A wireless station
Within reach
of everybody

In an oppressed society even the trees are whispering.

A WORK ABOUT COMMUNICATION, POWER AND COUNTER-POWER IN THE NETWORK SOCIETY.
It is frequently argued that society is now living in an information age, which has provided various information technologies (i.e. the Internet and cellular phones). These technologies give rise to the network society. In the network society information is the new capital and control over this capital equals power.

With ‘Living network’, Essaidi plants the seeds for a living network, a network made of trees capable of communicating over long distance. A network characterized by its abundance of potential wireless stations capable of providing analog, digital and even encrypted communication. This combined with the ease of relocating such wireless stations makes the living network a valuable alternative to areas where government is trying to control the flow of information.

A living network
An interesting headline on the front-cover of the Electrical Experimenter from July 1919 grabs our attention: “The trees now talk”. This is an article which covers the use of Tree Antennas to copy trans-atlantic radio messages. Tree Antennas are actual trees -instead of man-made structures- which through their essence of life act as an antenna for transmitting and receiving radio signals.

With that said Tree Antennas is obviously not a new concept, it builds on previous research initiated in 1904 by Major-General George O. Squier, Chief Signal Officer of the U.S. Army. Later, in the early seventies, the U.S. Army Electronics Command (ECOM) continued research regarding the use of trees as antennas in jungle-environments.

Tree Antennas is a project made possible by the help and insights of members of VERON – A13 – the Dutch association for experimental radio-research.