Re: [NetBehaviour] Accelerationist aesthetics

[Gretta Louw]

This makes so much sense to me, thank you Ruth. I see so much of this in 
Europe, North America and the western, urban mainstream; an utter inability 
(and, probably, unwillingness) to look outside our own narrowly defined 
cultural lens when purportedly studying/attempting to understand technology, 
media, digitalisation, and their impacts. It hampers real discussion and 
cross-fertilization of ideas. Preaching to the (mostly white, educated, urban, 
western, northern) choir - as most tech/ digital/ futurist and possibly 
accelerationist (I hope I'm wrong about the last one, still too early to tell) 
festivals/meetings/discussion do - is a futile endeavor and exhausting to 
watch. Diversification is essential, but the way the discourse has developed 
around diversity actually is counterproductive to achieving greater diversity. 
Just as an example, there are studies that have shown that reminding applicants 
of their 'diverse' (one must ask, according to whom, diverse from what??) 
background in a job ad by specifically stating that one is an equal 
opportunities employer etc, will in fact reduce the number of applicants from 
diverse backgrounds.

I am rambling, but this issue is always tacked on to the sidelines of debates 
around the pressing issues of our time; an afterthought or a nod to political 
correctness. It needs to be at the core: we should not discuss these issues 
unless we have sufficiently broad input, otherwise we are just talking 
ourselves into insignificance. NB: I am talking generally and from some 
disappointing experiences at European 'digital futures'-type round tables and 
panels, not about netbehaviourists. I do think that we all need to take a much 
more radical approach to inclusivity though. Let's not participate in mutual 
back-slapping or hand-wringing with ppl only from our own sub-cultures...

All the best to everyone, and thank you for sharing your thoughts. xx

> On 23 Apr 2016, at 21:54, ruth catlow  wrote:
> 
> Here Baruch Gottlieb reviews “Inventing the Future”by Srnicek & Williams  
> (co-authors of the Accelerationst Manifesto)
> https://blog.p2pfoundation.net/inventing-future-beholden-present-review/2016/04/08
> 
> He says
> 
> "visions or projects for teleportation, nano-surgery and socialist Mars 
> colonies, are not going to convince capitalists to stop attacking socially 
> produced value every way they can. We need more fundamental knowledge about 
> how the present is reproduced in this first place, the legacy of colonialism, 
> imperialism, patriarchy and slavery in the very devices we use to understand 
> such things, and we need social and cultural technologies to integrate that 
> consciousness into new behaviours, new sociabilities, new modes of exchange."
> 
> 
>> On 23/04/16 13:15, ruth catlow wrote:
>> So is this the accelerationist aesthetics question?
>> 
>> Q. How can we as artists and people use the logics & tools of automation and 
>> markets as part of making better art and better life for us all?
>> 
>> : )
> Tom said
>> 
> when it appeared that the prognostications of the first wave of
>> accelerationists had partly came true: namely, that the accelerations
>> inherent in capitalism, specifically the tendency to mobilize more
>> surplus labour and resources at greater rates of efficiency and
>> abstraction, would exacerbate the system's inherent contradictions to a
>> catastrophic point. Only partly came true though: the system did not
>> collapse but massively reorganized itself (all those would-be John Galts
>> suddenly all too happy to accept government bail-outs, massive
>> expropriation of assets from the poor). This required a recalibration of
>> the theses of that first wave of accelerationists, a recalibration that
>> perhaps either is reflected in art, or in which<<<
>> 
>> The unfettered development of automation and market-forces is currently seen 
>> as the preserve of people on the political right (who seek to preserve the 
>> status quo or enhance their wealth and power). But who may at some points 
>> ask for time-out (and bail-outs) in order to re-set their position of 
>> advantage.
>> 
>> Rob said
>> 
>> If I was trolling I'd argue that if you're on the left you're either a
>> conscious or an unconscious accelerationist. But it's possible to do
>> things in an un-Accelerationist way - it's not an inescapable or
>> inevitable cultural condition.
>> 
>> Yes, this is why I declared myself an Accelerationist- it was not a proud 
>> declamation (a la 'I'm a feminist and I'm proud') more an admission (a la, 
>> the declaration at meetings of people participating in the 12 step 
>> programme).
>> 
>> What I think is worth reflecting on (even if only idly) in this
>> discussion is whether there is anything in one's own life or work that
>> this strategy would be productive for. What could each of us better
>> understand and reason about (in some sense) so as to be able to better
>> change it?
>> 

