http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122119092302626987.html
Across the country, young people are joining campaigns that are drawing thousands of followers inspired by a common purpose.
They're not handing out leaflets at rallies for Barack Obama or John McCain. Instead, they're posing like statues in public squares, dropping their pants in train stations and bursting into song in malls.
Cities are being swept up in a wave of inane pranks. On a recent weekend, "zombies" smeared with fake blood idly roamed the streets in downtown San Francisco. That same weekend, a crowd of people in New York's Union Square danced to music that no one else could hear; and in Berkeley, Calif., jokesters in white, flowing robes handed out pamphlets at a farmer's market, touting the benefits of joining a cult. (Reason No. 5: "A great excuse not to talk to your birth family anymore.")
Pranksters say the random events are meant to jolt strangers out of their routines, shake up the monotony of urban life and create mildly awkward moments that play well on YouTube. Organized almost entirely online, the stunts also create a real-life sense of community among participants, many of whom are young people who spend their days in less-than-exciting office jobs.
"We're finding ourselves more and more disconnected," says Ari Lerner, a 24-year-old software engineer in Los Angeles who helps run a prankster group called GuerilLA. "We all sit at our computers and we forget there's a sun outside. It's a reaction to that."
Earlier this year, 15 pairs of identical twins, dressed in identical outfits, filled a New York subway car and mirrored each other's actions, without explanation. On different days over the next month, groups in New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Toronto plan to gather in public parks and listen to the same MP3 recorded set of instructions on their headphones. Onlookers will be presented with the spectacle of a seemingly random group of people playing games like freeze tag and Twister in unison.
Such events are part of a broader phenomenon that includes raves, guerrilla theatre, flash mobs, performance art and other public stunts. The urban playground movement encourages mass pillow-fights in public parks. In the Free Hugs Campaign, people go up to strangers and hug them.
Prankster groups are sprouting up around the country. Boston-based Banditos Misteriosos says its mailing list has doubled to more than 2,000 people since the start of the year. Scene Diego, which formed in San Diego, Calif., in February, says it has more than 1,000 people signed up as "undercover agents." And the Urban Prankster Network, a Web site started earlier this year by New York comedian Charlie Todd to help people organize stunts in their own cities, says it now has more than 23,300 members world-wide.
Mr. Todd, a 29-year-old teacher with the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in New York, is also the founder of Improv Everywhere, created in 2001 and credited with popularizing the current prank phenomenon. Mr. Todd says it began as a way to entertain himself and his friends. They would dream up outlandish scenarios and then try to make them happen.
Today, Mr. Todd's pranks typically involve hundreds of participants and precise choreography to create what looks like a weird, spontaneous moment. He says he never explains the pranks to onlookers. Instead, he lets people draw their own conclusions. "Some people look at them and say, 'Wow, that's a work of art,' " he says. "Others say, 'Wow, that's really stupid.' "
Some pranks just fall flat. One organizer in Phoenix tried to throw an impromptu party in a living room display at an Ikea in May, but it was a flop. Her posting on the Urban Prankster Network read: "Ikea mission: FAILED!!! Why!? Because only six people showed up."
Joey Skaggs, a longtime media prankster and author of the Art of the Prank blog, is critical of some of the latest stunts. Mr. Skaggs, whose best-known pranks include duping a New York television station in 1976 with a story about a bordello for dogs, says the stunts lack a subversive, anti-establishment edge. Because of that, people are less likely to stop and think about what they're seeing -- or even care. "The bar's been really lowered," he says. "There's a lot of junk out there calling itself pranks."
Today's prankster culture has roots in the Vietnam era, a time of social upheaval and political unrest. In 1967, at the height of the war, activist Abbie Hoffman and beat poet Allen Ginsberg organized hundreds of demonstrators to stage a mock levitation of the Pentagon. By chanting and singing outside the building, they said, they'd perform an exorcism and end the war. The stunt was part of a larger demonstration at the Pentagon that drew thousands of people and led to nearly 700 arrests. A year later, similar activities meant to lampoon and disrupt the Democratic convention in Chicago were staged by the Youth International Party, or Yippies -- founded by Mr. Hoffman, Jerry Rubin and others -- and included nominating a pig for president.
Some contemporary pranks owe much to their '60s precursors. During the Republican convention earlier this month, "Lobbyists for McCain" dressed in dark power suits and gathered in a parking lot in St. Paul, Minn., grilling hot dogs at a tailgate party and handing out fake money. The aim, the group said, was to call attention to what it called lobbyists' influence over the Republican campaign agenda. ("It's certainly common for there to be political theater surrounding candidates' events," says McCain campaign spokesman Tucker Bounds. "It's part of campaigning.")
The latest pranksters are "urban alchemists," akin to so-called guerrilla gardeners who cram plantings into sidewalk cracks, or people who create "found art" made from random items plucked from the streets, according to Jonathan Wynn, a sociologist at Smith College in Northampton, Mass.
"These are people in cities who take the public spaces and everyday life and make something kind of magical about it," he says.
Improv Everywhere pranks have typically been aimed at the consumer culture. In one 2006 stunt, 80 people dressed in what looked like Best Buy employee uniforms -- blue shirts and khakis -- walked around in one of the chain's stores in Manhattan, much to the confusion of everyone around them. Mr. Todd says a store employee called the police and the pranksters disbanded after the authorities arrived. Best Buy spokeswoman Susan Busch says the company "took it in good stride" and would only object if the prank interfered with customers shopping.
Last year, the group sent 111 shirtless men into an Abercrombie & Fitch in New York City, in a spoof of the chain's use of bare-chested hunks in its ad campaigns. The men (some fat, some thin) were told to say they were shopping for a shirt. Spokesman David Cupps says the company has no comment.
