What will Futel’s role be in the coming end times? As an organization whose core strategy is to glean discarded equipment on its way to the smelter and the toxic waste dump and turn it into installations which provide tools, information, and entropy to anyone who walks up to them, we are familiar with operating in the margins. Our users, also, tend to occupy several fringes of humanity, and we have seen them get erased from the city with each season.
Our position is a reminder that while local conditions may change radically, this day is not significantly more apocalyptic than any other we have experienced in our lifetimes. The devices we use and the specifics of how we encourage our users to use them will necessarily adapt, as will our message and attitude, but our mandate will not. We will establish a new era of communication, one in which reaching out is not only desirable, but mandatory.
Are we expending all of this effort only to see our payphones gleam in the rubble of the depopulated cities? Perhaps, but this was always a possible outcome. Are we jaded due to growing up in a decade when the imminent end of the world was promised to us weekly? Probably, but this outlook has allowed us to survive and do our work. Are our motives good and our results positive? Close enough.
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