(written by et al)

In addition to wandering around at night, I did another task while out in the southern wastes inbetween LA and SD.

This one was a direct attempt to engage the ideas I drew up in the previous task about public and private spaces. That's right: I did a task at THE IRVINE SPECTRUM!
What is the Irvine Spectrum, you may ask? Why, it's "one of Southern California’s most popular shopping and dining destinations, visited by nearly 11 million people each year". So basically, a huge, very public gathering space.

But how public is it? Well, it's owned by the Irvine Company, a massive quasi-governmental organization that once owned something like half of Orange County and had significant holdings all across the state. Now its ownings are confined to apartments, condos, office parks, and shopping malls (so only MOST of our lives). They run restrictive housing communities, allowing no exterior modifications to buildings. At least 2 friends and one relative live in housing owned by them. As for the "public" malls they own, well, their mall security is notorious for cutting bike locks and confiscating bikes of people who try to avoid massive traffic problems by not driving to the Spectrum.

Our mission? Test the limits of their conceptions of public space by playing a little game.

the RULES were:
1: When the tagger (person with the camera) believes they
have made a tag, they must claim this to the taggee (the person they
have just tagged). The two will review the video evidence and decide
whether a tag has been made.
2: For a tag to be complete, the taggee must be IDENTIFIABLE on camera. Disputes go to the taggee.
3: No tagbacks.
4: The taggee must not simply split when the tagger declares a tag. Those who do so will be PENALIZED.
5: After each hour, a wing of the Spectrum will be declared off limits. Anyone who enters these forbidden areas will EXPLODE.

The round was 20 minutes long.
The winner was to be the one who held the camera for the least amount of time.

I began with the camera, as the whole thing was my idea. Our operations were confined to the upper half of the mall-state. Check here for reference. Stores were off-limits.
Oh, by the way, I convinced some of the participants to sign up for SF0 and they join me as collaborators.

Here's video of the tags:


Full scoreboard (non SF0-ers are identified by first name):
1: younggunfire - 21.94s (time of possession), one tag (number of times tagged)
2: Nader - 44.61s, three tags
3: Justin - 145.95s, one tag
4: Christian - 236.08s, three tags
5: Leslee - 353.06s, two tags
6: et al - 457.95s, two tags

Yes, I lost. All that means, though, is there must be a REMATCH!

Some observations:

• we got strange looks, and even some encouragement (people shouted "RUN!" at us, and frequently pointed us in the direction of running players) but no direct intervention into our game.
  


• a man in a giant red robin suit seemed to follow us wherever we went. he even seemed to wave at the camera during one point of the video. was he spying on us, or simply encouraging us? we have no idea.
  


• i can't necessarily count.
  


• nonstop running for 20 minutes straight is tiring.
  


• one of the strangest parts was moving rapidly through the various ambiances of the storefronts. its something I was trying to avoid, but the sensory pull of the stores was pretty difficult to combat.