The group also sent more than 50 redheads to stand in front of a Manhattan Wendy's and chant "No pigtails!" in a mock protest of what they said was the inaccurate portrayal of redheads in the chain's ad campaign. Company spokesman Bob Bertini says the stunt was a minor distraction and showed people "engaging with the brand."
In fact, some advertisers are starting to see the marketing value of pranks. Taco Bell recently hired Mr. Todd to stage a "freeze" in a new restaurant in Flushing, N.Y., where paid extras posing as employees and patrons simply froze in place, baffling the actual customers. The stunt was later used in a viral marketing campaign for the restaurant's Frutista Freeze drink, and a video of the prank has been viewed 500,000 times online, says Taco Bell spokesman Will Bortz. "We thought it was brilliant," he says.
Some of Mr. Todd's admirers objected, however. "Taco Bell killed the freeze," says David Kartsonis, a 21-year-old video and TV producer from Redondo Beach, Calif., who helps organize events for GuerilLA. He says he won't do the stunt now because it's been overexposed. Mr. Kartsonis also complains that Improv Everywhere's videos seem geared more toward viral popularity online than in-the-moment fun: "They spend a lot more time worrying about the end viewer. We focus on people who are actually there at the time enjoying it."
Mr. Todd says he did the Taco Bell stunt after the freeze craze had passed; freezes have already been performed in 50 countries, he says. Sensitive to suggestions that he has been co-opted in some way, he adds that he keeps his commercial events separate from Improv Everywhere, so that prank participants won't show up for a stunt whose content is controlled by an advertiser.
Recently Mr. Todd began accepting corporate sponsorships. In exchange for running a Yahoo logo on the video of his coming MP3 pranks, he says the company is paying him a fee, which he plans to use to hire a production team and possibly stage aerial shots. Mr. Todd says he'll inform participants about Yahoo's involvement beforehand. "If I work on a corporate thing, there's going to be a certain percentage of my fan base who thinks it's evil," he says. "It's been a very difficult thing for me to figure out."
Most prank groups aren't wrestling with such issues, however. They're just trying to pull off a good joke. At a recent "marathon" staged by GuerilLA along the Strand in Manhattan Beach, Calif., unsuspecting joggers and bicyclists encountered a cheering crowd, water stands, a finish line and a person handing out medals.
Prank participants included a 25-year-old assistant video editor (who also feeds people's parking meters, just to be nice), a 51-year-old Verizon customer-service specialist who says he feels "locked in a cube" during the week, and a 36-year-old camera operator who recently proposed to his girlfriend during another stunt.
Gregg Tenser was one of the bewildered runners who broke the finish-line tape. He wanted to power through his 10-mile run, so he didn't stop to ask why people were cheering. "That was curious," he said, jogging away. Had a reporter not told him afterward what was going on, he says, he might never have realized it was a joke.
The 41-year-old money manager says he likes the idea of people doing something crazy for no reason. "It was a fun, borderline-bizarre experience," he says.
I think the Joey Skaggs comment says a lot about how the last generation of Pranksters seem to feel. That's absolutely the sort of vibe I got from the MLA class that RU Sirius taught... sort of a "We had a Purpose and a Cause!" banner to put them above the current pranksters.
Yet, from an archetypal standpoint, there doesn't appear to be a reason for Trickster to have a 'higher purpose' or cause. Often the trickster of myth was focused on his own appetite, survival or entertainment. I would say it seems far less often that he was trying to 'save' 'wake up' or 'enlighten' the recipient of his tricks.
So are the modern pranksters returning to a more base, less self-righteous view (a prank for personal fun, rather than to tell the rubes that THEY'RE DOING IT WRONG)? Or is this simply more purposeless activity, as humans become more jaded and less interested in making the world a better place? Or, are the pranksters today, just stupid and confuse 'prank' with 'dumb stunt' simply because they've lost any reference to other people's view of reality?
In my opinion, I think it may be the first... less activism and more pranksterism. I can see why such a view may be scorned by past pranksters, but I wonder if that may not have something to do with stagnation in their perception of reality (was that Joey Skaggs saying "God does not play dice with the world"?)
wow rat, you adequately summed up my points about Skaggs and the MLA Vibe.
First off, this article excites me, because it means there's MOAR of us, and MOAR people thinking in absurd directions.
Skaggs... he's brilliant, but he's a bit too much into the Hero trip if you ask me. I don't put up posters 'cause it's gonna save the world. I put up posters 'cause it's one of the most fun / cheapest ways to spend an afternoon. Skaggs looks down his nose at that form of pranksterism because it's not serving some cause (or some other baggage), but when he was battened down in his basement, protesters banging at the door, the phone ringing off the hook with death threats, you can't tell me he wasn't absolutely high on the type of chaos he created. I know what a trollgasm feels like, and I know he knows what it feels like. It's just too bad he has to feel like he's being a Good Guy in order to get that rush.
Fuck moral justifications for pranks!
hey, that'd be a good topic to riff on in a prank :p
I can understand Skaggs's sentiment and sympathize with it... But I think he's just rationalizing a fixation of his. At the end of the day, tricksterism's popularity is a good thing for your cause, if that cause is anti-establishmentarian, even if it means you have less control over how it fosters change and less of an idea how it is "supposed to" pan out. The difference between activism and just plain having fun is that with activism, you make up a narrative to explain how what you're doing is for the greater good. When you're just plain having fun, you don't bother with a narrative. I think both are the same in their potential to make things better - and in their potential to make things worse.
But some people need a narrative to move them to act... Others do not.
