Mike in Union Square

Mike in Union SquareMike was a New York City court employee I found sitting in Union Square on a beautiful, early summer morning.  He was doing crosswords while waiting for his daughter to finish a driver training class.

Listen to his interview and hear some of the things he had to say about Union Square!

First Interviews Complete!

Well, it was challenging at first to meet people to interview, but we got three initial interviews today!  I’ll be editing them and posting them individually over the next week or so, so keep an eye out for them to appear here.

Each actual interview ran between 8 and 10 minutes, which should provide plenty of material to condense down into my intended 2 or three minutes for the final product.  I found that each person had interesting and unique things to say about the area, so the initial idea seems to be panning out so far.  If I were taking a walking tour, the things these folks had to say are EXACTLY the kinds of things I would like to hear about the area.

I’m looking forward to getting the finished interviews up and hearing what feedback visitors have about them so I can improve the process further in the future!

First Interviews Today

Union Square subway station

Union Square subway station

Recording equipment is ready, the cards are here and the question list is complete.  I’m excited to be heading over to Union Square for the first set of interviews for the project!

Melanylefay will be helping me with the initial interviews and has agreed to be my call if I need to make bail. It’s good to have people.

Keep an eye on this space for the interviews to appear in a few days!

The Card to Get

Here’s the card to get:

Card

On their way to me now!

Recording equipment and business cards are on order.  Looking good for the May 30th kickoff date for first inteviews!

Welcome!

Welcome to On LocatioNYC! This is a project to create walking tours where the stories of places around New York are told in the voices of people who were there.

Right now, the project is in pre-interview stage.  I’ve created the basic website and technology needed for mapping (thanks, Platial!), and have a pretty good understanding of how this will work on a technical level.

Now I’m working on creating collateral (well, just simple cards, I think) I can give to folks I interview to help establish the legitimacy of the project and also pulling together recording equipment.

Right now, I’m hoping to complete the first couple of interviews the weekend of the May 30th.

Once I’ve completed post-processing of the interviews, they’ll be available right here along with basic location information.  Eventually, I’ll string together the first few into the first walking tour.  As the project develops, you’ll be able to download entire walking tours to your iPod and MP3 player or just listen to individual interviews right at this site.

I’ll post updates periodically for those who want to keep up on the progress of the project.

Thanks to all those who have helped conceptualize this project over the past few weeks.  It feels really good to have some of the groundwork laid and to be getting closer to zero day!

-Simon