Polylogue Is a Physical Alternative to Today’s Ephemeral Messaging Apps

Developed at the DRLab at the Berlin University of The Arts, Polylogue is an interactive installation and hyper-local message feed. Through an open Wi-Fi network, users within range of the wireless signal can send texts from their smartphones, tablets, or computers. These messages are immediately printed on a paper roll that runs between two translucent, black boxes.

Polylogue offers space for thoughts, questions, claims and nonsense to stand next to each other, to object, to relate: Depending on the time of contribution, messages are being printed above, under or next to each other and seemingly relate, though being fundamentally separated from one another through exactly this very simultaneousness.

Polylogue was conceived as a physical alternative to ephemeral apps like Snapchat and serves as an antithesis to the Internet’s “eternal memory.” Unlike today’s social media posts, these messages are not sent across the web to recipients thousands of miles away, and their relationships are entirely situational.

Notes submitted to Polylogue only travel six feet until reaching their final destination. After arriving at the second box, the memos are shredded and destroyed for good. The more frequent and faster users contribute to the feed, the shorter lived a single message becomes. The obliterated content accumulates at Polylogue’s feet in the form of a paper pile consisting of fragmented conversations.

Intrigued? You can read more about about the project here, and see it in action below!