----------empyre- soft-skinned space---------------------- Many thanks to Renate, Ben, and Tim for inviting me to join this urgent conversation. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the discussions thus far and am excited to take part.
Like many here, I’m curious about how we might confront mechanisms of surveillance capitalism, especially when they feel like totalizing assemblages. Much of my artistic practice engages with political economies of data collection, analysis, and visualization. I wanted to share two projects that feel relevant to the ongoing discussions. I’ve found much resonance in Ben and Leo’s work on obfuscating behaviors, especially ways of co-opting existing technologies as a form of resistance. For instance, I’ve been working to name some of the constituent dynamics of how information is shared on dominant social platforms, and experimenting with creating alternative platforms that attempt to recontextualize them. The first project was motivated by questions of how curation is controlled and enforced, and how misinformation proliferates. Specifically, I kept wondering about the slippery dynamics between what is considered official, what is shared overtly, and what is shared passively. My initial investigation into these areas resulted in Dumpster Drive [1], a file-sharing tool that allows users to share their digital detritus with one another. Using dumpster diving (digging through and reclaiming physical detritus) as a distribution model, the software creates a sharing network that lets users repurpose files that others delete. Downloading the Dumpster Drive application creates a virtual dumpster on each user’s desktop that sits alongside their default “trash bin.” Users can remove files from their hard drive by placing them into this collective dumpster. These files then become available for the Dumpster Drive community to claim. When a user downloads a deleted file, it is permanently deleted from the collective dumpster, so that each discarded file can only be repurposed by one user. Through this work, I aimed to interrogate different potential pathways of sharing and engagement, ones that could resist commodification, behavioral tracking, and controlled curation. What might passive models of online sharing-- whereby content isn’t shared with the aim of algorithmic and clickbait curation-- look like? How do we share personal artifacts while avoiding these algorithmically curated panopticons altogether? I really appreciate Jennifer and Derek’s fascinating and crucial interventions, especially in how they tactically grapple with COVID-19 misinformation. In addition to how social media plays a significant role in the spread of pandemic misinformation, I want to draw attention to how social media also operates in ways that inure the public to accurate information. Whether by obfuscating accurate data or through information overload, social media has also helped fuel “pandemic fatigue,” whereby many express feeling desensitized to any discussion of the very real, dangerous effects of the COVID-19 virus. In response, I created Pandemic Pulse [2], an application that drains a computer's resources at the rate of COVID-19 infections and deaths in a user’s location. It exhausts CPU power at the rate of local infections and dims the screen at the rate of local COVID-19- related deaths. The application recontextualizes relevant statistics about the pandemic and tries to make them relatable and tangible on a personal level. As social media platforms algorithmically curate statistics and overly reductive COVID-19 charts/ maps on feeds to encourage doom-scrolling, these platforms are also commodifying epidemiological data and victims of the virus. Within this calculated onslaught of information, can tactical modalities re-sensitize many of us to the macro-impacts of this virus? Both of these projects attempt to reconfigure certain apparatus of social media (platforms) in order to make them deeply felt and expose the behavioral repercussions of surveillance capitalism. I think that alternative, speculative tools and platforms can create important dialogic spaces. These could help others analyze and confront power, control, and transactional structures within social media. I look forward to hearing more from others on potential modes of resistance to mass (mis)information, surveillance capitalism, and more. All my best, Justin [1] https://justin.work/#/dumpster-drive/ [2] https://pandemicpulse.io/ On Mon, Feb 22, 2021 at 1:57 PM Renate Ferro <rfe...@cornell.edu> wrote: > > ----------empyre- soft-skinned space---------------------- > Many thanks to our Week 3 guests who joined us: Alex Taek-Gwang Lee, Robby > Collins, Domenico Barra, Paul O'Neill, Kerry Guinan and Ricardo Castellini. > I invite you to stay on this week if your schedule permits. It has been so > generous of you to share your work, research, and thoughts. I will also > welcome warmly Justin Blinder, Rahul Mukherjee, David Quiles Guilló, and > Ulises Mejias for joining us this week. We look forward to their own > contributions as we head into the end of this month's discussion, Social > Media: algorithms, untruths and insurrection > > To those of you who have been following all of the contributions have > extended our thoughts on surveillance capitalism, but I would like to lead us > into next week particularly thinking about Alex's insightful post from a few > days ago. Here is the link to Guattari's article he cited, Towards a > Post-Media Era. https://www.metamute.org/editorial/lab/towards-post-media-era > Thanks for that Alex. I also reposting the last sentence of your post which > I think might be interesting to think about as we head into next week, > <snip>There is no perfect Big Brother in surveillance's mechanical function, > but many potential resistances within them because its control always fails. > This is the reason why we should organize the possible resistance against > mechanical governmentality. <snip> > > I want to also nod to our colleague and friend in Western Canada, Arthur > Kroker and Marylouise Kroker who passed away last year. Their collaborative > work on these issues and more have been seminal to me. I share their edited > collection published in 1987, Digital Delirium. If you have a university > connection you may be able to link in to this > https://dspace.library.uvic.ca/handle/1828/7131 or pick it up via the > internet. It is really worth the read from beginning to end. > > In a nod to both Marylouise and Arthur I will quote this substituting in my > mind's eye social media for mass media: > "Mass media have never been about reciprocity, exchange, interaction, or even > communication. They replace reciprocity with false simulation, exchange, > with the tyranny of information overload producing