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Avoiding Surveil and Capture: Modes of Self-Presentation for a New Age of Cinema

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Avoiding Surveil and Capture: Modes of Self-Presentation for a New Age of Cinema Jacob Lacuesta FILM-240: Technologies of Identification

• Dr. Jacob Gaboury

December 16, 2019

1 Introduction On November 10, 2019, Disney launched their dedicated streaming platform, Disney+; releasing an extensive curated library built upon the catalogue of a media conglomerate that likely owns more market share than any other company in history. Their entrance into the digital streaming market shook up an already intense war between platforms, provoking a necessity for innovation in order to maintain user retention. This launch should be seen as a catalyst to bring about an increasingly inevitable future of micro-personalized cinema (MPC). There are three manifestations of MPC. Through its first stage comes the automation of navigating through a branching narrative film. The second stage is a transitional stage. Due to the costly nature of producing a branching narrative piece production companies will find ways to produce films at a lower cost and at faster speeds. Solutions could stem from volumetric video recording to the development of wholly realistic celebrities and AI reproduction of sight and

• soundtrack. With platforms leaning more towards production automation and the ever-increasing

speed of processors, this brings us to our third and final stage: the complete algorithmifcation of cinematic production and presentation—cinema that is produced for you, by you, in real-time. In

• rder to make the micro-personalization of cinema possible, a user’s taste profile is required.

Data is collected both through the means of a profile developed before streaming begins (asynchronous) and affect collection while streaming persists (synchronous). These modes of data collection and execution will be discussed further later. The concept of MPC, especially as it is theorized in its latter stages, presents itself as the epitome of post-cinema. Hito Steyerl notes post-cinema as a “stimulus package to buy new

2 televisions, home projector systems, and retina display iPads,”1 Not only has post-cinema become what was aforementioned, it is also now a stimulus package for buy into various platforms bounded with content exclusivity. Additionally, post-cinema does not concern itself with maintaining a well-rounded plot, it is concerned with maintaining attention. To obtain the attention of the viewer means to pull attention from competing platforms—the ultimate goal of MPC. Continuing and building upon Steyerl, like the internet, MPC will feel rather awkward as it takes inspiration from social networking sites. I see post-cinema’s ultimate form as an endless

• stream. There will be no beginning and there will be no end. It will be a series of calculated

privileged instances. It is simply a channel of noise one logs onto. Think of it as though you are watching an actual Truman Show, except instead of watching a life without post-production, it is Truman embodying the bursts of addictive spontaneity you would find scrolling through Facebook while Meryl displays gadgets you have recently perused on Amazon. Before leaping into this ultimate future, we must take a step back. This paper will first examine Project Blind Eye, an upcoming open-source software and film that provides a tangible

• bject and critiques the initial stage of MPC input and presentation. Following that will be a

discussion on the possible series of societal implications of accepting this form of media, examining through both asynchronous and synchronous means of identification. This section will also discuss modes of digital performance in order to protect the self from capture. Finally, though this future seems inevitable, there will be a dive into possibility of preventing this future through an anarchist lens of reference.

1 Steyerl, Hito. “Too Much World: Is the Internet Dead?” e-flux. Accessed December 14,

• 2019. https://www.e-flux.com/journal/49/60004/too-much-world-is-the-internet-dead/.

3 Blind Eye and Compulsory Identification Project Blind Eye is an application and accompanying film I developed between June and December 2019 under the guidance of Timothy Lenoir — who earlier aided in the development

• f an initial inquiry on the micro-personalization of cinematic presentation and production2 3.

