Strings is a piece of electronic literature based on human relationships and is presented through handwriting.  The Flash program goes through various human emotions, actions, or dialogues that occur within a relationship, such as arguments, flirtation, and laughing, which take form as animated and morphing lines of cursive writing.

Two arguments are presented that vary from a linear yo-yoing back-and-forth between “yes” and “no,” and a floating “yes” and “no” that is accompanied with a lingering “maybe.”  One form of flirtation is presented as a slowly scrolling “no” that morphs into a “maybe” (there is no “yes”), while the other is dominated by “yes” that flirts with the screen by “dancing,” twisting, and turning about.  In arms, a squiggly line forms into four items: “your,” “arms,” “O,” and “me.”  Audiences are left to interpret the meaning of “O,” however it is somewhat apparent that it means “hold” or “embrace” given that the “O” rotates (when the other words do not).  The last animation the program leaves you with is entitled poidog.  In it, a single squiggly line rapidly morphs to form the words/sentence “words are like strings that I pull out of my mouth.”  This final thought connects with how this piece is presented: all the emotions seen are represented as strings of thought and manifested as strings of writing.  The choice of cursive font over standard type is appropriate because, requiring unbroken and continuous flow, it mimics both the appearance and movements of string.

The fact that this piece of electronic literature is presented in handwriting at all and not an obvious computer font lends to the personalization of the experience.  Contrary to “killing off the author,” Strings is dependent on its author to convey the presence of “the hand” and the human in an interface/medium that is notoriously devoid of it (meaning completely computer-focused).  This piece is a great example of what Lev Manovich referred to as surface and deep data in “Trending: The Promises and the Challenges of Big Social Data.”  Strings was generated as a type of “deep data” to convey the emotions about a select few individuals (namely its own author).  But, in being posted and shared with the internet, it has transformed into a sample of “surface data” that is representative of how similarly its audience may feel.  As Manovich puts it, “one pixel comes to represent one thousand” (462).