do you believe in the telectroscope?

I Believe in the Telectroscope

So I have been and I have seen. I believe:

Now the only big question is what the hell do we use this exciting device for? Scribbling short messages on whiteboards surely cannot be the total sum of our endeavours.

Admittedly, some enterprising individuals have attempted synchronised dancing (to YMCA by the Village People?!) and one Englishman has tried to start a Transatlantic fight. But I'm looking for something more meaningful, somehow life-transforming! Am I asking too much?

I read somewhere recently that you can tell a new technology is reaching a level of acceptance and maturity when someone uses it to get married. History is littered with examples of the first marriage by telephone, the first marriage on TV, the first marriage on the Internet etc etc.

I am already married. So that is an experiment others will have to try. Me, I'd be keen to initiate some kind of game.

Telectroscopic chess anyone?

A Blooming of Beautiful Images

How nice to see Paul St George captured at his hour of triumph with a smile on his face. But what does that lever do? Does the Telectroscope have to be 'switched on' in some way?

So many people have been photographing the Telectroscopes at both ends of the Tunnel, that I almost feel as if I have experienced it myself already. And yet that pleasure is still to come:

The images (on Flickr BTW) show how much people are clearly enjoying the experience of silent communication at a distance. I'm very much looking forward to the simple and innocent pleasure of peering down a deep hole and seeing people wave back from the other end - or in some cases dance and hold up signs.

I do believe in the Telectroscope!

Big media too has reacted to this phenomenon BTW (see my bookmarks at http://del.icio.us/telectroscope/news).

Both BBC and the World Service have reports. And I have been asked to stay up late this evening and talk to BBC Radio 5 Live. Tune in if you can keep awake til 1am!

Oh and here's a YouTube video of a U.S. news item:

Extraordinary Scenes in London

Alas I could not be there, but my brother has managed to document the party to celebrate the opening of the Telectroscope at the London end. What extraordinary scenes:

Mini telectroscopes for sale!

The difficulties associated with restoring the Telectroscope archive:

An opportunity to communicate with our American cousins:

What to do with the London clay that Paul has displaced:

And tomorrow the telectroscope...

I enjoyed my lunch hour down at the site of the London Telectroscope meeting a couple of fellow believers, who were alerted by my Twitter feed and also via the Facebook group to the possibility of encountering Paul St George.

The surfacing has not been the terrifying experience that the cartoon above suggests.

Rather we all had a very gentle and rewarding social experience.

Tomorrow the drilling will cease and the Telectroscopes will be dragged into place. I wish I could be there to see it.

Perhaps someone else out there will do me the favour of taking some photos or some footage?

Paul has surfaced! The tunnel is complete!

I received a mysterious phone call at 7:00 a.m this morning from Paul St George.

He sounded tired, but elated. He urged me to come down to Tower Bridge to bear witness to the completion of the tunnel. When I arrived, this is what I saw:

Paul has emerged BlackSapper-like from his subterranean world at last.

Tomorrow he will prepare the ground for the Telectroscope and he has agreed to answer any questions that people may wish to pose him about his project.

++I suggest that as many of us as possible converge on the London site at 1pm (21/05/08) and really give him a grilling.++

If you take any photos, please do post them on Flickr and tag them with the word 'telectroscope'.

If you have any videos, please do post them on YouTube and tag them with the word 'telectroscope'

Please do join us tomorrow if you can. 1pm sharp.

Where Paul Is Drilling & When He Will Surface

It's official  - Paul's Telectroscopes will formally open to the public on 22nd May. You can even book an appointment to view rather than queue like the rest of us.

More exciting still, a New York newspaper has let slip that Paul is expected to 'break the surface' in both London and New York some time on Tuesday 20th May. Keep your eyes and ears peeled!

I have been using the somewhat sketchy details that Paul has given me in previous blog entries to add a bit more detail to a map that shows the precise route of the Tunnel.

View Larger Map

There are a few surprises.

Who Will You See Through The Telectroscope?

Having fallen under Paul's spell in London, I'd forgotten to think much about what must be happening at the other end of the tunnel in New York.

Luckily some people who live there have been keeping an eye on things. It turn out that Paul is planning to surface on Old Fulton Street at Fulton Ferry Landing, Brooklyn, just in time for the 125th birthday celebrations of the Brookyln Bridge. Very fitting, since it's very likely that Alexander Stanhope St George was present at the opening of the bridge.

A handful of New Yorkers are making their plans to visit their local Telectroscope (see The Gothamist blog, for example). And - get this - the Village Voice claims:

"The spectacle gets underway on the morning of May 20th when a gargantuan drill will rise up half-way from the East River near the Brooklyn Bridge. Another drill will rise in the Thames near the Tower Bridge."

Paul has mentioned nothing about this to me. But then again, he also failed to tell me that on the official Telectroscope site he's offering a Fast Track service for people who have specific ideas about who they wish to communicate with via the Telectroscopes: 

Fast track

Business meeting? Marriage proposal? We expect large numbers of people will want to visit the Telectroscopes and sometimes there may be long queues. Each day we will be able to fast track small groups of people at both ends to make it possible for families and friends to ‘meet’. Tell us why and when you need priority access to the Telectroscope and you might win the chance to jump to the front of the queue.

So who would you like to see at the other end of the tunnel?

A Trip To Paul's Workshop

It was with some trepidation that I set out for deepest darkest Millwall in search of Paul St George’s workshop. But amazement took the place of fear when I finally found him, sitting inside his Telectroscope! Or was that simply an image of him sitting at the other end of his Tunnel!?

The device itself is a lovely confection of brushed metal, shiny pipes, valves and stops and lenses. The drawings that we’ve seen previously are actually surprisingly accurate. I assumed Paul’s great grandfather had perhaps used a bit of artistic license but it turns out that what he’d imagined in his head is pretty much what Paul has built.

       

As for the Tunnel, everything is on course. Although Paul won’t commit to a precise date, he’s adamant that he will break through to the surface by the end of May.

So stay alert! If you spot any signs in or around the Tower Bridge area of seriously unofficial excavations, be sure to alert me here at the blog.

Experimental Broadband Setup

Stephen Herbert wrote:

"I was amused by The Times' journalist's idea that the Telectroscope would perhaps use the 'modern version of the telegraph, broadband internet cable'. Despite such popular books as The Victorian Internet (Tom Standage 1998), there is still a conception of the internet as 'new'. Somewhere around here I have a picture of an experimental broadband webcam setup, c.1890 - I'll see if I can find it........."

I'm delighted to say that Stephen was as good as his word, and has sent an engraving (see right).  Interesting to see that the Victorians had much the same idea as us about what webcams might be for...

Notion Island

Paul St George writes:

Tim, I found the drawing of the island and the start of the tunnels.

The first thing to say is that it is not really called Notion Island. I have agreed with the Council that I will do everything I can to avoid a further run of treasure seekers and prospecters.