Planned to be open source for academics, the project is meant to serve two purposes. First off, the project provides a tangible cultural object to examine and expand theoretical discussion. Secondly, the code is meant to provide a basis for further experimentation on how this streaming format could be made more productive in terms of capture. The film follows Aden; living in the Bay Area and faced with trouble to make ends meet, he resorts to pickpocketing phones from BART4 commuters along with his friend — Nat. One day, they accidentally steal the phone of a daytime tech executive and nighttime serial killer —

• Robert. By doing so, our characters are forced into on-running chase mediated by goons and IoT

technologies as the phone contained incriminating evidence for Robert’s crimes. While trying to mediate the situation, Robert tries to strike a deal with the Department of Defense for his IoT surveillance systems. In order to make the application work, users are required to go through a lengthy and unconventional process. Upon entering the project’s homepage and watching the ‘onboarding video,’ users are required to visit Watson’s Personality Insights application in order to obtain their OCEAN personality results. To obtain results, either a personal Twitter profile or a lengthy

2 Lacuesta, J., T. Lenoir. 2019. “The Cinema of You: an Initial Inquiry on the Micro-

Personalization of Cinematic Production and Presentation”. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.14522.34249

3 Additional guidance in both production and theory was brought in by Branwen Okpako,

Patrick LeMieux, and Joshua McCoy.

4 Bay Area Rapid Transit: the metro line connecting San Francisco with surrounding

suburban towns.

4 form of personal writing is required to be

• inputted. Finally, Watson will provide a series of

metrics that heavily detail consumer traits. It is the responsibility of the user to scour through these results to find their OCEAN personality — which is not in order and requires mental energy to make it so to match the application’s necessary

• input. If a certain personality trait is rated to be

>50%, the corresponding switch must be turned

• n. If else, the corresponding switch needs to be

left alone. Once this process is complete, it is

• nly then the film could finally be played. This

convoluted process was intended. By following the totality of these steps, it displays people’s willingness to identify oneself to a system for the purpose of convenience and novelty. There is the assumption that because the film is tailored to the individual personality, it is a presentation format expected to not ‘waste time.’ Additionally, the novelty of experiencing an advertised ‘film of the future’ leaves the idea of repercussion as an afterthought — even after faced with what Watson has collected beyond OCEAN just from a few tweets or a paragraph. This brings us to the topic of compulsory identification. It is the idea that conducting self- identification to a system will provide an overall higher quality of digital livelihood. The falsehood of providing your identity solely for the basis of obtaining a personalized cinematic

Figure 1. Watson's Personality Insights with Oprah's Twitter Profile Inputted Figure 2. Screenshot from "Blind Eye." The controls and 'start' button are on the lower-left side.

5 experience is a trap near-equivalent as Facebook’s option to identify oneself as one of 56 choices

• f gender. As Gaboury mentions in his paper Becoming NULL, “While identity may once served

as the basis for a progressive politics of visibility, it has been redeployed in the service of new regimes of identification for the purpose of value extraction […]”5. By becoming legible to the system, you are submitting yourself to the Deleuzian society of control brought upon by universal modulation. This refined version of audience segmentation through algorithmic psychographics sort users into categories (of which are moving targets) that experience which forms of information shall and shall not be presented6. It becomes more than in one version of Blind Eye Nat is a stoner-type while in another Nat is a born-again Evangelist. This could be supposedly benign such as the split personality of Nat; but it could escalate into situations such as the emboldenment of political echo chambers and the inability for outsiders of a politically charged stream to recognize and counter disinformation. Take for a hypothetical that nobody who is the slightest bit skeptical of Alex Jones would even be aware of his “Sandy Hook child actor” conspiracy; and therefore, disagree or counter that claim. At the end of the film, viewers are confronted with the harsh reality of being identified in this dystopia. Though there are nine different endings for this film, they all lead to a single destiny. DONI (Digital Operator and Network Integrator), the IoT system Robert tries to sell to the Department of Defense, is

5 Gaboury, Jacob. “Becoming NULL: Queer Relations in the Excluded Middle.” Women

& Performance: a Journal of Feminist Theory 28, no. 2 (April 2018): 143–58. https://doi.org/10.1080/0740770x.2018.1473986.