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
Pranksters say the random events are meant to jolt strangers out of their routines, shake up the monotony of urban life and create mildly awkward moments that play well on YouTube.
As good as reason as any other.
Scaggs needs to get a grip.
Did Bugs Bunny need a reason? Did Groucho need a reason?
Why do people become bags of douche when they get old?
Quote from: Cramulus on September 16, 2008, 06:48:05 PM
wow rat, you adequately summed up my points about Skaggs and the MLA Vibe.
First off, this article excites me, because it means there's MOAR of us, and MOAR people thinking in absurd directions.
Skaggs... he's brilliant, but he's a bit too much into the Hero trip if you ask me. I don't put up posters 'cause it's gonna save the world. I put up posters 'cause it's one of the most fun / cheapest ways to spend an afternoon. Skaggs looks down his nose at that form of pranksterism because it's not serving some cause (or some other baggage), but when he was battened down in his basement, protesters banging at the door, the phone ringing off the hook with death threats, you can't tell me he wasn't absolutely high on the type of chaos he created. I know what a trollgasm feels like, and I know he knows what it feels like. It's just too bad he has to feel like he's being a Good Guy in order to get that rush.
Fuck moral justifications for pranks!
hey, that'd be a good topic to riff on in a prank :p
So to tie two threads together, is Skaggs a victim of Logocentrism? Is "stunts lack a subversive, anti-establishment edge" simply another way of saying "the logos is missing from the prank"?
good tie-in. I'd say yeah.
I thought I coined the word Activitism, but as it turns out, it already existed. ;-P
http://www.p2pfoundation.net/Activitism
but my take on it is this: go out and do shit. Justify it later, if you want to. But getting off your ass and having fun is a type of cause. Maybe not a logocentric one. Maybe it's more pragmatic than what people are accustomed to.
QUIT YOUR SHIT AND HAVE ADVENTURES.
If you feel like you won the moral high ground, great, but don't pollute my pranks with your baggage!
I consider myself an "activist" and even I think Skaggs needs to loosen up.
Like Rata said...the trickster doesn't need a reason. Curiousity and boredom are as valid as any other, if not quite as beneficial. And just as fun, if not more so.
As an aside, we should really try and infiltrate the Urban Prankster Network. That is huge, and has the potential to be even bigger.
As an aside, its also worth noting that a lack of message or movement behind an action is the counterculture now. Anything else gets co-opted too quickly. Micro-culture and anonymous situations are a protest in that they cannot be captured and used by marketing executives and the movers and shakers of the media/popular culture, and anyone who truly thinks old thinking will work here is deluding themselves.
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 07:37:08 PM
As an aside, its also worth noting that a lack of message or movement behind an action is the counterculture now.
:mittens:
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 07:33:57 PM
I consider myself an "activist" and even I think Skaggs needs to loosen up.
Like Rata said...the trickster doesn't need a reason. Curiousity and boredom are as valid as any other, if not quite as beneficial. And just as fun, if not more so.
As an aside, we should really try and infiltrate the Urban Prankster Network. That is huge, and has the potential to be even bigger.
In most aspects of 'causes' these days there seem to be two options, Group A who is vehemently for something and Group B who are just as adamantly against the concept. Yet, both sides often seem full of shit. They employ crazy arguments to fend off even crazier arguments and both sides think that their option is the one that will take Humanity to the next level of Progress. Yet, often, it seems that neither side is worth fighting for, because both sides are full of dickish people with dickish arguments and dickish behaviors. During the 60's activism was extremely prevalent. The music, the social dynamics, the social gatherings, everything was about activism... saving the world... Utopia.... What better mask for the Prankster to wear, then, than one that justified and protected all of his actions within the acceptable belief system of the society?
Today, though, few people think Utopia is anything other than a fruit drink of mediocre flavor. Fewer 'activist' songs are written, fewer activist social events are held and fewer people care, or at least 'so it seems to me'.
Could we be seeing pranksterism in the post-activist society? "Meaningless pranks to stave off boredom" as the new mask of Prankster?
Well you all already know that I think the drive is irrational and goes well beyond reason anyway...even boredom and entertainment do not come into it. Its subversion is a matter of what it is, not what it aims for. It disrupts, confuzes and inverts the normal, and by interrupting any orderly functioning system, you are a priori subversive.
Also, srsly, the Boston/Conneticut crew should represent Discordia on the Urban Prankster network. Since its more IRL pranking, we'd want people closely linked to show our wares...at least to start with.
I've been meaning to. I've only been to one Improv Everywhere event, and I was like "christ, I could totally be organizing shit like this, I just don't have the contacts."
getting out of your apartment IRL is hard work!
Well AFAIK, the UPN is now totally removed from Improv Everywhere. Its merely a meeting ground for pranksters to connect and swap tips and ideas.
QuoteToday's prankster culture has roots in the Vietnam era, a time of social upheaval and political unrest. In 1967, at the height of the war, activist Abbie Hoffman and beat poet Allen Ginsberg organized hundreds of demonstrators to stage a mock levitation of the Pentagon. By chanting and singing outside the building, they said, they'd perform an exorcism and end the war. The stunt was part of a larger demonstration at the Pentagon that drew thousands of people and led to nearly 700 arrests.
One of my friends/former co-workers got arrested at that protest for pissing on the Pentagon. :lulz: I really should give him my copy of the Principia Discordia. I don't know if he's ever read it.
Back on topic: I signed up for the Indana Improv group on The Urban Prankster Network. I'm not getting my hopes up yet though.
I was unaware that there were other "official" groups. I will sign up for Cinci's, if they have one...
There are no such groups in the south, as far as I can tell.
It looks like Cinci may as well not have the four or so groups that it does. I don't think anybody's actually done anything with them. Retarded...
