A diary written as part of an ongoing explorative intervention into Amsterdam’s complex network of delivery companies. I prototype alternative functions for elements of existing socioeconomic infrastructure informed by research into organisations such as Deliveroo, the Riders Union, the FNV, Tring Tring and PostNL.

2017 10 05 23 35
step out of your pizza cave.

memories are our currency of choice, it is more possible than ever to mould humanities sprawling mass. our hyperconnected state facilitates the instantaneous spread of gripping ideas that oscillate wildly across the socio-economic environment. they carry promise of redemption, ‘we sell hope in packets’, offering a life that is more convenient, more efficient, more subservient, more more. slowly fading are the last vestiges of the human condition, hidden underground in basement workshops or lost to quiet corners of the web

hence the need for some action, the insertion of some social value to these dynamic new commercial beasts, scuttling aggressively across the globe with no end in sight, before they conspire to absorb everything

~

the city is alive with information, humanities latest foodstuff, the category of substances found most dear, after all without sustenance, what are we? but the city is also full of web based food delivery services, and subsequently full of pizza

i would propose that something is done to turn the suffering of low wage workers into prosperity for society, forgive me for sounding at all red, for i am weary. we use the plight of the delivery driver to spark a sense of responsibility among the wider workforce. no i am not talking about a proletariat, rather a group of people with hopes and dreams totally in conflict with each other. otherwise known as human beings.

2017 10 07 00 19
the active city

do you really enjoy living in a world where your thoughts are pre-digested and served to you from an insulated bag?

i say this because i see another way, one where you are free to decorate the city with your fully realised self. if we collectively decide that, rather than self deprecating ourselves thru continual philosophical, economical and theatrical critical bombardment, we could instead trust and each other in realising a more environmentally, culturally and cognitively sustainable world. cities where people play out their passions and desires in balance with society.

to reach this future we must renounce the tools of our self-enslavement, time and currency. i would love to tell you that this can be a gradual process, but i fear too much is already at stake.

let’s then imbibe life with a touch of energy, a sense of carnival, a little bit of good old fashioned fun. i say there’s nothing to be lost in trying something different, we’ve been gloomy for far too long now. let’s take one last look at our consciousness before we cast it into oblivion forever.

~

it’s nice to vent some of this data into a machine, this one holds so many uses, in fact that is it’s glory, the ability to adapt to seemingly any task i can imagine. or it can imagine.

~

Wat zou uw keuze zijn als u ervoor kiest om uw eigen beslissingen te nemen?

2017 10 07 19 56
the chameleon city.

imaging the city as a celebration, a carnivalesque ideology promoting self contradiction thru being, creates a place where it is ok to not be ok, to be irregular, to be different. this dream world is not merely a utopian fantasy, but, as I have described before, a realists logic puzzle. once you see the our global species as just that, a united species, it seems logical to draw lines in the dry cracked sand of the planet to denote difference. instead we should look to our inherent and collective uniqueness, and it’s endless ability to act and react both physically and mentally to other manifestations of this same uniqueness.

a city where people are not defined and exploited by their choices but supported and boosted to higher states of praxis or theory by a society which happily says ‘yes’ with a wry smile.

~

this brings us neatly on to the players in this city, the characters who give it meaning and purpose. the doctors, the rabbis, the merchants, the messengers, the framers, the drunks, the craftspeople, the outsiders, the insiders, the inbetweeners, all together they make up a rich tapestry which flutters gently in the social breeze.

~

my interest lies, currently, with the messengers and delivery people. the ones tasked with silently transporting the hopes and desires of the population. they make everything possible in the touch of a button, but what do we give them in return?

2017 10 12 01 21
the city in my dreams is built from random packets

we structure our reality based on collected(1), corroborated(2) and stored(3) information which we use to give our lives meaning, when a new piece of information is received(1) we check it against all our previously acknowledged information(2) if accepted it is inserted as part of our manifest character(3). we are our stored knowledge, people seem to become fixed to a certain set of packets which govern their choices, they create a filter to protect us from seemingly ‘hostile’ packets whilst attempting to attract ‘friendly ‘ ones.

this endless need for constant meaning and reason has led us to create such sociological and systemic marvels as religion, economics, science, time, the list goes on… the one thing they all have in common is a conviction that there is always more to achieve, a higher state of knowledge/consciousness/wealth/efficiency. it is this incessant need for dominance that, to be blunt, infuriates me. it is such a shortsighted and archaic mode of being which disconnects

~

what if we couldn’t use our stored packets to select which new ones we encounter? we would be encouraged to consider other sets of foreign packets and process them. a medium that is inanimate yet intimate makes it difficult to react with aggression and understanding and acceptance becomes more likely. anonymity is important. everything applies to everyone, except it doesn’t.

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there is a relationship between digital and physical packets. how far does one need to cycle to deliver a packet via the internet? possible metrics include electricity and bytes.

~

we are environment

2017 10 12 01 21
recycled packets

our economically evolving ecosystem has leaks, there are points at which it overcompensates for a lack of revenue by spending more… and continues to do so. sometimes they release a large quantity of value into the public realm for a moment, before it is taken back into the belly of the metaphysical monetary machine.

to give a practical example. the delivering of junk mail produces a lot of paper, piles of unwanted adverts and offers which aren’t really offers. this paper could be used to move us out of the economy for an essential 21st century social function, the transferal of physical information.

thru using paper as a short wave communicative medium we stand to rebuild some of the social disconnects that exist in the world today, with not only immense efficiency but humanity.

~

2017 10 17 23 48
recycled packets

2017 10 17 23 48
recycled packets

2017 10 17 23 48
recycled packets