Arguably, the possibilities bandied about concerning “future influence” on the Large Hadron collider could also be construed as an anomolous extreme of planned obsolescence. Planned, or structured obsolescence operates by building in a limited time frame of usefulness for a product, ensuring the need for consumers to continually dispose the old and buy again a familiar but newer model. The reverse engineering manifest in creeping featurism reaches its logical limits with the time-travel theories concerning the LHC.  Not unlike an adventure safari into the Jurassic that obsolesces various models of the future with every haphazard step away from the presented path.

We could read all instances of obsolescence as actions of future operatives, butterfly effects orchestrated to endanger in advance would be stationary species. From beta decks to tasmanian tigers– each extinction at once opening up an alternative universe focused on the future, and marooning the residuals in lost worlds, memory holes and the shadowy spaces of network culture (or shadow cultures of networked spaces)