6 Cheney-Lippold, John. “A New Algorithmic Identity.” Theory, Culture & Society 28,

• no. 6 (2011): 164–81. https://doi.org/10.1177/0263276411424420.

Figure 3. Screencap from Blind Eye; a world in disarray.

6

• activated. As the final musical number –– Olivia Newton-John singing Xanadu –– blurs in the

background, the film becomes increasingly unwatchable as both image and sound becomes

• bscured. As the credits roll, viewers are confronted with a brutal montage of recent events

including war, death, and overall societal discourse; all supposedly caused by the DONI system. Xanadu was chosen because it exemplified not only the antagonist’s success but also capture through IoT devices. A prominent line is “A million lights are dancing and there you are, a shooting star7.” This exemplifies being identified. The “lights” that are referred to in the film are lights coming from phones. “An everlasting world and you’re here with me, eternally8,” represents the self being catalogued into what can be perceived as digital permanency. Xanadu can be defined as a place that is ideal. However, Xanadu (both place and song) represented at the end of the film seems unsettling. The performance of extras leading up to Olivia Newton-John’s final musical number is presented as whimsical fun (as so

• ur phones) nonetheless the synchronous marching and chants seem conformist; militaristic;

almost dystopian9. It is exactly a present and future we are faced with. Xanadu is an ideal place; a place only ideal to those in position of power as we are bounded perform militaristic fun in

• rder to support a higher regime.

Implications of Capture and Modes of Digital Performance

7 Xanadu, n.d. 8 Ibid. 9 Xanadu. Universal, 1980.

Figure 4. Militaristic Fun in Xanadu (Universal)

7 Though MPC may seem as though it is an exciting future, there are damning societal

• implications. Stemming from Foucault’s biopolitics, MPC would be an extension of soft-
• biopower. The purpose of soft-biopower is to, “regulate(s) how those categories themselves are

determined to define life10.” In other words, it is meant to mediate a possible set of random events and therefore, hopefully, mediate the outcome. Cambridge Analytica did this successfully during the 2016 US Presidential Election by identifying moderate voters and persuading them to vote for Trump11. The Obama campaign also conducted this successfully on a significantly smaller scale through Project Narwhal in the 2012 Presidential Election12. By mediating events and outcomes successfully means reaching a state of equilibrium13. In order to extend this form

• f control, one must be surveilled and captured. To be under the gaze of surveillance means to be

under the will of some form of power. Continued inquiry on MPC is important. Being that our digital and physical life has merged into one, we have formed a hyperreality that goes beyond the boundaries of Disneyland. Our world has become a series of images; images by which those who hold the tools of post- production could reshape to one’s desires.14 The social construction of reality is reaching a new stage of manipulation with the deep convergence of social media and cinema.

10 Cheney-Lippold, A New Algorithmic Identity, 173

11 Rosenberg, Matthew, Nicholas Confessore, and Carole Cadwalladr. “How Trump

Consultants Exploited the Facebook Data of Millions.” The New York Times. The New York Times, March 17, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/17/us/politics/cambridge-analytica- trump-campaign.html.

12 Rutenberg, Jim. “Data You Can Believe In.” The New York Times. The New York

Times, June 20, 2013. https://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/23/magazine/the-obama-campaigns- digital-masterminds-cash-in.html.

13 Cheney-Lippold, A New Algorithmic Identity, 172 14 Hito, “Too Much World: Is the Internet Dead?”

8 The following will describe means of capture through two modes of data collection, asynchronous and synchronous, and its implications. Pairing with that will be modes of digital performance of which one can conduct to protect the self. Asynchronous The first mode of data collection in order to produce the MPC experience is

• asynchronous. Asynchrony primarily delves into the profile of what Gilles Deleuze would refer

to as the dividual. As we interact with digital technologies, our identities become faceted into a multitude of categories. To be categorized, or modulated, Cheney-Lippold states that, “It configures life by tailoring its conditions of possibility.15” Instead of individuals, we become the multi-dimension dividual –– ever-modulating subjects that pre-configure the instances and destinies that will be seen in MPC. In order to avoid capture, we primarily turn to queer theory and the performance of