When I first heard of these things, the first thing I thought of was the old OM. It seems like it would be fun, but I tire easily and can't be counted upon to organise these things.
I have joined the Toronto group.
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122119092302626987.html
In fact, some advertisers are starting to see the marketing value of pranks. Taco Bell recently hired Mr. Todd to stage a "freeze" in a new restaurant in Flushing, N.Y., where paid extras posing as employees and patrons simply froze in place, baffling the actual customers. The stunt was later used in a viral marketing campaign for the restaurant's Frutista Freeze drink, and a video of the prank has been viewed 500,000 times online, says Taco Bell spokesman Will Bortz. "We thought it was brilliant," he says.
Well, our fangs have been pulled.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 18, 2008, 04:54:06 AM
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122119092302626987.html
In fact, some advertisers are starting to see the marketing value of pranks. Taco Bell recently hired Mr. Todd to stage a "freeze" in a new restaurant in Flushing, N.Y., where paid extras posing as employees and patrons simply froze in place, baffling the actual customers. The stunt was later used in a viral marketing campaign for the restaurant's Frutista Freeze drink, and a video of the prank has been viewed 500,000 times online, says Taco Bell spokesman Will Bortz. "We thought it was brilliant," he says.
Well, our fangs have been pulled.
Why oh why didn't someone just collapse and start screaming about parasites in the Frutista eating his brain?
Goddam amateurs.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 18, 2008, 04:54:06 AM
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122119092302626987.html
In fact, some advertisers are starting to see the marketing value of pranks. Taco Bell recently hired Mr. Todd to stage a "freeze" in a new restaurant in Flushing, N.Y., where paid extras posing as employees and patrons simply froze in place, baffling the actual customers. The stunt was later used in a viral marketing campaign for the restaurant's Frutista Freeze drink, and a video of the prank has been viewed 500,000 times online, says Taco Bell spokesman Will Bortz. "We thought it was brilliant," he says.
Well, our fangs have been pulled.
yeah, god forbid we ever reach a position that allows us to exploit and profit from corporate marketers.
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 12:36:15 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 18, 2008, 04:54:06 AM
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122119092302626987.html
In fact, some advertisers are starting to see the marketing value of pranks. Taco Bell recently hired Mr. Todd to stage a "freeze" in a new restaurant in Flushing, N.Y., where paid extras posing as employees and patrons simply froze in place, baffling the actual customers. The stunt was later used in a viral marketing campaign for the restaurant's Frutista Freeze drink, and a video of the prank has been viewed 500,000 times online, says Taco Bell spokesman Will Bortz. "We thought it was brilliant," he says.
Well, our fangs have been pulled.
yeah, god forbid we ever reach a position that allows us to exploit and profit from corporate marketers.
Uh huh. Then we're "cool" and "cute", until the inevitable media backlash.
Quote from: Dr. Payne on September 18, 2008, 10:28:08 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 18, 2008, 04:54:06 AM
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122119092302626987.html
In fact, some advertisers are starting to see the marketing value of pranks. Taco Bell recently hired Mr. Todd to stage a "freeze" in a new restaurant in Flushing, N.Y., where paid extras posing as employees and patrons simply froze in place, baffling the actual customers. The stunt was later used in a viral marketing campaign for the restaurant's Frutista Freeze drink, and a video of the prank has been viewed 500,000 times online, says Taco Bell spokesman Will Bortz. "We thought it was brilliant," he says.
Well, our fangs have been pulled.
Why oh why didn't someone just collapse and start screaming about parasites in the Frutista eating his brain?
Goddam amateurs.
It makes me weep.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 18, 2008, 03:18:49 PM
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 12:36:15 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 18, 2008, 04:54:06 AM
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122119092302626987.html
In fact, some advertisers are starting to see the marketing value of pranks. Taco Bell recently hired Mr. Todd to stage a "freeze" in a new restaurant in Flushing, N.Y., where paid extras posing as employees and patrons simply froze in place, baffling the actual customers. The stunt was later used in a viral marketing campaign for the restaurant's Frutista Freeze drink, and a video of the prank has been viewed 500,000 times online, says Taco Bell spokesman Will Bortz. "We thought it was brilliant," he says.
Well, our fangs have been pulled.
yeah, god forbid we ever reach a position that allows us to exploit and profit from corporate marketers.
Uh huh. Then we're "cool" and "cute", until the inevitable media backlash.
you forgot "paid".
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 03:42:59 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 18, 2008, 03:18:49 PM
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 12:36:15 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 18, 2008, 04:54:06 AM
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122119092302626987.html
In fact, some advertisers are starting to see the marketing value of pranks. Taco Bell recently hired Mr. Todd to stage a "freeze" in a new restaurant in Flushing, N.Y., where paid extras posing as employees and patrons simply froze in place, baffling the actual customers. The stunt was later used in a viral marketing campaign for the restaurant's Frutista Freeze drink, and a video of the prank has been viewed 500,000 times online, says Taco Bell spokesman Will Bortz. "We thought it was brilliant," he says.
Well, our fangs have been pulled.
yeah, god forbid we ever reach a position that allows us to exploit and profit from corporate marketers.
Uh huh. Then we're "cool" and "cute", until the inevitable media backlash.
you forgot "paid".
If I wanted that kind of pay, I'd go man a glory hole down at the bus station.
Or work for the McCain campaign.
the commercialization of pranks and situationist theater is the beginning.
Now that it's a way to sell something, it loses some of its power. For those of you who read Transmetropolitan, you'll recall how when they make Spider Jerusalem (a futuristic Hunter S Thompson) into a product (they make a cartoon, a sitcom, and a soap opera based on his life), a lot of people stop taking him seriously.
