An adjunct interactive infotainment unit supplementing The Yes Men in Finland home page.
From Digitoday, 23.08.2001.
Embarrassing end to the top seminar at the University of Technology
By Reijo Holopainen
TURKU (23.08.2001) - Both the seminar audience and the organisers fell for it -
Hank Hardy Unruh, the representative of the WTO, who introduced "impulse
overalls," was somebody else. The group behind the exploit succeeded in its
aim - their lecture was totally absurd but, nevertheless, even the press
believed every word of it.
The impulse overalls, which were introduced last Thursday at the Fibres and
Textiles for the Future Seminar at the Tampere University of Technology with
considerable aplomb, has been revealed to have been a well-planned, top-quality
prank. The aim of the exploit was simply to prove that you can put forward
anything you like in academic seminars on condition that you have enough
authority and status.
The exploit which embarrassed the seminar audience and among others the EU
Commissioner for Information Society was carried out by the Yes Men
organisation, the members of which have tricked people, also in the past, into
believing that they represent the WTO. The Yes Men own the domain www.gatt.org.
Through this address invitations meant to be sent to the WTO end up in wrong
hands.
This was the first time the Yes Men hit Northern Europe. The computer engineer
who spoke under the pseudonym "Hank Hardy Unruh" gave a lecture dealing, apart
from the Impulse Overalls, with the stages of the American civil war and
Orwellian nonsense.
Taped and PowerPointed
The opening of the zip of his outfit launched a shot of carbon dioxide, which
made a phallic pole to spring from between his legs. The speaker's assistant
taped the whole performance but was too nervous to use the Microsoft PowerPoint
programme correctly, which baffled the audience. The assistant videoed the star
speaker's every step, including him having lunch and going to the toilet.
As the lecture got on, the possibilities of the Impulse Overalls began to sound
almost fascist but seemed to raise few participants' doubts. The audience
hardly reacted to the "WTO" presentation, clapped unenthusiastically in the end
and asked no questions.
Unruh said that with the outfit the manager can control his employees
effectively. Tiny transmitters and receivers send impulses and convey orders.
This is "management at its most efficient." Unruh and his phallic symbol were
extensively covered in Aamulehti.
The aim to prove the audience's inability to judge
In the same Fibres and Textiles for the Future Seminar, a Clothing+ research
unit from Reima-Tutta Company introduced the Reima Smart Shout outfit, which
really used similar technical innovations to the joke Impulse Overalls.
Helsingin Sanomat, the newspaper which shed some light on the prank on
Thursday, reached the person who embarrassed the developers of intelligent
clothing in Paris. The man said that it was about demonstrating in style. The
goal of the prank was to point out that the powers that be have no idea of what
is going on in the hype world.
- "By lecturing under the WTO's flag, you can even justify murders, even if the
audience are well-educated and intelligent," Unruh told Helsingin Sanomat.
On their home page, the Yes Men have published their Tampere exploit, including
the story published in Aamulehti.
Research on intelligent clothing going strong.
The impulse overalls only a cunning prank.
published on 23.08.2001 15:34