This extremely thorough spoof of the New York Times was distributed today to over 1.2m people. It’s an elaborate exercise in creating an alternate reality – by getting people to think of these things, of the possibility of an end to the war in Iraq, free health care, etc. it makes them more conceivable, and hence more likely.
I signed up through the project’s “secret” website, and distributed a few hundred of them in the East Village. Most people didn’t really notice anything different, but by about noon people had heard about the project and were eager to get their hands on the fake papers!
A Possible Future
This extremely thorough spoof of the New York Times was distributed today to over 1.2m people. It’s an elaborate exercise in creating an alternate reality – by getting people to think of these things, of the possibility of an end to the war in Iraq, free health care, etc. it makes them more conceivable, and hence more likely.
I signed up through the project’s “secret” website, and distributed a few hundred of them in the East Village. Most people didn’t really notice anything different, but by about noon people had heard about the project and were eager to get their hands on the fake papers!