Drawball… Holy Cow!!
Wednesday, January 30th, 2008 by Jonathan
It’s not a new topic, in fact it’s at least a couple of years old (according to conflicting reports on the topic), but Drawball still strikes me as something that is ahead of its time. Drawball is fairly straight forward – it’s a huge digital circle which users can draw/write/scribble on with digital ink. The ink is rationed out in small amounts after a user completes a simple puzzle. Much of the murkiness that surrounds the history of Drawball is due to the retaliatory nature of the international canvas. Even the Wikipedia entry has been vandalized to the point of collapse under the weight of controversy. For sometime a huge South Korean flag adorned the upper region of the ball – the efforts of countless dedicated souls who put an enormous amount of time (and digital ink) into the icon. The flag was turned into a Pepsi logo by vandals and is nearly undecipherable today behind all the layers of graffiti.
In essence, Drawball is a living artistic expression of people all over the world. It’s arguably the largest collective canvas the world has ever seen, and from what I can tell, still fairly obscure. Check it out if you get a chance. The Hall of Fame is especially fascinating.
