London,
14
February
2013
|
23:00
Europe/London

Unique digital city portrait to go on displace at TechHub at Google Campus

 

London: From Strictly to Skyfall and Barack Obama to Hurricane Sandy, the hot topics that get London talking online have been captured for the first time ever in a unique digital portrait of the city created by world renowned digital artist, Brendan Dawes. From Friday 15th February, the artwork will take up a permanent home at TechHub at Google Campus, London – home to over 500 of the most exciting and innovative online start-up companies in the world.

Commissioned by EE to mark the of arrival 4G in the UK, Dawes created a series of 11 digital city portraits – one for each of the first 11 cities across the UK to receive 4G technology. The design is a modern sophisticated response to the representation of a city - formed from millions of bits of data as people talk and interact in the UK about the biggest events of the day.

The data was captured from over 4320 minutes or three days' worth of analysis from 29th to 31st October 2012. This time period represents the day before, during and after the period in which 4G was introduced to London and 10 other cities across the UK.

Each chosen topic and the hundreds of thousands of digital conversations associated with them are represented by a specific colour coded keyword. From the keywords at the bottom of the artwork a series of lines flare out to form a myriad of coloured interlinked circles. The thickness of the lines and the size and brightness of the circles represent the popularity of each topic and the frequency at which people were speaking about them.

Steven Day, Chief of Brands and Communications, EE commented: "People know the London accent as soon as they hear it. Now, for the first time, we've discovered what it actually looks like. EE has launched superfast mobile 4G and Fibre Broadband in London, and we wanted to mark this in a visual way that everyone in the city can relate to and enjoy."

The UK's relationship with the USA clearly dominates the London image – with large swathes of red representing President Obama's visit to the capital and large white circles representing discussion about the hurricane in New York.

London being one of the financial epicentres of the world also resonates - with large vibrant aqua circles showing just how much Londoners talk about money.

Rosa Glover, Head of Events & Community at TechHub said: "TechHub is a unique environment where technology startups can start up faster. We nurture a international network of like-minded and focused tech entrepreneurs, providing places where they can work, meet, collaborate, network, learn and have fun. By getting the right people together in a physical space, good things happen. We are excited about the potential of mixing our innovative startups with the power of 4G!"

A further seven digital city portraits will be re-printed and housed in the buzzing, conversation-filled conference rooms throughout TechHub.

Brendan Dawes said: "Having the digital city portraits series displayed at TechHub at the Google Campus in an amazing honour. As an artist I’m always trying to push boundaries and explore new forms, like so many of the entrepreneurs at the TechHub, so there is a great synergy."

The digital city portraits series will be on permanent display within TechHub at the Google Campus, London from 15th February, 2013.

For more information on EE, please visit www.ee.co.uk

- ENDS -

For further information, images of each city portrait or comment from an EE spokesperson, please contact the team at M&C Saatchi PR:

Thom Landers: thom.landers@mcsaatchi.com / 0785 056 1154

Jess Turner: jess.turner@mcsaatchi.com / 0771 809 3115

Research

1The data was captured during 29th to 31st October 2012 - the day before the launch of EE, the launch day and one day post launch.  

About EE

EE is the most advanced digital communications company in Britain, providing mobile and fixed-line services to 27 million customers, and is the first company in the UK to provide 4G mobile services alongside fixed-line fibre broadband.

EE is the company that runs the Orange, T-Mobile and EE brands in the UK.

Its 4G service will cover more than half of the UK population by June 2013 and EE continues to improve the speed and reach of the UK’s first 4G network. Its fibre service already covers 50% of the population.

EE's mobile service currently provides coverage to 99% of the population with 2G and 98% of the population with 3G.

Follow us on…

Facebook at: www.facebook.com/ee

Twitter at: www.twitter.com/ee

YouTube at: www.youtube.com/ee

LinkedIn at: www.linkedin.com/company/ee-uk

About Campus London

Campus, powered by Google, offers seven floors of flexible work spaces, free high speed internet and all the support startups need to fuel their ideas. Campus hosts weekly mentoring programmes, speaker series, networking events and many more events, powered by the startup community. So if you're a London-based startup or are just passing through town, we invite you to join the Campus community. Follow our updates on the Campus Google+ pagesign up to become a member and work from the cafe, or register to one of the many events on the Campus calendar.

About TechHub

TechHub creates spaces around the world for tech entrepreneurs to meet, work, learn and collaborate, and runs a load of great events, advice sessions and more. We provide physical and virtual spaces that enable technology startups to work smarter, develop faster and increase their chance of success. How? Through our one-vision global community. Every TechHub Member is working on a tech product.

Entrepreneurs and their teams drop in or set up shop, advice flows freely (so does beer and pizza), angels appear, relationships blossom, and the likes of Jimmy Wales or Eric Ries may even pop in for a chat.

TechHub offers flexible workspace, access to an energetic community, the resources of a global company, the energy and shared knowledge of a tech conference and the buzz of a social networking event rolled into one! Find out more at www.techhub.com.