On using the attention frackers’ tools against them
For thirty years, customizing your interface to the internet meant knowing how to write code, and the people who designed the UX and algorithms that define social media feeds had the only vote that counted. Now, through "vibe coding," someone with no engineering background can put a working tool into the world in an afternoon. What opportunities does this shift present? Is the early-web dream of “fixing the internet” now feasible? How wary should we be of these tools, seeing as they are constructed by the attention frackers themselves?
We will read across the media thinkers who saw this coming, from Marshall McLuhan and Neil Postman through Zeynep Tufekci, and we take up Jaron Lanier's argument for data dignity alongside the current case for federated social media and middleware.
We will also build. As a group, we’ll construct wrappers around the most exploitative platforms we use: interfaces that replace the algorithmic Skinner box of platforms like Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube with something that empowers us with more intentional choice. As we do so, we will critically examine the quandary of using the master’s tools on the master’s house. Culture jamming has always worked on borrowed infrastructure, and the infrastructure has never been this borrowable (though we might break some terms of service)!
No coding experience required. That is the whole point.
Led by Brian Rosen, longtime Pixar technologist and now a research scientist at Google X, The Moonshot Factory.
Our courses cost $250, with a Supporter rate for students with an income above 100k. We also offer a Supported rate for students with constraining circumstances.
Please see our Refund Policy HERE.
Additionally, we offer three tuition-waiver scholarships per course. To apply for a scholarship, click HERE.
Photo by Andre Moura