L'MIT di Boston Digitalizza la Vita Dei Turista a Firenze

Back from Florence, where I presented to the local officials and the press (comunicato di stampa – video of the President of the Province of Florence introducing the press conference), an in-progress report of the Tracing the Visitor’s Eye project (slides for the 1-hour press conference). Feedbacks have been rather positive. Interestingly, some journalists linked this work to stories that have been in the local news lately. Could the results presented help move the David statue or better understand the impact of the implementation of low-cost (new Ryanair routes to Pisa sold to travelers as if they were flying to Florence). A relevant point raised during the day was that these data could not only help the understanding of tourist movements in Florence, but also compare with the competing cities in a national (competition with Venezia and Pisa) and global levels (how are tourists of Florence different from the other cities?). In that context, future effort will aim at defining the profiles of Flickr users and matching their different behaviors in the top 20 tourist cities.

The perks of this project: 24 hours in Florence.

In the media:

• Il turista fa clic e si svela
• Il Mit di Boston studia la vita dei turisti di Firenze
• Turismo: Primo studio del’MIT’ su vita turisti a Firenze
• Firenze tra le città più fotografate al mondo
• Turismo, il MIT di Boston attraverso le foto ricostruisce gusti et iteneratir dei visitatori
• Turismo: Firenze e Roma le più fotografate
• Turismo: per il Mit è Firenze la città più fotografata d’Italia

Relation to my thesis: Slightly leaving the pure aademic tracks, it is a peculiar exercise confront research to people that finance it (*sigh* the quest of the relevance…). More than presenting results, the message I intended to communicate was about the seriousness and potentials of people-generated location information and digital traces (partially inspired by Bruno Latour).