• failure. Failure is seen as something that is exclusively queer because queerness is an existence

that trails against the capitalist narrative of consumption and reproduction16. Failure in this case is the refusal of participating in systems that support ongoing neoliberal structures. In one sense, with Blind Eye, one can refuse to follow the directions to operate the film properly and simply hit the “play” button without any input whatsoever. In another, it could be the refusal of participating within the digital landscape overall. Though this may seem like a viable option of identity protection, there are implications. Tung-Hui Hu states that by performing failure,

15 Cheney-Lippold, A New Algorithmic Identity, 173 16 Gaboury, Becoming NULL: Queer Relations in the Excluded Middle, 148

9 contributing nothing to the system, it incites other possibilities of identification17. This is part of the broader concept of semiocapitalism. An example Hu expresses is with Netflix in which when a film/show recommendation is not clicked, it simply says to the system that the user is

• uninterested. Refusal is a form of feedback18.

A better mode of digital performance, of which is an extension of refusal, is whatever. Whatever is a mode of digital performance that begs for randomized spontaneity, often deviating from actual desires of content, in order to obscure your identity and trick the system. Yes, you may enjoy crime genre shows; but according to the computer, you also like Minecraft’s animated series and Test Patterns19. Gaboury notes whatever as something that is, “neither both productive nor oppositional, but rather as a subject filled with absolute potentiality […]20.” Whatever seems as though it is the ultimate solution. Hito Steyerl notes that the internet has become offline and is embedded throughout our everyday livelihood through commercial surveillance technologies.21 Our digital life is now real life. Navigating a world in this circumstance, there will always be digital ghost that follows. Your friends could be identified through proxemics, transactions monitored through card, and location (or daily procedure) through vehicles with default navigational systems. I see whatever as a counterbalance to what can be collected through daily experiences.

17 Hu, Tung-Hui. “Wait, Then Give Up: Lethargy and the Reticence of Digital

Art.” Journal of Visual Culture 16, no. 3 (2017): 337–54. https://doi.org/10.1177/1470412917742566.

18 Ibid. 19 Test Patterns is a series just as the title described nineteen episodes of television test

patterns.

20 Gaboury, Becoming NULL: Queer Relations in the Excluded Middle, 149 21 Hito, “Too Much World: Is the Internet Dead?”

10 Synchronous Synchronous modes of data collection refer to data that is collected as an MPC stream is being presented. With the implementation of cameras within television sets increasing –– which up to this point has been left aware yet critically unquestioned by the public –– it will provide the primary basis of synchronous data collection; especially as the front-facing camera is a common feature within all screens we purchase. Additional methods of synchronous collection could eventually be added, such as the measurement of CO2 exhaled.22 It is all part of the overarching trend of commodifying affect. There are three primary issues concerning MPC and facial recognition technologies. These issues could be best described through data colonialist perspectives. The current modes of data collection, or more appropriately data extraction, is akin to that of colonialist practice. Jathan Sadowski describes data colonialism at best. Just like European ships venturing out into the “New World,” they are seeking novel platforms of exploitation. Older platforms could be described as land while novel would be through digital scapes23. With digital life becoming real life, the two have merged into one. The proliferation of MPC is an extension of IoT systems invading a new territory: your home. The power dynamics between user and platform is something that is despairingly uneven. Because of the unintelligible document known as the End User License Agreement (EULA), which Sadowski notes that is akin to the unintelligible declarations of coloniality declared by the Spanish, users navigate platforms without meaningful

22 Bryce, Emma. “Forget Blood Tests. Breath Analysis Could Help Us Diagnose

Diseases.” WIRED. WIRED UK, February 20, 2019. https://www.wired.co.uk/article/breath- analysis-dolby-owlstone.