I don't want to see the day when I freak out somebody with a prank or mindfuck, and they laugh it off as "one of those taco bell publicity stunts".
But we're the ones on the fringe, actually doing it. So we have the power to come up with new kinds of pranks and freakouts which are a surprising to people in a world of factory-produced surprises.
Quote from: Cramulus on September 18, 2008, 06:40:44 PM
I don't want to see the day when I freak out somebody with a prank or mindfuck, and they laugh it off as "one of those taco bell publicity stunts".
Too late. They've already killed street theater. Fortunately, that wasn't very important, anyway.
you guys are missing my point.
since this method has been co-opted, and since the result of that has been to attach a monetary value to the ability to plan and implement marketing campaigns based on absurdist-ish guerilla street theater, and since we're better at this sort of thing than most other groups out there...
why aren't we exploiting the fuck out of the idiots willing to PAY us to do this and using it to finance more ambitious projects of our own?
If your ambitious project is a massive media mindfuck and my ambitious project is buying a 12-person hot tub with mood lighting and a bose sound system and filling it with hot sluts, so what? we can both still help each other achieve BOTH goals.
good call. If I could get a $$ job $$ planning and throwing pranks, I'd shart myself with mirth every hour on the hour.
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 09:52:39 PM
you guys are missing my point.
since this method has been co-opted, and since the result of that has been to attach a monetary value to the ability to plan and implement marketing campaigns based on absurdist-ish guerilla street theater, and since we're better at this sort of thing than most other groups out there...
why aren't we exploiting the fuck out of the idiots willing to PAY us to do this and using it to finance more ambitious projects of our own?
If your ambitious project is a massive media mindfuck and my ambitious project is buying a 12-person hot tub with mood lighting and a bose sound system and filling it with hot sluts, so what? we can both still help each other achieve BOTH goals.
Always starts out that way.
Then, before you know it, you're too busy planning your next paid gig to worry about the things that matter.
Trust me. The CoN has more people and more time to lay traps than you have time to dodge them.
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
Joey Skaggs, a longtime media prankster and author of the Art of the Prank blog, is critical of some of the latest stunts. Mr. Skaggs, whose best-known pranks include duping a New York television station in 1976 with a story about a bordello for dogs, says the stunts lack a subversive, anti-establishment edge. Because of that, people are less likely to stop and think about what they're seeing -- or even care. "The bar's been really lowered," he says. "There's a lot of junk out there calling itself pranks."
I hate to say it, because I think his work is genius, but I *really* don't like that guy.
Beyond that, :mittens: to Rat and Cram.
Quote from: Cramulus on September 18, 2008, 06:40:44 PM
the commercialization of pranks and situationist theater is the beginning.
Now that it's a way to sell something, it loses some of its power. For those of you who read Transmetropolitan, you'll recall how when they make Spider Jerusalem (a futuristic Hunter S Thompson) into a product (they make a cartoon, a sitcom, and a soap opera based on his life), a lot of people stop taking him seriously.
I don't want to see the day when I freak out somebody with a prank or mindfuck, and they laugh it off as "one of those taco bell publicity stunts".
But we're the ones on the fringe, actually doing it. So we have the power to come up with new kinds of pranks and freakouts which are a surprising to people in a world of factory-produced surprises.
It just ups the bar, really. In every generation, stuff stops freaking people out, and you have to come up with new things to freak people out with. Start by freaking out yourself, right?
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 19, 2008, 12:52:47 AM
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 09:52:39 PM
you guys are missing my point.
since this method has been co-opted, and since the result of that has been to attach a monetary value to the ability to plan and implement marketing campaigns based on absurdist-ish guerilla street theater, and since we're better at this sort of thing than most other groups out there...
why aren't we exploiting the fuck out of the idiots willing to PAY us to do this and using it to finance more ambitious projects of our own?
If your ambitious project is a massive media mindfuck and my ambitious project is buying a 12-person hot tub with mood lighting and a bose sound system and filling it with hot sluts, so what? we can both still help each other achieve BOTH goals.
Always starts out that way.
Then, before you know it, you're too busy planning your next paid gig to worry about the things that matter.
Trust me. The CoN has more people and more time to lay traps than you have time to dodge them.
Yes yes yes.
Also, it would be funny as hell to borrow a riff from Don Hertzfeldt and agree to commercial projects, then produce work that's so far over the edge they could never use it.
Quote from: Nigel on September 19, 2008, 01:34:51 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 19, 2008, 12:52:47 AM
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 09:52:39 PM
you guys are missing my point.
since this method has been co-opted, and since the result of that has been to attach a monetary value to the ability to plan and implement marketing campaigns based on absurdist-ish guerilla street theater, and since we're better at this sort of thing than most other groups out there...
why aren't we exploiting the fuck out of the idiots willing to PAY us to do this and using it to finance more ambitious projects of our own?
If your ambitious project is a massive media mindfuck and my ambitious project is buying a 12-person hot tub with mood lighting and a bose sound system and filling it with hot sluts, so what? we can both still help each other achieve BOTH goals.
Always starts out that way.
Then, before you know it, you're too busy planning your next paid gig to worry about the things that matter.
Trust me. The CoN has more people and more time to lay traps than you have time to dodge them.
Yes yes yes.
Also, it would be funny as hell to borrow a riff from Don Hertzfeldt and agree to commercial projects, then produce work that's so far over the edge they could never use it.
Pretty sure these guys aren't getting paid in advance. Also fairly certain they aren't getting more than min wage (if that).
