During gym training months after completion, recognition arrived:
“I'd pirated all the music filling this system. Full albums ripped from YouTube, artists unpaid.”
During build, I questioned this only on quality grounds—"Will compressed files corrupt my masterpiece?"—not ethical ones. Decided: "Fuck it. Pirated makes more sense."
The system plays what it has become. Rams created honest system (SK4) → corrupted downstream (sealed devices, planned obsolescence) → I built tribute honouring his principles → I corrupted it identically (Temu knockoff tools, pirated MP3s) → blaster outputs corrupted sound → mouse dances to that corruption.
I built the system. I corrupted the content. I am the mouse.
THE MEASUREMENT MECHANISM
Functional modular sound system topped with white laboratory mouse glued permanently to inescapable wheel, perpetually chasing red marble it can never reach. The mouse spins faster as music volume increases—mechanically proven through microphone input modulating DC motor speed via PWM control. Louder system = faster mouse. Not metaphorical.
The name collapses three identities: Guettho (dilapidated inversion of Rams' pristine design utopia), Blaster (Blas-ter, my name as maker), Mouse (experimental unit running faster as pressure increases). All three are me.
Recognition crystallised through building: when my day job gets demanding, I ramp up output everywhere else—pilot school, sculpture, photography—to make each pressure appear smaller by comparison. The demanding thing gets louder, so I run faster across all domains. Not reducing hustle—multiplying it.
The mouse mechanism isn't abstract. It's autobiography. Full-time analytics leadership + 8-10 maker works annually + functional precision standards + photography + pilot training. The modular independence isn't aesthetics—it's survival strategy materialised. No single point of failure across life systems.
When pressure increases, we work harder just to hold up situations cascaded to us. The mouse spins faster. Not slower. Not stopping. Faster.
"The measurement proves complicity—I chose the shortcuts, I performed the extraction logic, I built tribute using identical corruption I critique. Builder, corruption agent, and experimental unit—unified. The measurement instrument was built WITH the corruption it measures."
CORRUPTED CIRCLE
May 2025: Materials accumulating for months after seeing Rams' SK4 at Sydney museum—seven years after first encountering it in Berlin. Night before building, used inherited Guaraní dream work methodology. Woke with clarity on different project. But during morning cleaning ritual—mopping floors, burning palo santo—the mouse mechanism arrived. Complete and insistent.
The blaster measures what happens when Dieter Rams' honest design principles get inverted into soulless cost-cutting minimalism downstream from origin. "Makes more sense" logic—convenience over principle, cost over quality, sealed over repairable. Form separated from function. Surface without substance.
Through sonic output, demonstrates complete circle: Corrupted tools build functional assembly outputting pirated sound, mouse responds mechanically to volume, experimental unit dances to corruption whilst believing we're following original vision.
This documents one survival pattern within corrupted conditions—not universal response. Some experimental units collapse under pressure. Some refuse participation. Some withdraw strategically. I multiply hustle across domains. The mechanism measures that specific pattern honestly because these works are measurement tools—if I'm not honest about complicity, I corrupt the entire methodology.
Rams' principles (honest/dishonest, quality/cheap, repairable/sealed) got inverted. I honour the attempt whilst documenting the inversion. I confess complicity whilst maintaining functional standards. The tension itself is the truth.
I am the mouse. The mouse keeps running. I keep building. "Rams, I still believe."
White laboratory mouse glued permanently to inescapable wheel, chasing red marble it can never reach. Mouse spins faster as volume increases—mechanically proven, not metaphorical.
Modular platform—independently serviceable. Rams' repairability principle honoured despite corrupted content.
RAMS, I STILL BELIEVE.' Dead speakers, pirated music, Temu tools. Honouring principles whilst performing identical corruption.
Arduino Mega with shield drives display and controls. Salvaged plywood, visible construction, legible joinery. Pirated MP3s scrolling on screen—tribute built WITH the corruption it measures.
Materials: Salvaged plywood, dead speakers refinished white, dual Arduino electronics (Mega + Nano), Ryobi ONE+ 18V battery, DC motor, white toy mouse, red marble, pirated MP3s, Temu knockoff tools
Dimensions: Modular platform configuration
Cost: ~$213
Build Timeline: Four weeks intensive, May 2025
Mouse Mechanism: Microphone reads volume level, modulates DC motor speed via PWM control. Louder music = faster mouse, mechanically proven. White toy mouse glued permanently to wheel—inescapable, no liberation possible. Red marble mounted on stick—promise perpetually pursued, never reached.
Dual Arduino System: Arduino Mega with shield drives display and controls. Arduino Nano runs mouse spinner independently. Microphone input → volume detection → PWM motor control.
Power: Ryobi ONE+ 18V battery, 4-6 hour runtime, grid independent
Modular Architecture: Independent servicing possible—Rams' repairability principle honoured despite corrupted content. Visible construction, legible joinery throughout.
Critical Corruption: SD card filled with pirated music (YouTube rips, artists unpaid, files compressed). Temu knockoff tools instead of quality tools I could afford. The tribute was built WITH the corruption it measures.
Status: Fully operational. Blaster plays pirated sound, mouse spins faster as volume increases, measurement complete. Sonic output documents corruption circle honestly.
Context in Series
Fourth piece (#4 of 12), Complicity phase nadir. Following Hellfire R9X's infrastructure documentation, turns recognition inward: builder, corruption agent, and experimental unit unified in single object.
Mouse spins faster as pressure increases—mechanically proven survival pattern where demanding situations multiply hustle across domains rather than reducing load. Self-implication complete: chose shortcuts, performed extraction logic, corrupted tribute whilst maintaining functional standards.
This is the deepest point of complicity recognition before the arc shifts toward Powerlessness phase. Not just recognizing external infrastructure is complicit (R9X), or that fragmented consciousness operates through corrupted tools (Telegraph)—but that I am actively performing the corruption I critique while maintaining the illusion of principle.
Honest measurement requires honest complicity acknowledgment. Sets up Discourse Apparatus's examination of how violence-shaped containers enable transmission velocity.