23 Sadowski, Jathan. “When Data Is Capital: Datafication, Accumulation, and

Extraction.” Big Data & Society 6, no. 1 (2019): 205395171882054. https://doi.org/10.1177/2053951718820549.

11 consent and fair compensation24. Following are three examples in which MPC could make your face exploited through nonconsensual productivity. The first issue lies within the dissolution of digital anonymity. In July 2016, it was ruled that the sharing of Netflix, and other streaming platform’s passwords to others is a violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986.25 By having systems able to biometrically identify who you are, by violating this act, this could be a breach of the EULA and therefore revoke platform access. This form of biometric identification could also categorize you as a digital criminal and revoke your ability to access information throughout the internet. Through its worse-case-scenario, first-time offenders could be facing a penalty of up to five years in prison26. Content streaming platforms lose a substantial amount of capital as a result of password sharing; and with the streaming wars becoming increasingly tense, these platforms will embolden means to reduce password sharing in order to increase profits. Another issue embeds itself within function creep. Function creep can be defined as the utilization of data outside of an expected purpose; often data collected by one agency and sold to third parties. An issue in relation to this lies within what Simone Brown calls digital

• epidermalization27. By sitting in front of the television, you could be unknowingly and

unwillingly providing labor to produce and refine outside systems of both facial recognition and racial categorization –– both heavily utilized within the contexts of policing and surveillance. Current forms of facial recognition technologies are often biased toward those who possess

24 Ibid. 25 “18 U.S. Code § 1030 - Fraud and Related Activity in Connection with Computers.”

Legal Information Institute. Legal Information Institute. Accessed December 16, 2019. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1030.

26 Ibid. 27 Browne, Simone. “Digital Epidermalization: Race, Identity and Biometrics.” Critical

Sociology 36, no. 1 (2010): 131–50. https://doi.org/10.1177/0896920509347144.

12 lighter skin tones – primarily Caucasian and East Asian individuals – the populace who tends to program most of the software we utilize. Companies such as Netflix has a vast number of diverse consumers globally; consumers that could become the consumed. By participating in MPC, users could be developing and refining these algorithms of policing and oppression. Finally, by participating in the consumption of MPC, you participate in the production,

• too. “In the future, everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes,” says Andy Warhol. As you

gaze at the television set; displaying an array of emotions as you experience what is offered; you could be providing a facial data set of affect. With this dataset, your labor and body are potentially destined for exploitation as your affect will provide life to the background character

• f someone’s journey through Deepfake technologies. Hell, if you are attractive enough ––

which is assumed to be biased towards Caucasian and East Asian faces –– you may very well become the star. Just as how Instagram and TikTok owns your content, Netflix and Disney+ will exploit your likeness. Think of it as though you are Truman Burbank within your own personal Truman Show. Just like the film’s tagline, you are “On the air, unaware28.” A remedy to this predicament could require the obfuscation of the face. As the screen provides commodity, you must refuse to become commodified. Though there are implications in the politics of refusal, these implications are not universal. It may be the new norm that one must

• btain entertainment through the mask. I imagine the future being a family sitting in front of a

television set sporting Zach Blas’ Facial Weaponization Suite29. Now that the internet is undead and everywhere, the home has lost its status as the space of comfort and vulnerability. Though

28 The Truman Show, Paramount, 1998. 29 “Facial Weaponization Suite.” Zach Blas. Accessed December 16, 2019.

http://www.zachblas.info/works/facial-weaponization-suite/.

