Shit the bed we got a letter.

 

Hey! I just stumbled upon your site while doing some research on the subject. I’ve been doing this stuff for almost 3 years now on my college campus. So many interesting places. I recently decided I’d like to take pictures and share my experiences. I was wondering if I could get some advice first though. I may or may not have climbed a crane in a construction site in the middle of campus. I got a few pictures but the go pro battery died and I didn’t get any footage. Guess I’ll have to try again. But I put a picture up on reddit and had some mixed responses. My biggest concern was this user ****. He is another student at **** and claims the footage has been submitted to the police. I wore a mask and everything. And personally I think he’s just a troll. But I was wondering if you could look at the thread and give me some advice. If I go around campus and take pictures of the cool rooftops and urban art, will I get in trouble by putting it on the internet. People post videos of buildering all the time and are fine. Would love to hear what you think, and maybe give y’all some good shots of **** soon.

 

Hey ****, Thanks for getting in touch. Sorry we’re a bit slow. We are just slow. There’s no excuse as such. We just don’t move very quickly.

Hopefully there have been no consequences for your little escapade. If I’d replied a bit earlier, I’d say that there’s almost certainly not going to be any fallout from this, and the dick on Reddit is being a dick because he is a dick. Hopefully that’s still the case. Certainly in the UK, I don’t know of anyone who has been arrested retrospectively for trespassing. Furthermore, you could easily argue that you photoshopped that image or stole it off the internet and then made up your story, so, seriously, unless you damaged something or left your ID behind, I wouldn’t worry.

Next up: pick your audience. An anonymous Instagram account posting images with suitable hashtags is probably your best outlet. If you’re worried that you’re not getting enough reach, then ask yourself WHY you’re doing the climbs. If it’s for the experience, reach doesn’t matter. If it’s to curate some badass online profile for yourself in an attempt to garner likes and followers and simply boost your ego, then we can’t help you.  The Reddit users probably won’t appreciate it either. Rooftopping has crescendoed into one almighty sausage-measuring party that’s now all about image and not about the experience. Nike and Canon jumped on the bandwagon. There are sock companies sponsoring foot-dangling selfies. With its descent into the mainstream, it’s now more radical NOT to climb cranes. Weird, huh?

(Regarding the ego stuff and us not being able to help you – I’m lying. If you get some cool photos, send them over. It’s all about the photos.)

(Buildering is all about contradictions. Sorry about that.)