Would you know a base station if you saw one? What with the SiteFinder database still not getting updated, it's time to see if you notice now when the lamp post next to you is suspiciously pregnant, or if cellular base stations have become so much a part of our landscape that they no longer merit our attention. Some of the following photographs are transmitter towers used …
I hate those masts that are trying to look like trees but because they are clearly artificial look like strange and alien corruptions of nature. Perhaps like a tree created by someone who has never seen a real tree in their lives, something from a nightmare or the weird Men In Black corner of surreal phenomenae.
I would much prefer that they looked like something properly different but interesting- perhaps given more of a 1950s retro-future look or generally sculped into some intriguing form that adds interest to the landscape and would perhaps confuse future archaeologists rather than being made into these vile essence-of-wrongness carbuncles.
Old idea.
I read an article recently in - I think, the Bellylarf - about an artist who drew a tree inside German enemy lines so well, that, one night, the British removed the real one and substituted a fake, made of steel with a squaddie inside, to report back on enemy movements. (Maybe by shaking the leaves to Morse Code??). Enemy didn't notice.
Anyone confirm? Can't find the link anywhere.
Oh, yeah, and I worked on the team at Nokia Siemens Networks that designed a mini wall-mounted basestation, where the cover could be easily swapped for the environment. I heard of local artists painting bricks/pebbledash/stone etc. on the cover, to look like the wall it was mounted on. You _really_ wouldn't see it, unless you knew where to look. (Bit like that daft space bint's sodding handbag floating about somewhere)
And, please, the Mast Debate joke's been done already. No more, Pleeeth!
Heh was just given the heads up about Inverness appearing in this by a friend. I can see there's one taken in Falcon Square, in Inverness station and what appears to be a pretty obvious fixture on the side of the Eastgate Centre. I've never come across Inverness in El Reg before... has to be a first for everything I suppose!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3152343/World-War-1-artist-went-behind-enemy-lines-to-sketch-German-positions.html
a bloody steel tree!? i wonder if it still exists in a museum or something.......
how the hell did they not notice though? wouldnt it be obvious when it inevitably gets hit by something and goes "DINK" as it bounces off rather than exploding into splinters? and infact wouldnt it just be damn obvious anyways???
Hans: "Hey Sarge, ze tree is looking shiny today."
Sarge: "Random."
Hans: "Should ve shoot it?"
Sarge: "No, better not. A tree as shiny as zat must have been expensive......"
going to go watch armstrong and miller now..... standard :)
p.s kudos on the st andrews day getup reg :)
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