Individual Project

Anja Groten, member of Hackers & Designers, presents her research at the Hochschule für Künste Bremen's 'The Dynamic Archive'.

Platforming as Practice
The Technical and Collaborative Workings of the Hackers & Designers Collective

The notion of the platform has become a common expression – a default term used to describe technical infrastructures designed for interaction, specifically for sharing, aggregating and archiving of information. Despite referring to technical projects, the notion of the platform is also used figuratively, addressing social and organizational structure of collectives. The platform – as an abstract yet spatial image functions as a point of reference for organisational work, allowing to address ephemeral aspects of that work. Being affected by an organising body, attuning to it, resisting it and representing other forms of organisational realities often goes hand in hand. In these different modes the platform becomes a way of structuring and orienting. In order to further expand on the relationship of platform and organisation this talk will pay attention to instances of Hackers & Designer’s collaborative practice in which a technical object referred to as platform was imagined, planned, designed and used. By doing that I intend to problematise positive and enabling tropes such as ‘support’, which suppose the role of platforms (technical and non-technical) as acting in service of those who use them.