Facebook Piece

[ed. The experiment from Hell.]

Purpose: To enact algorithmically-driven engagement on Facebook to foster a paradoxically participatory subjectivity. Test the proposition that social media are conceptual art for the masses; that perhaps they use the aspirations of conceptual art to interpellate user populations as “masses,” as compliantly productive audiences.

1. Reactivate dormant account Robert Horning and reset privacy settings to their defaults

2. Remain logged in to Facebook on personal computer and smartphone

3. Every day, perform the following 20 actions on Facebook or through Facebook’s Open Graph API

• Submit five friend requests to profiles suggested by Facebook’s “People You May Know” algorithm
• Post one photograph of myself
• Post one photograph I’ve taken of anything but myself
• Post one photograph found elsewhere on the Internet
• Post one update about something I listened to that day
• Post one update about something I read that day
• Post one update about something I wrote
• Like three things in my Newsfeed
• Like three things on the Internet at large
• Comment on two Newsfeed items
• Click on one sponsored ad

4. Accept all friend requests, should there be any.

5. Obey any requests for information generated automatically by Facebook’s interface

6. Continue until account has reached maximum or minimum number of friends

by Rob Horning, TNI | Read more:
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