13 this may seem like a reliable solution, situations may change as refusing to identify is increasingly becoming an act of criminality. Just like how a key (password) is required to enter a car (platform), a breathalyzer (face) may be required to start it. Anarchist Perspectives and Fighting Back By being aware of these implications comes to question the acceptance of this technology’s inevitability. Maybe it stems from the fact that media literacy is a subject that is rarely addressed within the US education system; media studies in general is an area of study that is frowned upon. Or maybe it is simply my overall pessimism with the current state of the world; as with many others within my generation who are unable to see living up to the age of 40. Just as soft-biopower attempts to mediate our destinies, it is important that we ourselves attempt to mediate the destiny of MPC; a destiny that either prevents its existence or allows proliferation yet in a way that is suited to better serve us. In order to make this possible, we analyze through an Anarchist frame of reference. According to Os Keyes et al., we need to employ an anarchist form of Humanistic Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). This can be defined as, “any HCI research or practice that deploys humanistic epistemologies […] and methodologies (e.g., critical analysis of designs,

Figure 5. Facial Weaponization Suite (Blas)

14 processes, and implementations; historical genealogies; conceptual analysis; emancipatory criticism) in service of HCI processes, theories, methods, agenda setting, and practices […]30." The politics surrounding Anarchist HCI follows along two principles. The first requires us to question the current state of our world and how the livelihood of any given form of technology will serve us. The second is to question for who, primarily, will a given form of a technology serve. The overall goal of Anarchist HCI, and Anarchism in general, is to dismantle the powers that provoke dignity and autonomy31. MPC – as we currently examine – violates these two necessities as not only the body is unknowingly forced into productivity but also its primary purpose is to be an extension of exercising soft-biopower. In a perfect world, Anarchist HCI could be implemented at full throttle. In order to dismantle these social disparities, we need to dismantle the powers that invoke them – both the government and capitalism32. By doing so, not only would MPC never reach full actualization, but other forms of media and surveillance technologies that have brought us to our current state

• f affairs would be no more. However, we do not live within this perfect world. In turn, we must

develop roadblocks for MPC by questioning every step of its actualization with the aforementioned framework. If all else fails, Project Blind Eye is meant to provide us the opportunity to fight back. With the currently existing code being the basis for further experimentation and theorization by

• thers, this project will continue to be an asset of public confrontation. What I hope to be the

next stage of this application is the implementation of computer vision in order to not only add

30 Keyes, Os, Josephine Hoy, and Margaret Drouhard. “Human-Computer Insurrection:

Notes on an Anarchist HCI.” Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, n.d. https://doi.org/10.1145/3290605.3300569.

31 Ibid. 32 Ibid.

15 affect controls to the inputted film but to also capture images and confront users with the aforementioned possible implications of synchronous identification. Conclusion Along with being an extension to the initial theorization on MPC, this essay served as introduction to the newly-minted Project Blind Eye. It represents the first form of MPC that relies on the basis of compulsory identification. MPC, and being identified in general, are means to subjugate people through soft-biopower. To avoid identification and capture, performing whatever at the moment is the best course of action, as to do nothing would still mean

• something. Being that the internet is offline, whatever serves as a counterweight to daily activity.

Later stages of MPC will require gaze tracking. Though a data colonialist framework, issues that arise from MPC development include: unwilling participation to fine-tune surveillance systems, biometric identification of platform use and possible penalties, and the risk of one becoming an unintended digital celebrity. To avoid gaze tracking features would require obfuscation of the

• face. Finally, in order to possibly avoid the full potential of MPC, Anarchist HCI seems to

provide us the best theoretical framework in order to move forward. In Lacanian terms, cinema is seen as a mirror by which one views the world as an

• mnipotent being. Cinema is also seen and has been utilized as a tool of soft-biopower. It was

critiqued as a tool of modeling to the masses how a productive member of society should behave in order to feel whole by living the illusion of the American Dream, this has been and still is

• relevant. Nevertheless, MPC is destined to become the ultimate mirror. Within our current world
• f disarray, brought upon by a DONI-like system, MPC will be but a tool to blame all but those

in the position of Capitalist power for human rights and standards of living are ever-decreasing

16 as a result neoliberal falsehood. It will be as though our globalist society is in a standoff by which even though we are legible to the system, we are not fundamentally legible to each other; beyond race and nationality and to division within community and family. If MPC is not confronted, we will simply be shooting each other through a gaze of obscurity preluded by the militaristic fun of living in Xanadu.

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