General Info
Over the last few years, more and more information on the migratory situation has been appearing in the media - the narratives are conducted in a non-intuitive way, the amount of information is overwhelming and not all relevant of it is readily accessible. We intend to research, sort through and present the information, and use this platform to do so. We focus our research on the various aspects of the process of fortification of European Union, the events leading up to the creation of the walls and fences, as well as the consequences of their construction.
What is WALLOBSERVER.EU
The platform takes the form of an interactive archive, and will slowly fill up with available information regarding the migratory laws in the European Union, the erected walls and fences on the borders of EU - their plans, their introductions, their development and their influence on the environments. The website includes information about border zones, security barriers on the borders of and within Europe, the legal documents and actions which change the future of the migratory situations, the effects the infrastructures have on the lives of numerous people.
We are making an attempt to verify and organise the available information. The main elements of the website include a map of Europe and a timeline along which one will be able to navigate. The information is organised in various categories, which you can turn on and off - the categories include: walls and fences / stories of individual people, who who have experienced first hand the process of getting into Europe / information published by the state and national services / reports and stories published by various non-governmental organisations, activists and volunteers / official documents published either by a given country or by the EU, influencing the migratory situation.
What we do
We collect and analyse the information and data from publicly available sources. We look through documents, reports, media articles as well as social media posts and videos - regarding the situation of the refugees, as well as various situations that contribute to a change in the situation at the borders.
Why we think it’s important
Above all we would like to contribute to raising awareness about the migratory situation and the process of EU fortification in an accessible way. We try to follow various sides of the situation, and present the information in an unbiased form, so that the user can form their own opinions and views.
The process
The process of gathering the data begins with a wide internet search, a comparison of various stories, and checking whether the sources are viable. An important factor of the work is putting the links into the Wayback Machine - a website focusing on the preservation of digital media.
Then comes the stage of data structuring: we categorise our source materials and provide information regarding their internal data. After finding a certain event that is somehow related to the topics covered on our website, we try to find reliable sources, using one or more media documents. We analyse the event, find out where and when it happened, who was involved, and what category it belongs to. We write a brief description of the event, which you can later see as a pin on the map, and as a timeline event.
Archiving data
An important part of our work is archiving the media articles. All media content is vulnerable to change - at any time it can be edited or deleted entirely. That's why archiving the website with Wayback Machine is required. The tool records the entire contents of a webpage, including its source HTML, images, and JavaScript source, making it the most accurate representation of our sources.
Who we are
We are a group of students form the Faculty of Anthropology and Cultural Studies at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań (Poland), where we started our collaborative work within the Interactive Media and Multimedia Performances degree. The MA programme invites students form various disciplines, and encourages interdisciplinary work - our team comes from different background, including computer science, animation, cognitive science, sound engineering and interactive media.
How can you help
You can spend some time on the website, look through the articles, try to understand the complexities of the migratory situation in Europe. You can also share our website, on various social media platform - spread our work and our research. We also encourage the possibility of adding information to the archive, by clicking the + in the right upper corner. By doing so you can send us an article, a media story, info about non-governmental organisation or any other piece of information about the fortification of the European Union.
About the website
The web design and logo were done by the members of our team.
The web development was done by a member of our team.
The map we use is from openstreetmap.org.
The fonts we use are:: BBBouquet, Saira, and Atkinson Hyperlegible.
The icons we use are Material Symbols and Iconify.
The 3D models of border walls and fortifications, as well as the modification of human models and textures were done by a member of our team.
The adult man model was done by DNC44, and the child model was done by Azmal-Hossain - both taken from Sketchfab.
Feel free to use all the provided information.