Re: [NetBehaviour] Accelerationism

[Simon Biggs]

This quote from Marx and Engels certainly describes current management 
practices. I have experience of management workshops where the socially and 
psychologically disruptive methods outlined in the quote below are promoted and 
explicitly employed. The aim is to keep workers on their toes - constantly off 
balance, not certain where next they will be required to jump. It’s quite nasty 
and all done in the name of economic efficiency. The workers are considered as 
a raw resource, that can be made redundant if they don’t do what is required of 
them, whether they are an administrator, researcher or Professor. It is pure 
McKinsey poison and they predicate it on pseudo-science - which makes it even 
worse because the theory is so flakey. The latest wheeze is to employ 
neuro-science to validate their practices.

Foucault would role in his grave - but I imagine he would also role in his 
grave if he read the Accelerationist Manifesto. I’ve not read it, but the quote 
Ruth gave from Gottlieb’s review makes it sound like the other side of the same 
coin as McKinsey. It is also promoting normative values, just with a different 
character. I’m pretty sure I’m not an Accelerationist (or that I consciously 
subscribe to any other ism).

best

Simon


Simon Biggs
si...@littlepig.org.uk
http://www.littlepig.org.uk
http://amazon.com/author/simonbiggs
http://www.unisanet.unisa.edu.au/staff/homepage.asp?name=simon.biggs
http://www.eca.ed.ac.uk/school-of-art/simon-biggs







> On 24 Apr 2016, at 01:08, Michael Szpakowski  wrote:
> 
> Marx & Engels on accelerationism in 1848:
> "The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the 
> instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with 
> them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of 
> production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first condition of 
> existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant revolutionising of 
> production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting 
> uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier 
> ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and 
> venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become 
> antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that 
> is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses 
> his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind." <>
>This does the *descriptive* job as well as anything written since and it 
> still stands perfectly well...
> Sent from my iPhone
> ___
> NetBehaviour mailing list
> NetBehaviour@netbehaviour.org
> http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour

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[NetBehaviour] Accelerate Marx [Was: Re: Accelerationism]

[Rob Myers]

There's also the discussion of machines in the Grundrisse, which the 
"Accelerationist Reader" book starts with as "Fragment on Machines" (from "once 
adopted into the production process of capital, the means of labour passes 
through different metamorphoses, whose culmination is the machine" here:

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1857/grundrisse/ch13.htm )

This is probably where Left Accelerationism originates as an attitude towards 
and seeking to work through or escape the process Marx & Engels describe below.

What's particularly interesting in relation to "Inventing The Future" is its 
discussion of automation and free time. And it touches on the quality of the 
alien in a way that might, in a funhouse mirror way, be recognizable in *some* 
other post-70s Accelerationism.



On April 23, 2016 8:38:21 AM PDT, Michael Szpakowski  wrote:
>Marx & Engels on accelerationism in 1848:
>"The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the
>instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and
>with them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes
>of production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first
>condition of existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant
>revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social
>conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the
>bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast-frozen
>relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and
>opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before
>they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is
>profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his
>real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind."
>This does the *descriptive* job as well as anything written since and
>it still stands perfectly well...
>Sent from my iPhone
>
>
>
>___
>NetBehaviour mailing list
>NetBehaviour@netbehaviour.org
>http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour

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[NetBehaviour] Auto-Re: Discussion Sandy Baldwin, Alan Sondheim

[土木建筑学院]

 
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[NetBehaviour] Discussion Sandy Baldwin, Alan Sondheim

[Alan Sondheim]

Discussion Sandy Baldwin, Alan Sondheim

(the work i'm doing, theory/practice - edgespace, blank,
gamespace, revrev, limits of temporality, etc.)

http://www.alansondheim.org/memento03.jpg
http://www.alansondheim.org/sandyalan42116s.mp3
http://www.alansondheim.org/roches44.jpg

(some of my comments are problematic; the discussion
was informal, we were both tired. but for me, there
is much that's central to my work and thought and may
be of interest.)

Thanks greatly to Sandy Baldwin


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Re: [NetBehaviour] Accelerationist aesthetics

[Rob Myers]

One of the things that critics of accelerationism often do is to call
for.accelerationism.

