International Directory of Fictitious Telephone Numbers - based on the title, I will refer to this piece as IDFTN for ease of typing.

IDFTN is a piece of media made by Martin John Callanan. Martin is a conceptual artist from England, who has had work in many museums around England, Spain, and the Netherlands. He does a lot of interactive artwork and sculptures that combine traditional work with new technology or something that may not seem related at first. This piece is one of his lesser-known works but I think that it is really interesting regardless.

INDFTN is a real phone book, put together by countries from all over the world. Inside it are phone numbers from all these countries that are put aside for use in movies, TV, plays, etc. These numbers will never be in public use, this way if someone in a move calls a number, that person somewhere won't be harassed by unwanted calls (i.e. 8675309).

The way this media piece works is that a telephone with a display is programmed to go through the entire book and call each number. On the display is a message of the words “error” or “not available” that comes up in whatever language the number is associated with. The phone just goes through endlessly, set to speaker mode so that all you hear is the dialing tones and then some message saying the number cannot be reached.

It just goes through over and over. In a sense, this piece can be easily argued as linear because of the actions, however, the randomness quickly makes this anything but linear in nature. At the same time, there is always the sense of the unknown. You do not know what message will be played. There is also a very small chance that the phone makes an error and actually calls a number. The odds are not likely but, considering that all technology does glitch, it could happen.

If this were a game, it would be akin to puzzle game, or even like a continuous side scrolled. In the sense of s side scrolling game, it will generally go on forever until an impasse has been reached. This phone will continue to dial these numbers until the power is cut, or the phone bill is not paid.

When looking at the grid of Game and Play types made by Callois, this piece of media falls under Alea. Alea is the concept of randomness and chance. A game or activity with this creates a sense of unpredictability that keeps the user or viewer engaged. In comparison to Huizinga's theories of play, it is in the sense of Ludus. It is a simple yet complex task with a set of outcomes that can only be from a select group. If this were to be made into a video game, it would be a pretty boring game. It would need a variable element in it. The most obvious of these being a real phone that is answered by an unknown person or maybe hidden messages on some of the fake phone lines.

Either way, I like when concept art does something; even if it seems mundane or silly. It is, to me, interacting with real life or mimicking a part of life. In this sense, IDFTN also falls under simulation on the classification chart. The last main idea to talk about here is the presence of a work. How is a piece interacting with the environment and itself? Is it physically entering our world, or is it mimicking elements from it? The phone here meets many of these criteria. It is in our world and it actually interacting with real devices in our world. I think that it is unique that it's purpose is to go through this enormous book of fake numbers, which itself is interesting to think about that so many numbers have been put aside for the sake of art.

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