Artist

Jon Smeathers

Curator

Sofie Burgoyne

Join Here Thru One General Assembly today!

First meeting: 7pm to 9pm, Wednesday 4 August 2021

Location: Contemporary Art Tasmania

For more information and for expressions of interest please contact: secretary.htoga@gmail.com

In conjunction with Rehearsing the Future, Jon Smeathers will initiate a framework for accelerating cross-platform micropolitics through his new work Here Thru One General Assembly.

Here Thru One General Assembly is a member-run and advocacy union investigating the algorithmic governance of YouTube’s deep learning mechanisms. Herein it will be referred to as “the Union.”

The purpose of the Union is to offer its members a platform to share recommendations, concerns and to discuss future measures to instigate permanent changes to YouTube’s content preferencing in Hobart.

In August, the Union is offering a prototype participatory program for rehearsing user protocols within YouTube accounts and managing the effects of algorithmic governance. The program will be centered on the collective management (public, multi-user) of a single YouTube account. During the program participants will make decisions in weekly general meetings to develop and implement user protocols, discuss and review analytics and implement changes to YouTube’s engagement metrics in specific geographies, audiences and rankings.

Throughout the program participants will:

• Develop an in depth understanding of YouTube’s deep learning mechanisms
• Access a public YouTube account in order to test trial search techniques and preferences in relation to content and other users in the local area
• Engage with weekly general meetings to discuss analytics, raise any issues or concerns and ratify user protocols through the Union’s constitutional structures
• Implement different search styles to manipulate YouTube’s search and discovery system data and learn how to fix YouTube’s recommendations
• Learn how to manage YouTube’s data storage protocols and SEO
• Explore material that would normally go undiscovered through individual accounts and within “personalized collections”
• Monitor “trending” search results and YouTube’s deep learning system
• Impact YouTube’s data on “interests” and “trending” in Hobart

The Union is open to all interested parties from all diversities. No technical skills or union alignments are required to participate in the program or to become a member.

Here Thru One General Assembly will be holding weekly meetings every Wednesday night in August in Hobart. The first public meeting will be held at Contemporary Art Tasmania on Wednesday the 4th of August 2021.