We went to the Model Engineering Show at Alexandra Palace at the weekend. I found myself drawn to the little figures that sometimes populate the models. They're often the least regarded bit of the model, pre-bought, not scratch built, not always exactly to scale, often not at the same fidelity as the engineering they're there to decorate. A bit like 3D render ghosts.
We were talking at the show, about the way modeling acts as a way of preserving an engineering culture - capturing in minature particular conjunctions of techniques and materials. And about how there'd probably be no equivalent for the age of network technologies. The internet won't get modeled in miniature.
Then, yesterday there was a programme on BBC4 about model railways. Apart from some gratingly emphatic gender politics (model railways are for DADS and SONS) there was a little more analysis than the usual nostalgia-fest and someone pointed out that model railways only captured the physical stuff, didn't model the social relationships. And I thought Hornby Network Modelling!
I don't know what that means. Obviously. But I'd like to work it out. Like Lyddle End 2050, but for networks. Or Network Realism, but with glue. Or something.
Anyway.