An Artist Used 99 Phones to Fake a Google Maps Traffic Jam

An Artist Used 99 Phones to Fake a Google Maps Traffic Jam

“What I’m really interested in generally is the connection between technology and society and the impact of technology, how it shapes us,” Weckert says. He cites philosopher Marshall McLuhan: We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us. “I have the feeling right now that technology is not adapting to us, it’s the other way around.”


Google Maps provides a particularly illustrative example of that relationship. Not only is it a closed system, with little transparency around what data informs it and how it’s used, but Google Maps also uniquely shapes the physical world. If it picks up a traffic jam—real or fabricated—it might redirect vehicles to less-traveled streets, in turn putting strain on infrastructure that wasn’t built for the extra volume. “I see a pretty interesting conflict between infrastructures and cities and new technologies,” says Weckert. “There’s some friction between them.”


That’s partly why Weckert spent some of his time on one of Berlin’s bridges, where bottlenecks frequently occur even without an artistic assist. But he also explored another layer of Google’s influence, by marching his cart in front of the company’s headquarters in the city.


“If you stand in front of it, you wouldn’t realize it’s Google headquarters,” says Weckert. The company had originally planned to set up a tech campus in Berlin’s Kreuzberg district, but backed down in 2018 after prolonged community protests. It opened its current office a little over a year ago. “Nobody basically realized that they arrived in Berlin. The crucial question is what will it make of the n ..

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