Today, thousands of nerds, techies and ad slaves will descend upon the fair city of Austin, Texas for the 2011 edition of South by Southwest interactive. Odds are, Twitter is going to crash due to an influx of tweets with the #sxsw hashtag. Who knows? Maybe AT&T’s network will once again fail because of legions of iPhone users documenting their entire experience on their phones. Either way, your life is about to be bombarded by tweets, texts, phone calls, Foursquare check-ins, and Facebook posts for the next week. It’s going to be horrible, especially if you’re not there.
The good people at R/GA recognize the terribleness that comes along with adult spring break every March. So, they’ve developed a mobile website for the event simply titled “Social Media Hell.” Using tweets and Foursquare check-ins, users can unlock seven levels of SXSW defined by these categories:
* Lust: what/whom people are loving at SXSW
* Debauchery: check-ins at Austin bars
* Gluttony: check-ins at Austin BBQ and Tex-Mex joints
* Greed: the most aggressive overtweeters
* Wrath: what/whom people are hating at SXSW
* Idolatry: who’s being tweeted about most at SXSW
* Vanity: who’s “tweeting too hard” about themselves; i.e., naked self-aggrandizement
A leaderboard on the site shows what users have experienced the most hellacious events over the course of week, thus competing for the honor of “Mayor of Hell.” Taking the early lead is self-proclaimed University of Michigan football coach, @jack_braswell. Huh?