MADE TO MEASURE
For their investigative and artistic data experiment MADE TO MEASURE, the group Laokoon creates the doppelganger of a person unknown to them based solely on their personal online data. Five years of this person's life were reconstructed and filmed in detail on a large theatre stage. A few months later, the original and her datafied double met. The spectacular experiment becomes tangible on an interactive storytelling website, where visitors can experience what conclusions can be drawn about a person's character, psychology and future behavior though algorithms. Laokoon exploits the potential of digital storytelling and invents a novel and complex narrative form about and through the internet.
The and one-of-a-kind cross-media project MADE TO MEASURE also includes a TV documentary that uses concrete examples to illustrate how online companies, advertisers and other data traders use the information they collect to profit from peoples’ weaknesses, insecurities, illnesses and addiction potential. Several experts, such as a former Google marketer, an expert for psychological targeting, a former Youtube developer, a psychologist, as well as data analysts, privacy activists, journalists and philosophers, shed light on the mechanisms of online advertising and personalized content on video and social media platforms.
But couldn't behavioural data also be used for the benefit of humanity? What forms of manipulation do we think of as socially acceptable or even desirable? MADE TO MEASURE allows visitors to experience in an impressive way how far-reaching the insights into our inner lives and our most intimate secrets are, which we grant Google, Facebook & Co. every day. And it poses the big philosophical question: Does the idea of individual autonomy become obsolete in the digital age? Who determines who we are and who we think we are?
TEAM
This project wouldn't have come to life without
the cooperation, work and support of a myriad
of individual and collective actors. We want to express our deepest gratitude to all of them.
PARTNERS
MADE TO MEASURE is a cross-media project initiated and developed by the Group Laokoon and the German Federal Cultural Foundation;
in co-production with WDR, SRG SSR, rbb, Docmine and OSZE RFoM;
realized in cooperation with PACT Zollverein (Essen);
with the support of Kulturhaus Brotfabrik, vorAnker and the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, as well as S+T+ARTS in Motion.
WHERE TO BE EXPERIENCED?
September 1st 2021 - 10.15 PM
Broadcast on WDR (linear)
September 4th, 7:20am
Broadcast on SRF info
- Sternstunde Philosophie
September 8th - 12th 2021
ARS ELECTRONICA - Festival for Art, Technology and Society
August 29th 2021 - 10 AM
Broadcast on SRF1 - Sternstunde Philosophie
November 11th 2021 - August 28th 2022
Deutsches Hygienemuseum Dresden