Wallet $15-200

Type: tree | Size: small
COMPONENTS
Credit Card
ID Badge
PROBLEM

The money needs somewhere to live.

SOLUTION

The Wallet is the MTREES canonical currency and identity containment platform — a bi-fold or tri-fold rectangular substrate fabricated from leather, synthetic leather, or the material the manufacturer describes as leather without elaborating further. The Wallet holds cards, cash, and a loyalty program membership the operator joined under duress at a register in 2019 and has not used since but cannot bring themselves to remove because removing it would require a decision. The Wallet lives in a pocket. The Wallet is lost approximately twice per year and found in the same pocket it was always in, which is a different pocket than the one that was checked. Contents include: payment instruments of diminishing balance, identification documents bearing a photo taken during a period the operator does not discuss, a folded receipt that is not a record of anything important but cannot be thrown away until it is confirmed to not be a record of anything important, and exactly one card that does not belong to the operator and has been there long enough that returning it is no longer socially viable. The Wallet does not judge. The Wallet contains.

components

The Credit Card is a 86 by 54 millimeter polycarbonate rectangle that converts future earnings into present purchasing power at the point of sale, enabling the acquisition of any product, service, or experience that accepts it, which is most of them. It does not ask whether the purchase is necessary. It does not ask whether this is a good time. It asks for a PIN or a tap and then it is done and the thing belongs to you and the conversation about whether it was a good idea happens later, in a different room, at a different time, when the statement arrives. The Credit Card is the preferred tool of anyone who has decided that having the thing now is worth the administrative overhead of having paid for it then. It works everywhere. It works fast. It does not judge. It does however remember, in the form of a line item, every single time, without exception, with the merchant name and the amount and the date, forever, or until the account is closed, whichever comes first.

Inspect

A laminated credential clipped to the body that communicates authorization, identity, and approximate rank within the organizational caste system. The ID Badge is the Medal of Honor of the corporate theater — coveted by those without one, taken for granted by those with one, and immediately weaponized by those with a colored stripe that means something the new hires have not yet decoded. Security is achieved by the badge existing. Whether the badge belongs to the person wearing it is a secondary concern the system has chosen not to prioritize. It can be lost, stolen, cloned, tailgated around, left on the roof of a car, or found in a parking lot and used for three weeks before anyone notices. Many desire it. Few carry it. The photo on it looks like no one.

Inspect
Inputs
Outputs
TREE
AVAILABLE INPUTS
AVAILABLE OUTPUTS
Schema
                            {
    "id": "tree_wallet",
    "name": "Wallet",
    "type": "tree",
    "inputs": [],
    "outputs": [],
    "passthru": [],
    "children": [
        "comp_credit_card",
        "comp_id_badge"
    ],
    "extends": null,
    "price": "15-200",
    "size": "small",
    "problem": "The money needs somewhere to live.",
    "description": "The Wallet is the MTREES canonical currency and identity containment platform \u2014 a bi-fold or tri-fold rectangular substrate fabricated from leather, synthetic leather, or the material the manufacturer describes as leather without elaborating further. The Wallet holds cards, cash, and a loyalty program membership the operator joined under duress at a register in 2019 and has not used since but cannot bring themselves to remove because removing it would require a decision. The Wallet lives in a pocket. The Wallet is lost approximately twice per year and found in the same pocket it was always in, which is a different pocket than the one that was checked. Contents include: payment instruments of diminishing balance, identification documents bearing a photo taken during a period the operator does not discuss, a folded receipt that is not a record of anything important but cannot be thrown away until it is confirmed to not be a record of anything important, and exactly one card that does not belong to the operator and has been there long enough that returning it is no longer socially viable. The Wallet does not judge. The Wallet contains.",
    "template": "tree"
}

Universe Alpha