, is to learn).
• The resulting transcription is the result of a randomly inaccurate, glitchy transcribing tool.
• It was glitched by randomly (and increasingly) inserting the phrase [GLITCH_AS_POETRY] into its alphanumeric values:
  

  Click to download a PDF with the intervened alphanumeric values.

  

  Click to download a PDF with the intervened alphanumeric values.

  

  Click to download a PDF with the intervened alphanumeric values.

  

  Click to download a PDF with the intervened alphanumeric values.

  

  Click to download a PDF with the intervened alphanumeric values.

• An animated GIF was created to serve as centerpiece:
  

  Centerpiece for the Glitch as Poetry portrait

• A PDF file containing the intervened alphanumeric values of the images above was then converted into image files.
• The alphanumeric values for these images were themselves intervened by substituting specific characters with the word [Poetry]:
  
• The resulting images were then mixed in with the original files in order to create an animated GIF that served as the background:
  

  Background for the Glitch as Poetry portrait

Suggested follow up questions:

• What are the implications of inaccurate transcriptions being considered poetry?
• Why is Youtube’s transcription tool capable of being inaccurate?
• How can Youtube’s transcription tool be compared and contrasted with the practice of translating poetry?