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 19, 2008, 01:35:48 AM
Quote from: Nigel on September 19, 2008, 01:34:51 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 19, 2008, 12:52:47 AM
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 09:52:39 PM
you guys are missing my point.
since this method has been co-opted, and since the result of that has been to attach a monetary value to the ability to plan and implement marketing campaigns based on absurdist-ish guerilla street theater, and since we're better at this sort of thing than most other groups out there...
why aren't we exploiting the fuck out of the idiots willing to PAY us to do this and using it to finance more ambitious projects of our own?
If your ambitious project is a massive media mindfuck and my ambitious project is buying a 12-person hot tub with mood lighting and a bose sound system and filling it with hot sluts, so what? we can both still help each other achieve BOTH goals.
Always starts out that way.
Then, before you know it, you're too busy planning your next paid gig to worry about the things that matter.
Trust me. The CoN has more people and more time to lay traps than you have time to dodge them.
Yes yes yes.
Also, it would be funny as hell to borrow a riff from Don Hertzfeldt and agree to commercial projects, then produce work that's so far over the edge they could never use it.
Pretty sure these guys aren't getting paid in advance. Also fairly certain they aren't getting more than min wage (if that).
Ohhhh but it's not about getting paid, it's about wasting a bunch of their time and then handing them something that is only lulz. And doing it TOTALLY DEADPAN. :lulz:
Can you imagine agreeing to do a cutting-edge ad for Nike, asking for three months, and then handing them something utterly beautiful and perfectly orchestrated and so fantastically fucked up THAT THEY ABSOLUTELY COULD NEVER USE IT? :lulz:
And then PITCH A HISSY FIT when they reject it.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 19, 2008, 12:52:47 AM
Always starts out that way.
Then, before you know it, you're too busy planning your next paid gig to worry about the things that matter.
Trust me. The CoN has more people and more time to lay traps than you have time to dodge them.
Ah yes... the magic of co-optation again.
Suddenly I'm having flashbacks of flower power symbols machine embroidered on a line of clothing made by little girls in India so they could be sold to counter-culture wannabees in JC Penney mega-mall outlets.
Good times.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 19, 2008, 12:52:47 AM
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 09:52:39 PM
you guys are missing my point.
since this method has been co-opted, and since the result of that has been to attach a monetary value to the ability to plan and implement marketing campaigns based on absurdist-ish guerilla street theater, and since we're better at this sort of thing than most other groups out there...
why aren't we exploiting the fuck out of the idiots willing to PAY us to do this and using it to finance more ambitious projects of our own?
If your ambitious project is a massive media mindfuck and my ambitious project is buying a 12-person hot tub with mood lighting and a bose sound system and filling it with hot sluts, so what? we can both still help each other achieve BOTH goals.
Always starts out that way.
Then, before you know it, you're too busy planning your next paid gig to worry about the things that matter.
Trust me. The CoN has more people and more time to lay traps than you have time to dodge them.
Yeah, but I'm working for the man
now. Can't I at least be doing something I find fun?
I mean, I spend my day making photocopies and proofreading worksheets. And I make shit money for it! If I'm going to be a low level white collar slave, it'd be so much cooler to be
pranking people --
professionally. How can you
not work for the CoN, anyway?
I have to agree with Cram. I am spending 40+ hours a week stuck in cubicle hell... on the upside, its a fine slack job... on the downside, its 40 freakin hours that I could be spending on something I like, if only they weren't the ones giving me teh monies.
If I could make monies pimping out the "counterculture", why not? Worst Case, I spend 40+ hours a week planning and executing mindfucks/street theatre/etc rather than writing reports on vulnerabilities and remediation.
The counterculture has been co-opted, hell, its been co-opted since the hippies wanted to give the world a Coke... in perfect harmony. ;-)
I mean, if people have ethical issues with working for 'the Man', that's fine... However, if I were to have the opportunity to make money from pranks, rather than Excel spreadsheets, Word Docs and network scans, I'd take it.
Quote from: Cramulus on September 19, 2008, 01:39:01 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 19, 2008, 12:52:47 AM
Quote from: East Coast Hustle on September 18, 2008, 09:52:39 PM
you guys are missing my point.
since this method has been co-opted, and since the result of that has been to attach a monetary value to the ability to plan and implement marketing campaigns based on absurdist-ish guerilla street theater, and since we're better at this sort of thing than most other groups out there...
why aren't we exploiting the fuck out of the idiots willing to PAY us to do this and using it to finance more ambitious projects of our own?
If your ambitious project is a massive media mindfuck and my ambitious project is buying a 12-person hot tub with mood lighting and a bose sound system and filling it with hot sluts, so what? we can both still help each other achieve BOTH goals.
Always starts out that way.
Then, before you know it, you're too busy planning your next paid gig to worry about the things that matter.
Trust me. The CoN has more people and more time to lay traps than you have time to dodge them.
Yeah, but I'm working for the man now. Can't I at least be doing something I find fun?
I mean, I spend my day making photocopies and proofreading worksheets. And I make shit money for it! If I'm going to be a low level white collar slave, it'd be so much cooler to be pranking people -- professionally. How can you not work for the CoN, anyway?
Oh. I get paid to abuse people, you see.
Quote from: singer on September 19, 2008, 12:02:44 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 19, 2008, 12:52:47 AM
Always starts out that way.
Then, before you know it, you're too busy planning your next paid gig to worry about the things that matter.
Trust me. The CoN has more people and more time to lay traps than you have time to dodge them.
Ah yes... the magic of co-optation again.
Suddenly I'm having flashbacks of flower power symbols machine embroidered on a line of clothing made by little girls in India so they could be sold to counter-culture wannabees in JC Penney mega-mall outlets.
Good times.
Ah, yes...or American flags made in China.