Increasing our knowledge of the present in order to transform it is
promethean. And unless these new technologies are magic they will be
detourned from existing ones. The merely oppositional left has had a
long run. Visions of a better future may be something that help us get
to...a better future.

:-)

On Sat, 23 Apr 2016, at 06:54 AM, ruth catlow wrote:
> Here Baruch Gottlieb reviews “Inventing the Future”by Srnicek & 
> Williams  (co-authors of the Accelerationst Manifesto)
> https://blog.p2pfoundation.net/inventing-future-beholden-present-review/2016/04/08
> 
> He says
> 
> "visions or projects for teleportation, nano-surgery and socialist Mars 
> colonies, are not going to convince capitalists to stop attacking 
> socially produced value every way they can. We need more fundamental 
> knowledge about how the present is reproduced in this first place, the 
> legacy of colonialism, imperialism, patriarchy and slavery in the very 
> devices we use to understand such things, and we need social and 
> cultural technologies to integrate that consciousness into new 
> behaviours, new sociabilities, new modes of exchange."
> 
> 
> On 23/04/16 13:15, ruth catlow wrote:
> > So is this the accelerationist aesthetics question?
> >
> > Q. How can we as artists and people use the logics & tools of 
> > automation and markets as part of making better art and better life 
> > for us all?
> >
> > : )
> >
> Tom said
> >
>  when it appeared that the prognostications of the first wave of
> > accelerationists had partly came true: namely, that the accelerations
> > inherent in capitalism, specifically the tendency to mobilize more
> > surplus labour and resources at greater rates of efficiency and
> > abstraction, would exacerbate the system's inherent contradictions to a
> > catastrophic point. Only partly came true though: the system did not
> > collapse but massively reorganized itself (all those would-be John Galts
> >  suddenly all too happy to accept government bail-outs, massive
> > expropriation of assets from the poor). This required a recalibration of
> >  the theses of that first wave of accelerationists, a recalibration that
> >  perhaps either is reflected in art, or in which<<<
> >
> > The unfettered development of automation and market-forces is 
> > currently seen as the preserve of people on the political right (who 
> > seek to preserve the status quo or enhance their wealth and power). 
> > But who may at some points ask for time-out (and bail-outs) in order 
> > to re-set their position of advantage.
> >
> > Rob said
> >
> > If I was trolling I'd argue that if you're on the left you're either a
> > conscious or an unconscious accelerationist. But it's possible to do
> > things in an un-Accelerationist way - it's not an inescapable or
> > inevitable cultural condition.
> >
> > Yes, this is why I declared myself an Accelerationist- it was not a 
> > proud declamation (a la 'I'm a feminist and I'm proud') more an 
> > admission (a la, the declaration at meetings of people participating 
> > in the 12 step programme).
> >
> >  What I think is worth reflecting on (even if only idly) in this
> > discussion is whether there is anything in one's own life or work that
> > this strategy would be productive for. What could each of us better
> > understand and reason about (in some sense) so as to be able to better
> > change it?
> >
> > Both these points indicate something that Left Accelerationism has been
> > criticised for from various angles - it is a *selective* acceleration.
> >
> >
> > Left Accelerationists are critiqued as these social-power-tools (of 
> > automation and market-forces) are seen as inherently dehumanising and 
> > destructive of solidarity and freedom?
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On 23/04/16 02:49, Rob Myers wrote:
> >> On 22/04/16 03:27 AM, ruth catlow wrote:
> >>> Not that we all need to be in an unending frenzy of communication and
> >>> exchange. More that we have ever-more nuanced ways to sense the
> >>> significance of different kinds of participation: in a loop of 
> >>> unwitting
> >>> participation and active collaboration and organisation.
> >> I think this (and Simon & Pall's conversation) raises two important
> >> points about "Accelerationism".
> >>
> >> The first is that contemporary society appears to have speeded up
> >> anyway. We can debate whether progress or the economy has stalled, but
> >> our experience of life seems to involve the compression of time by
> >> technology and by socioeconomic demands.
> >>
> >> The obvious critic of this kind of speed and acceleration, as Paul
> >> mentioned, is Virilio. Who I think relates speed to power in a way that
> >> makes sense of our experience of it as disenfranchising.
> >>
> >> Wanting to slow down from *this* kind of acceleration isn't a bad thing
> >> and is in fact the end point of MAP/Fixing The Future -style
> >> 

[NetBehaviour] Accelerationism

[Michael Szpakowski]

