bending what is possible to do. I have always seen
these explorations as works of creative assembly that
are naively constructive but certainly not de-con-
structive. This is an approach that puts assembly be-
fore sabotage, that builds upwards from scrap and of
finding ways to reuse leftovers for our own purpose
and to build new possibilities.
This can seem slightly subversive, but more often it is
“subconstructive”, and a collaboration that builds
from below, intensifying small initiatives and assem-
bling the parts for a course on the road towards a
desirable future.
As I now look back on these methods and these situ-
ations it becomes clear to me that a certain mindset
has followed these works. They do not possess any
special “essence”, but instead are a typical way of
working – a mixture of curiosity, construction, shar-
ing, playing, and what I would now call designing. It
is as if a special mindset affected me all throughout
my journey, and I know that many others have shared
this same experience after having met to collaborate
with other likeminded friends. We all shared a com-
mon ground and a common idea, a certain approach
to work and life, and I will elaborate further on this
“mindset” or sense of assembly that Deleuze and
Guattari might have called the working of an “ab-
stract machine”. This line of thought I choose to call
“hacktivism”.
the abstract machine of hacktivism
As I have mentioned previously, from my point of
view, the mindset behind all these small assemblage
works was constructive and therefore it might seem
confusing to label it ”hacktivism”, as ”hacking” is a
term usually connected to digital deconstruction
and illegal network activities. Indeed, ever since it
was coined in 1995 by Jason Sack the neologism
”hacktivism” (of ”hacking” and ”activism”), has been
connected to the field where autonomous anarchist
tradition meets activism and digital subversions. It
is where squatters, phreakers, scammers, crackers
and cultural jammers mix civil disobedience, online
activism and hacking to employ the ”nonviolent use
of illegal or legally ambiguous digital tools in pursuit
of political ends” (Samuel 2004).
To give a clearer distinction, hacking guru Eric Ray-
mond distinguishes between hackers, who build
things, and crackers, who break things (Raymond
2001). Here hacking is a sharp-witted mode of cun-
ning construction and the opposite of cyber terror-
ism. This distinction makes the practice discussed in
this thesis in line with what I before called ”subcon-
struction”, a passionate love for coding, building,
playing and sharing, and within the hacker commu-
nity something that concerns much more than the
programming of computers. As we will see further
on in the chapter on hacking, it is a mindset of add-
ing your small component to a larger system and of
tuning its running processes into more desirable di-
rections.
As opposed to the “passive” role of the normal con-
sumer the productive activity of the hacker is central
to the “building” of something and will be a com-
mon theme that runs throughout this thesis. As we
will see presently there are many layers of to this
theme and that there is no sharp distinction between
these roles. As the art theorist Nicolas Bourriaud ar-
gues, there are many ways of being productive.Using a remote control is also production, the timid
production of alienated leisure time: with your fin-
ger on the button, you construct a program. (Bour-
riaud 2002b: 39)However, I must make a distinction between Bour-
riaud’s production and from my own interpretation.
I mean that the active productivity of the hacker lies
closer to that of Richard Sennetts craftsman whom
attain skill through production, and where ”people
are anchored in tangible reality, and they can take
pride in their work.” (Sennett 2008: 21) It is the per-
haps that naive act of producing something that
gives the feeling of ”I added something outside of
myself ”, even though this ”something” does not have
to be a concrete thing or something that is directly
useful in solving a problem.
&What is important to keep in mind is the building
mindset of hacking, of the use of the existing system
or infrastructure and with your own creation plug-
ging-in, into the existing structure. This is in opposi-
tion to the subversive critic who wants to uncover
the malicious mechanics behind society, tear down
the curtains of illusions, knock down the walls of
power, un-plug the ”evil capitalist machine”, sabo-
tage the apparatus and drop-out. Rather to the con-
trary, hacking is more a matter of curiosity, under-
standing a system, reverse engineering it, finding a