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 07:54:49 PMWell you all already know that I think the drive is irrational and goes well beyond reason anyway...even boredom and entertainment do not come into it. Its subversion is a matter of what it is, not what it aims for. It disrupts, confuzes and inverts the normal, and by interrupting any orderly functioning system, you are a priori subversive.
this reminds me of that bit in Illuminatus about how people ("the robot") subconsciously sabotage the Machine.
Quote from: PayneWhy oh why didn't someone just collapse and start screaming about parasites in the Frutista eating his brain?
Goddam amateurs.
:mittens:
Quote from: Triple Zero on November 16, 2008, 03:22:58 PM
Quote from: PayneWhy oh why didn't someone just collapse and start screaming about parasites in the Frutista eating his brain?
Goddam amateurs.
:mittens:
S'Troof
Without a pointed message or "higher cause" you're doing corporate marketers work for them.
They can just hijack your messageless, broadly appealing stunts because there isn't a message in people's mind's to compete with it. It's like having a catalog of selling ideas with a fill in the blank for the copy and brand strategy.
If there was a strong message associated with these stunts, marketers wouldn't touch them because they'd interfere with their selling ideas.
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 07:37:08 PM
As an aside, its also worth noting that a lack of message or movement behind an action is the counterculture now. Anything else gets co-opted too quickly. Micro-culture and anonymous situations are a protest in that they cannot be captured and used by marketing executives and the movers and shakers of the media/popular culture, and anyone who truly thinks old thinking will work here is deluding themselves.
Evidence pls.
Also define "old thinking" and "new thinking."
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 07:37:08 PM
As an aside, its also worth noting that a lack of message or movement behind an action is the counterculture now. Anything else gets co-opted too quickly. Micro-culture and anonymous situations are a protest in that they cannot be captured and used by marketing executives and the movers and shakers of the media/popular culture, and anyone who truly thinks old thinking will work here is deluding themselves.
I just want to say to this: sometimes having no resolute message *is* a message onto itself.
When the "Silent Rave" went down in NY, it gave me warm fuzzies. It was just a bunch of lovely people genuinely having fun and collectively making each other happy. I think that touches people and speaks on a whole level that a mere prank with a political agenda never could. It was pure. It was real and it was beautiful.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8leK1mfNivc
I fucking love people sometimes, man. When was the last time
you felt that?
Silent Rave? That sounds like fun -- the video doesn't explain too well though. Was it people getting together for a party atmosphere but with no music?
were you in NYC this april?
Quote from: navkat on November 27, 2008, 03:32:36 PM
I love fucking people sometimes, man. When was the last time you felt that?
word
Everyone brought headphones, ipods, walkmans, whatever and gathered in Union Square and just got down. All day and all night. People who might never otherwise have attended a traditional "rave" and people from all walks of life (who otherwise might never have spoken to each other) got involved and partied down.
Additionally, I have some friends in Vancouver who throw "Guerilla Raves."
This guy, Drew, sets his gear up on a predesignated place (usually a train-car or a fast food restaurant) at a specific time and he does a live PA techno set while everyone parties until they get kicked out. Usually the law is really good-natured about it and everyone has a good time.
This is Drew doing the Skytrain Rave in 06:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3vRc6ootYY
My hometowns are Babylon & Brentwood, NY, BTW so yeah; I'm in NY a lot but not this past April.
yo, give a holla next time you're in the area
I live in Yonkers, but rarely venture into the city
I kind of hate NYC
but it's tolerable if I'm hanging out with people
Why do you hate NYC?
Quote from: navkat on November 27, 2008, 03:32:36 PM
Quote from: Cain on September 16, 2008, 07:37:08 PM
As an aside, its also worth noting that a lack of message or movement behind an action is the counterculture now. Anything else gets co-opted too quickly. Micro-culture and anonymous situations are a protest in that they cannot be captured and used by marketing executives and the movers and shakers of the media/popular culture, and anyone who truly thinks old thinking will work here is deluding themselves.
I just want to say to this: sometimes having no resolute message *is* a message onto itself.
When the "Silent Rave" went down in NY, it gave me warm fuzzies. It was just a bunch of lovely people genuinely having fun and collectively making each other happy. I think that touches people and speaks on a whole level that a mere prank with a political agenda never could. It was pure. It was real and it was beautiful.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8leK1mfNivc
I fucking love people sometimes, man. When was the last time you felt that?
I fucking LOVE pranks, and my favorite kind are the ones that make the pranked want to laugh/join in, but a close second are random acts of group weirdness and fun.
Quote from: Cramulus on November 27, 2008, 04:06:43 PM
yo, give a holla next time you're in the area
I live in Yonkers, but rarely venture into the city
I kind of hate NYC
but it's tolerable if I'm hanging out with people
Awesome. I'm gonna take you up on that.
:hammer: :hosrie: :noodledance:
Quote from: BAWHEED on November 27, 2008, 04:14:30 PM
Why do you hate NYC?
I could really go on for pages about this, but in short:
It's too big for my taste. I think when a city hits a certain critical mass, the social climate changes. Other people are expendable because there's no shortage of them.
Something about the size of the city and the number of different scenes and threads makes it a
factory for Big Fish in a Small Pond. I dislike people that think they are the King of All Kings because they have NYC hacker cred or something
Every mean thing people say about upper east coast elitists is basically true. A lot of New Yorkers think of themselves as sophisticated cognoscenti, and think of anyone from outside NY as some kind of bumpkin. There's certainly a very strong vibe in new york that New York is FOR REAL and everywhere else is PEANUTS.