Marx & Engels on accelerationism in 1848:
"The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the 
instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with 
them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of 
production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first condition of 
existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant revolutionising of 
production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting 
uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier 
ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and 
venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become 
antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that 
is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his 
real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind."
   This does the *descriptive* job as well as anything written since and it 
still stands perfectly well...
Sent from my iPhone___
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Re: [NetBehaviour] Accelerationist aesthetics

[ruth catlow]

Here Baruch Gottlieb reviews “Inventing the Future”by Srnicek & 
Williams  (co-authors of the Accelerationst Manifesto)

https://blog.p2pfoundation.net/inventing-future-beholden-present-review/2016/04/08

He says

"visions or projects for teleportation, nano-surgery and socialist Mars 
colonies, are not going to convince capitalists to stop attacking 
socially produced value every way they can. We need more fundamental 
knowledge about how the present is reproduced in this first place, the 
legacy of colonialism, imperialism, patriarchy and slavery in the very 
devices we use to understand such things, and we need social and 
cultural technologies to integrate that consciousness into new 
behaviours, new sociabilities, new modes of exchange."



On 23/04/16 13:15, ruth catlow wrote:

So is this the accelerationist aesthetics question?

Q. How can we as artists and people use the logics & tools of 
automation and markets as part of making better art and better life 
for us all?


: )


Tom said



when it appeared that the prognostications of the first wave of

accelerationists had partly came true: namely, that the accelerations
inherent in capitalism, specifically the tendency to mobilize more
surplus labour and resources at greater rates of efficiency and
abstraction, would exacerbate the system's inherent contradictions to a
catastrophic point. Only partly came true though: the system did not
collapse but massively reorganized itself (all those would-be John Galts
 suddenly all too happy to accept government bail-outs, massive
expropriation of assets from the poor). This required a recalibration of
 the theses of that first wave of accelerationists, a recalibration that
 perhaps either is reflected in art, or in which<<<

The unfettered development of automation and market-forces is 
currently seen as the preserve of people on the political right (who 
seek to preserve the status quo or enhance their wealth and power). 
But who may at some points ask for time-out (and bail-outs) in order 
to re-set their position of advantage.


Rob said

If I was trolling I'd argue that if you're on the left you're either a
conscious or an unconscious accelerationist. But it's possible to do
things in an un-Accelerationist way - it's not an inescapable or
inevitable cultural condition.

Yes, this is why I declared myself an Accelerationist- it was not a 
proud declamation (a la 'I'm a feminist and I'm proud') more an 
admission (a la, the declaration at meetings of people participating 
in the 12 step programme).


 What I think is worth reflecting on (even if only idly) in this
discussion is whether there is anything in one's own life or work that
this strategy would be productive for. What could each of us better
understand and reason about (in some sense) so as to be able to better
change it?

Both these points indicate something that Left Accelerationism has been
criticised for from various angles - it is a *selective* acceleration.


Left Accelerationists are critiqued as these social-power-tools (of 
automation and market-forces) are seen as inherently dehumanising and 
destructive of solidarity and freedom?





On 23/04/16 02:49, Rob Myers wrote:

On 22/04/16 03:27 AM, ruth catlow wrote:

Not that we all need to be in an unending frenzy of communication and
exchange. More that we have ever-more nuanced ways to sense the
significance of different kinds of participation: in a loop of 
unwitting

participation and active collaboration and organisation.

I think this (and Simon & Pall's conversation) raises two important
points about "Accelerationism".

The first is that contemporary society appears to have speeded up
anyway. We can debate whether progress or the economy has stalled, but
our experience of life seems to involve the compression of time by
technology and by socioeconomic demands.

The obvious critic of this kind of speed and acceleration, as Paul
mentioned, is Virilio. Who I think relates speed to power in a way that
makes sense of our experience of it as disenfranchising.

Wanting to slow down from *this* kind of acceleration isn't a bad thing
and is in fact the end point of MAP/Fixing The Future -style
Accelerationism: let's get the machines to do the busy-work so we can do
something actually useful with our time instead.

The second is that Accelerationism isn't a historical epoch like
postmodernism or globalisation. It's a *strategy*.

If I was trolling I'd argue that if you're on the left you're either a
conscious or an unconscious accelerationist. But it's possible to do
things in an un-Accelerationist way - it's not an inescapable or
inevitable cultural condition.

