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18.Found Footage_ FTAA 920607 📼.mp4

Found Footage FTAA 920607 📼.srt

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So this is the last tape in my bag. All that’s left now are those Poe and H.G. Wells collections I still haven’t gotten around to yet. And a couple technical manuals from that TV station that found their way in too.

To be fair, I’m a little sad this is the last tape. Digitizing and uploading these videos each week has been a fun side project. It’s been nice to think about… all this?

With one last tape comes one more document, too. Looks to be a government form of some sort:

https://i.imgur.com/Hz6mjsS.jpeg

In all my training as an historian, we talked a ton about “What is history?” We discussed what counted and what didn’t. We debated if this book should or shouldn’t count, if a documentary was “real” history, if this person was no longer an historian because they did X, Y, and Z.

It had never occurred to me that we didn’t really discuss another more important question: “Why is history?”

I’m actually kinda shocked it took this long for me to see that gap. But now that I see it, I can’t unsee it. Why do we need history? How is it useful? What’s it for? That all feels like such a better question than the gatekeeping we did discuss.

I’m not sure what all this means for history - that very word is both very real and very false in my brain now, all at once. A movable, ever-changing past feels weird to embrace. But I guess that’s the world now.

I’ve been thinking of a quote from Doctor Who, when the 11th Doctor says something that feels like it fits here: “We're all stories, in the end. Just make it a good one, eh?”

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Transcript

• 0:01 - FTAA Warning

• 0:08 - PSA Title Card

  

  • Numbers count down from 8 to 3

• 0:21 - Transcript: On June 4th, a note appeared on the President's desk in Washington. No one was seen entering or leaving the Oval Office. It was simply signed "Your Descendants.” The note outlined the impacts felt by the future: our children's children. Most of the note still remains classified but this can be shared: The actions you take in your today impact our today. We in the future live with the consequences of your decisions. We ask you simply: make better ones. For our sake and yours. This message was brought to you by the FTAA.

• 1:14 - FTAA logo

  

• 1:29 - PSA Title Card

  

  • Numbers count down from 8 to 3

• 1:41 - Transcript: We have been through an ordeal. We have come out the other side. The storm has subsided. The terror is at an end. Have faith: the scars will mend. The timeline has been corrected. America is safe once again. This message was brought to you by the FTAA.

Puzzles

• Clock is at 12:15 position - J in semaphore