I haven't spent a lot of time in London, but I got the same vibe there. Maybe it was the size, maybe it was 'cause I was a tourist, but it felt very similar to NYC. People are unapproachable. Self-isolation is a survival skill. Everything is retardedly expensive.
The last sentence is certainly true.
Cain,
had a coffee in London, then filed for bankruptcy
Quote from: Cramulus on November 28, 2008, 02:28:08 PM
Quote from: BAWHEED on November 27, 2008, 04:14:30 PM
Why do you hate NYC?
I could really go on for pages about this, but in short:
It's too big for my taste. I think when a city hits a certain critical mass, the social climate changes. Other people are expendable because there's no shortage of them.
Something about the size of the city and the number of different scenes and threads makes it a factory for Big Fish in a Small Pond. I dislike people that think they are the King of All Kings because they have NYC hacker cred or something
Every mean thing people say about upper east coast elitists is basically true. A lot of New Yorkers think of themselves as sophisticated cognoscenti, and think of anyone from outside NY as some kind of bumpkin. There's certainly a very strong vibe in new york that New York is FOR REAL and everywhere else is PEANUTS.
I haven't spent a lot of time in London, but I got the same vibe there. Maybe it was the size, maybe it was 'cause I was a tourist, but it felt very similar to NYC. People are unapproachable. Self-isolation is a survival skill. Everything is retardedly expensive.
He's right. About everything.
When I first left NY (even though I grew up on The Island, NYC was my backyard and stomping ground), I had this general assumption in my head that
of course New Yorkers are much more advanced than the rest of the country. I wasn't really mean about it, just prejudiced.
There's a sort of sociopathy in the social soup there. People can be really awesome when they want to be, but day-to-day, it's dog-eat-dog. This wouldn't be so bad except for the fact that New Yorkers are raised to be PROUD of it. "If you don't like it then hey! Go fuck yourself!" There's a certain pride that comes from being the meanest dog with the biggest teeth--like a sign around your neck that says "You don't wanna fuck with ME, buddy."
New York has a lot of good qualities too. Sometimes I get homesick because shit gets so DEAD here...the instant gratification of having every fucking cuisine, entertainment, music, art, subculture--right down to the obscure at your fingertips spoils you for anywhere else. It's like sensory overload all the time and since I've left, I've gained seven pounds because I spend so much of my time craving...something...walking from room to room of my house, driving everywhere, snacking, smoking and not being able to figure out what it is.
NY is a 24-7 dirty Cocaine Disco with the stench of perfume and bum pee and burnt kosher hotdogs on it.
But to live there all the time is not worth it. New York loves her tourists who come for a visit and spend their money freely, but as soon as you're down on your luck or have actual BILLS to pay, The City, she is a cruel bitch.
Toronto has it too... most cities do to a certain extent. I think its because living in huge cities can be so annoying that it literally starts to feel like you are some kind of warrior simply for being able to put up with it on a daily basis. The, you start to think less of the people who don't go through what you are going through... as I would assume actual soldiers must feel a lot of the time.
Toronto gets a lot of heat from the rest of Canada, which in turn makes Torontoians even more unpleasant to people not from here. Sort of a "Fuck you before you can say anything" vibe... I would assume its similar in NYC.
Am I blaming you for the New York headspace? No. But I'm not blaming NYC either. It's quid pro quo.
The specific thing I hate about NYC is not present in most other cities I've been to. I've been to a handful of large cities, and none of them (save London) made me feel like such an outsider. I think it's the size. Wouldn't be surprised if it was present in Toronto too.
In Portland, I felt like if I did something cool, people would actually notice. I mean, it's small enough of a city that it feels like a big community. I spent a lot of time in Portland just biking around and talking to people, and within three days, the place felt comfortingly familiar.
In New York, nothing is as salient as how tiny and insignificant you are when juxtaposed with the 20 million person greater-metropolitan area.
So, it's no so much about NYC as it is about you really. I realize that sentence sounds like a shitty comment, but I don't mean it that way. It's not intended as a dig of any sort, but it does seem to be about your mindset in a large crowd than it really is about NYC or London or Toronto.
well certainly, my brain and how it relates to a city is one of the components of my dislike for New York. But I wouldn't say it's just that.
Fair enough.
Quote from: BAWHEED on November 28, 2008, 03:15:24 PM
Toronto has it too... most cities do to a certain extent. I think its because living in huge cities can be so annoying that it literally starts to feel like you are some kind of warrior simply for being able to put up with it on a daily basis. The, you start to think less of the people who don't go through what you are going through... as I would assume actual soldiers must feel a lot of the time.
Toronto gets a lot of heat from the rest of Canada, which in turn makes Torontoians even more unpleasant to people not from here. Sort of a "Fuck you before you can say anything" vibe... I would assume its similar in NYC.
Am I blaming you for the New York headspace? No. But I'm not blaming NYC either. It's quid pro quo.
When I lived in Vancouver, they called Toronto "New York North"
lol
Quote from: navkat on November 28, 2008, 04:40:08 PM
Quote from: BAWHEED on November 28, 2008, 03:15:24 PM
Toronto has it too... most cities do to a certain extent. I think its because living in huge cities can be so annoying that it literally starts to feel like you are some kind of warrior simply for being able to put up with it on a daily basis. The, you start to think less of the people who don't go through what you are going through... as I would assume actual soldiers must feel a lot of the time.
Toronto gets a lot of heat from the rest of Canada, which in turn makes Torontoians even more unpleasant to people not from here. Sort of a "Fuck you before you can say anything" vibe... I would assume its similar in NYC.
Am I blaming you for the New York headspace? No. But I'm not blaming NYC either. It's quid pro quo.
When I lived in Vancouver, they called Toronto "New York North"
lol
And we call Vancouver "Frisco North".