Taipei Travel

Digital machines work with striking precision. They never question their role in the process of value generation, they don’t unionize, they don’t strike. At the same time, the bug is an imminent feature of their existence. They regularly malfunction and resist to work as intended. What critical potential lies in the crippled struggle of algorithmic entities? Is the glitch a role model for resistance and labor strike in the times of gamified digital capitalism?

Examining these questions, “Every Strike Hits Dead Center” is a critical negotiation of the concepts of “work” and, as its counterpart “leisure” on the example of NPCs – non-player characters – in video games. With a humorous approach, video game spaces are examined for their subversive potential, setting the stage for an updated critique of capitalism that focuses on human and non-human working conditions. The three works presented – the video installation Club Stahlbad, the film Hardly Working, Red Redemption and Loop Labor – question social norms in relation to “productivity” and “free time” both on the level of representation as well as in terms of their material conditions.