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TOTALLY
WIRED
RIPLEY D. LIGHT
@RIPLEYDLIGHT
Bones jiggled by turbulence, brain numbed via SkyMall, nose twitchy
with the smell of my neighbor’s peanut breath and secret farts, I am
lost. My hand reaches for my lone salvation, a ladybug-sized nub on
the armrest labeled map. The little seat-back screen lights up with a
fetching 3D rendering of our plane—there’s me and you, Gail the gassy
librarian, in row 27!—gliding over a bumpy, russet and tawny patch of
Wamsutter, Wyoming. We are 36,572 feet up, traveling at 197 degrees
due west-southwest at 542 miles an hour. Rejoice, for I am found.
FlightPath3D, you confection of cartography, code, and cartoonery,
the only travel buddy I need. I zoom in, and—courtesy of crowdsourced
reviews in ecstatic cahoots with the GPS—greater Wamsutter beck-
ons: At the Dusty Trail Cafe, Sheryl S.’s companion, one George, “had
the Elvis Presley French toast ... to die for!!!!” I envy this man-hero and
his suicidally good breakfast. Soon I’m over the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache
National Forest, thinking about an alternative life as a park ranger. The
airplane animation transforms me from foggy midflight nobody into
myriad adventuresome somebodies: explorer, maverick, anthropologist
with God’s-eye view of his eternal subject, humanity.
I become even more: The display invitesme to consider material real-
ity as no other modern screen can. When I’m told it’s minus 74 degrees
outside, my ice-cold ginger ale transubstantiates, a fizzy nip of a distant
storm cloud. Then there’s the geolocation. Knowing one’s exact place in
the world frees one to contemplate one’s place in the world. Even the
glitches, the misfires beside “Origin” and “Destination” of UNKNOWN
UNKNOWN, prompt me to ask: Where am I going? Where have I been?
In the beginning—think back—we sat in ignorance from takeoff to land-
ing (unless the pilot wished to edify us over the intercom). In the ’80s, we
received an ETA screen, the world’s most maddening download bar. Then
came a 2D GPS feed, a blue blip blooping its way over a white landscape,
like a Looney Tunes treasure map, cute, reassuring. But only now have
we reached a new heaven: 3D satellite map, destination guide, cockpit
view, a live camera feed from the plane’s nose, even instructions for bag-
gage pickup. All in service of that most exalting technology of all, flight.
Watching Paddington 2, it’s easy to forget. But witnessing the speedometer
shoot from 356 to 583, the altimeter from 16,000 to 41,000, reminds me
that, yes, we pigs really can fly—that I and this 900,000-pound winged
canteen are traversing a continent of lakes, canyons, mountains, millions
upon millions of ranchers and accountants, Sheryl S. and her satiated
friend. Suddenly, complaining about legroom seems deranged. Instead,
I want to turn to the window and, like Harper Pitt in Angels in America,
tell the sky, “Nothing’s lost forever. In this world there’s a kind of pain-
ful progress. Longing for what we’ve left behind, and dreaming ahead.”
WE ASKED CONTRIBUTORS:
“WHAT STRAND
OF FAN-CREATED
CULTURE IS
YOUR FAVORITE,
AND WHY?”
“Tape trading—people who record
live performances by bands, with
permission or without, and trade the
files on the internet through non
profit channels. They are archiving
performances that otherwise would
be lost to the ether and strength
ening the communities of fans.
How else would I have met all these
other Dungen freaks?” —Senior
editor Michael Calore, “Write Stuff,”
page 34
“I’ve always wanted to go to one
of those immersive, liveaction
roleplaying events set in a fandom
world. There’s one for Battlestar
Galactica in Norway where they
hire out a real battleship!” —Con
tributor Laurie Penny, “We Can Be
Heroes,” page 50
“After a magazine published a cover
story I photographed about The
Walking Dead, I came face to face
with THE FANS. They altered, reinter
preted, revised, modified, and trans
formed every photograph of the
cast in multiple and hilarious vari
ations. It was as if a secret cabal of
guerrilla artists had been lying in
wait, ready to pounce and meme at
the first sign of fresh TWD artwork.
Walking Dead fans are tirelessly
devoted and extremely talented.”
—Photographer Art Streiber, “The
Indecision Maker,” page 60
“People livetweeting Love Island.
I don’t watch the show and don’t
really know what it’s about. (Big
Brother UK? Bachelor Island?)
But the memes are so good, it’s just
as entertaining from the outside.”
—Senior writer Nitasha Tiku, “Three
Years of Misery at Google,” page 80
ELECTRIC WORD WIRED 27.
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