a numbed culture that > shuts down for self-protection, interaction with a dense operational network > substituting polls and focus groups and high -intensity marketing warfare for > genuine solidarity, data for communication and speed for meaning." > > So, hoping that the juxtaposition between Guattari and the Krokers will > incite all of you who have joined in so far to comment as well as those of > you lurking from afar. > Best, > Renate > > Biographies > Justin Blinder is a Brooklyn-based artist, technologist, and researcher. His > work examines how bottom-up, immersive, and poetic approaches to technology > can help us to better understand socio-political institutions, built > environments, social networks, and others’ lived experiences. His work has > been included in exhibitions at the MoMA, New York, NY; Nathan Cummings > Foundation, New York, NY; Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, Germany; the > Collection Museum, Lincoln, England; Urban Institute of Contemporary Arts, > Grand Rapids, MI; Eyebeam Art and Technology Center, New York, NY; and BRIC, > Brooklyn, NY. Selected personal projects of his have been featured in online > publications such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, > BBC, The Guardian, and The Verge among others Justin is currently a Research > Assistant in the City Science group at the MIT Media Lab. He was previously a > Creative Technologist at The New York Times R&D Lab, Eyebeam Honorary Fellow, > and NEW INC member. He holds a BFA in Design and Technology from Parsons. > https://justin.work/ > > Rahul Mukherjee completed his doctoral studies in Film and Media Studies at > University of California, Santa Barbara, with graduate emphases in > ‘Technology and Society’ and ‘Global Studies’. His academic preoccupations > often meander into imaginings about media’s role with(in) alternative futures > for/of politics and technology. He has been a fellow at the Center for the > Humanities, Utrecht University and Atkinson Center for Sustainable Future > fellow at the Society for the Humanities, Cornell University (2017-18). > Drawing on the conceptual lenses of cultural studies, media theory, and > science studies, he has written on database management systems, advertising > cultures of mobile telephony, Bollywood thrillers, development discourses, > chronic toxicity, and translocal documentaries. He has been part of two > collaborative projects related to mobile media practices: one concerned with > the circulation of locally produced SD-card enabled music videos in parts of > India and the other exploring ICT usage in Zambia. Rahul’s work has appeared > in many peer-reviewed journals including New Media & Society, BioScope, > Media, Culture & Society, Science, Technology and Human Values, Communication > and Critical/Cultural Studies (with Lisa Parks), and Asiascape: Digital Asia > (with Abhigyan Singh). His book titled “Radiant Infrastructures: Media, > Environment, and Cultures of Uncertainty” (forthcoming from Duke University > Press, Apr 2020) involves mediations of debates/controversies related to > radiation emitting technologies such as cell antennas and nuclear reactors. > Rahul’s second book project “Unlimited: Aspirational Politics and Mobile > Digital Practices in India” examines aspirational mobilities unleashed by > mobile media technologies (under review). He is beginning a third book > project on the histories of wireless signals and plant ecologies interwoven > in the work of biophysicist JC Bose. Rahul received the Nicholas C. Mullins > award from the Society for Social Studies of Science in 2014. At Penn, Rahul > is part of the Digital Humanities and Environmental Humanities initiatives. > He is part of the editorial advisory board of the Journal of Visual Culture > and Media+Environment. > > David Quiles Guilló. born artist in 1973. now also tech entrepreneur, > curator, writer, composer and full publisher at large with a family. right > now: working on a new project, incubated by telefónica's open future > alicante, and warming the jets for the 5th edition of the wrong biennale. > founder and director of: - The Wrong Tv (since 2o2o) live streaming > exhibitions & love - 7tNbjV (since 2017) releasing abstract literature > graphic novels and art projects as paperback books - Abstract Editions (since > 2o15) publishing house to deliver the new abstract literature genre printed > to the world - The Wrong Biennale (since 2o13) the most compelling digital > art biennale ever - Nova (from 2o1o to 2o12) a contemporary culture festival > - Rojo® (from 2oo1 to 2o11) a visual magazine & platform to promote > creativity and visual art lectures & workshops in many institutions since > 2oo1; mis museum for image and sound, sesc paulista, sesc pompeia and > cinemateca brasileira in são paulo, sesc copacabana and eav parque lage in > rio de janeiro, centre d’art santa monica, elisava school for arts & hangar > in barcelona, european cultural foundation in rotterdam, university of > málaga, casino luxembourg, arco art fair in madrid, instituto cervantes in > nyc and casablanca, hagaram design museum in seoul, university of art in > linz, pxl-mad school of arts in hasselt, and saic, school of the art > institute of chicago, to mention a few https://davidquilesguillo.com > > > Ulises Mejias > Ulises Ali Mejias is professor of communication studies and director of the > Institute for Global Engagement at SUNY Oswego. His research interests > include critical data studies, philosophy and sociology of technology, and > political economy of digital media. Ulises' work has appeared in various > journals in his field and he is the author of "Off the Network: Disrupting > the Digital World" (2013, University of Minnesota Press) and, with Nick > Couldry, of "The Costs of Connection: How Data is Colonizing Human Life and > Appropriating it for Capitalism" (2019, Stanford University Press). Ulises is > co-founder of Tierra Común (tierracomun.net), a network of activists, > citizens and scholars working towards the decolonization of data, and he is > in the process of launching a Non-Aligned Technologies Movement > (nonalignedtech.net). He serves on the board of Humanities New York, an > affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. ulisesmejias.com. > > > Renate Ferro > Visiting Associate Professor > Director of Undergraduate Studies > Department of Art > Tjaden Hall 306 > rfe...@cornell.edu > > > > _______________________________________________ > empyre forum > empyre@lists.artdesign.unsw.edu.au > http://empyre.library.cornell.edu -- Justin Blinder Technologist, Researcher, Artist https://justin.work +1 617.645.0327 _______________________________________________ empyre forum empyre@lists.artdesign.unsw.edu.au http://empyre.library.cornell.edu
