[NetBehaviour] UnProductive Solutions

[Marialaura Ghidini]

Dear List,

We want to introduce you to UnProductive Solutions, a curatorial & research project posing as an international holding company, https://unproductivesolutions.com/  

UnProductive Solutions develops digital technologies that escape the logic of hyper-efficiency and productivity. The project offers a critical perspective on technology and its impact on us as humans by investing in products and platforms that honour the irrationality of human emotions and the pleasures of idleness and fortuitous occurrences.

Are you tired of the seductiveness of the experiential narratives of the tech industry? Of technology predicting human behaviours to provide users with solutions? Of AI companions who simulate care and love? Do you want to release users from the assumptions and standardised logic of algorithms?

Over the course of ten weeks, UnProductive Solutions is launching five new technologies developed by 'subsidiary companies'. Each company is an artistic project by an international artist invited to collaborate with us. Their tech services explore the externalities of the gig economy, the Blockchain as a kind of Cargo cult that presumes to dispense precious objects, the moralistic discourse of the post-internet plateau, the displacement of algorithmic assistive technologies with human poetry, and bio surveillance and the boundaries of our bodies, among other topics. 

At present, three “subsidiary companies” have launched services on UnProductive Solutions.

> *The Emotional Labor Wage Calculator* that was developed by *TRK: technically responsible knowledge* (founder and CEO, Caroline Sinders - New Orleans, USA). The calculator offers insider advice on the challenges of e-delivery jobs and to help consumers calculate what an equitable wage should be. https://unproductivesolutions.com/tkr-calculator-subsidiary/ 

> *proof of word™* that was developed by *Trust Chain Solutions* (founders Guido Segni and Matìas Reyes - Tuscany, Italy) and allows people to register a promise using blockchain technology. The platform offers users to speak their word out loud to the world and sculpt it forever on the blockchain with a few clicks. https://unproductivesolutions.com/trust-chain-solutions-subsidiary/ and https://proofofword.business/  

> Last week, the NO DATA INSTITUTE (founder, Tara Kelton — Bangalore, India) has joined the UnPro portfolio of subsidiaries. From March 10 - March 19, their service — *Storage Search Engine™* — offers a human-powered search platform that gives users access to minds around the globe. Their mission is complete privacy – to create a world in which recording is no longer permitted, and information is never stored. https://unproductivesolutions.com/no-data-institute-subsidiary/ and https://nostorage.land/  

Over the next five weeks, UnPro will launch two additional technologies. The artists behind these subsidiary companies are Bruce Asbestos (Nottingham, UK) and Lauren Lee McCarthy (Los Angeles, USA). 

Last but not least, UnProductive Solutions is always looking for collaborations and ideas that deviate from the standard. If you want to get in touch, we’d love to hear yours. https://unproductivesolutions.com/pitch/


All the bests,
Marialaura & Rebekah


Who we are:

We have been working together as Modrak&Ghidini since 2017, when we launched the project #exstrange - an intervention into the online marketplace eBay. We bring together our different interests: Rebekah’s creative resistance to consumer culture using the company-as-medium, and Marialaura’s interest in online curation and working with various exhibition formats.
https://rebekahmodrak.com/
https://marialaura-ghidini.hotglue.me/