What I think is worth reflecting on (even if only idly) in this
discussion is whether there is anything in one's own life or work that
this strategy would be productive for. What could each of us better
understand and reason about (in some sense) so as to be able to better
change it?

Both these points indicate something that Left 

Re: [NetBehaviour] Accelerationist aesthetics

[ruth catlow]

So is this the accelerationist aesthetics question?

Q. How can we as artists and people use the logics & tools of automation 
and markets as part of making better art and better life for us all?


: )

Tom said


when it appeared that the prognostications of the first wave of

accelerationists had partly came true: namely, that the accelerations
inherent in capitalism, specifically the tendency to mobilize more
surplus labour and resources at greater rates of efficiency and
abstraction, would exacerbate the system's inherent contradictions to a
catastrophic point. Only partly came true though: the system did not
collapse but massively reorganized itself (all those would-be John Galts
 suddenly all too happy to accept government bail-outs, massive
expropriation of assets from the poor). This required a recalibration of
 the theses of that first wave of accelerationists, a recalibration that
 perhaps either is reflected in art, or in which<<<

The unfettered development of automation and market-forces is currently 
seen as the preserve of people on the political right (who seek to 
preserve the status quo or enhance their wealth and power). But who may 
at some points ask for time-out (and bail-outs) in order to re-set their 
position of advantage.


Rob said

If I was trolling I'd argue that if you're on the left you're either a
conscious or an unconscious accelerationist. But it's possible to do
things in an un-Accelerationist way - it's not an inescapable or
inevitable cultural condition.

Yes, this is why I declared myself an Accelerationist- it was not a 
proud declamation (a la 'I'm a feminist and I'm proud') more an 
admission (a la, the declaration at meetings of people participating in 
the 12 step programme).


 What I think is worth reflecting on (even if only idly) in this
discussion is whether there is anything in one's own life or work that
this strategy would be productive for. What could each of us better
understand and reason about (in some sense) so as to be able to better
change it?

Both these points indicate something that Left Accelerationism has been
criticised for from various angles - it is a *selective* acceleration.


Left Accelerationists are critiqued as these social-power-tools (of 
automation and market-forces) are seen as inherently dehumanising and 
destructive of solidarity and freedom?





On 23/04/16 02:49, Rob Myers wrote:

On 22/04/16 03:27 AM, ruth catlow wrote:

Not that we all need to be in an unending frenzy of communication and
exchange. More that we have ever-more nuanced ways to sense the
significance of different kinds of participation: in a loop of unwitting
participation and active collaboration and organisation.

I think this (and Simon & Pall's conversation) raises two important
points about "Accelerationism".

The first is that contemporary society appears to have speeded up
anyway. We can debate whether progress or the economy has stalled, but
our experience of life seems to involve the compression of time by
technology and by socioeconomic demands.

The obvious critic of this kind of speed and acceleration, as Paul
mentioned, is Virilio. Who I think relates speed to power in a way that
makes sense of our experience of it as disenfranchising.

Wanting to slow down from *this* kind of acceleration isn't a bad thing
and is in fact the end point of MAP/Fixing The Future -style
Accelerationism: let's get the machines to do the busy-work so we can do
something actually useful with our time instead.

The second is that Accelerationism isn't a historical epoch like
postmodernism or globalisation. It's a *strategy*.

If I was trolling I'd argue that if you're on the left you're either a
conscious or an unconscious accelerationist. But it's possible to do
things in an un-Accelerationist way - it's not an inescapable or
inevitable cultural condition.

What I think is worth reflecting on (even if only idly) in this
discussion is whether there is anything in one's own life or work that
this strategy would be productive for. What could each of us better
understand and reason about (in some sense) so as to be able to better
change it?

Both these points indicate something that Left Accelerationism has been
criticised for from various angles - it is a *selective* acceleration.


I am currently showing a live networked video piece, I created with
Gareth Foote, called /Time is Speeding Up/ at 20-21 Visual Arts Centre
up in Scunthorpe as part of the show We Are Not Alone. I have no idea
whether this is an Accelerationist artwork.

It's increasing our ability to perceive and reason about our situation,
so quite possibly.


I agonized about the aesthetics of the work- at first- so un-"cool", so
un-cyber - because the humans are so alive AND they make the work.
But now I'm really happy with it and would like to assert a place for
this almost folksy aesthetic (rather than a rush to slick, black
fluidity) in post-capitalist art.

Bladerunner's lived-in street-culture future