The Wilderness Downtown

I thought this clever little video was spreading virally, so I ignored passing it on in case I was last on the bandwagon. But people are still telling me they haven't tried it yet.

Arcade Fire's video for their song, We used to Wait, is interactive. You tell it the address of your childhood home, and using various satellite maps and street views, it incorporates images of your home into a multi-windowed set of videos tied together by flocking birds and a faceless young runner. The song's okay too.

It was eerie to see my house again - well, not a house, a two-storey council home built above a store (called a maisonette, I think) - and eerier still to see that although the various maps managed to find exactly the right house, they had the street address down as being in the next town over.

Some people have reported it not working for them. I'm using Chrome, if that helps.

Here's the URL for the experience.

(Edit to add: Well, I wasn't the last. Boing Boing, usually first on the block, posted this nine minutes after I did.)