Annette Schindler, [plug.in] Art and New Media, Basel, 11.11.03
Users select a keyword for which they receive up-to-the-minute, customised news reports within seconds. In a trendy but trustworthy design, with the proven interaction structure of well-known news agencies, the news articles are divided into headlines, leads and content texts, audio-visual material and links to related news.
Loogie.net uses standard search engines to search for texts, images and videos on the desired topic. The content found is stored in a database, analysed by a text classification system and classified according to importance. Related terms are defined by the programme and only the data identified as relevant by the computer algorithm is used and automatically compiled into a news page. Loogie.net news is therefore not produced by humans, but by ‘computer-generated reporters’ or intelligent software. They are therefore not subject to the selection of party opinions or power interests but to that of the machine, which is fed by the more democratic but also arbitrary information pools of the Internet. By delegating all power of definition back to the machine, the artist also takes an ambivalent and critical look at our society’s seemingly unbridled faith in technology.
Users can have their personalised news read out by online newsreaders, print out the entire story, send it on by email or give the ‘reporter’ feedback on his text in the form of ratings and comments. Finally, they can intervene directly in the content by replacing text: For a generally more positive basic tone, you could replace ‘bad’ with ‘not very good’, for example, or you could go further and replace ‘George W. Bush’ with ‘Britney Spears’, for instance, and bring the pop icon to world power.
His claims (“Loogie.net is the most trusted organisation in the world.’ ‘We Report – You Decide!’ ‘When News breaks – Loogie.net is there.”) are derived just as much from the copy-paste principle as the staff – an army of editors and reporters, superiors and subordinates from all over the world with names and portraits: here, too, the artist holds up a mirror to the media’s desire for self-promotion and hierarchical structure – but also to all those who accept such mechanisms unquestioningly.
Probably the most subversive part of the work, however, is the way in which it utilises and exploits the workings of the internet: all news items are linked and archived. This rapidly growing archive is constantly indexed by search engines. As many new pages are added every day, the importance of the Loogie.net news websites for search engines increases. This results in a higher ranking and the probability that you will end up on generated Loogie.net news pages instead of well-known online news companies when surfing via a search engine is constantly increasing. The pages found in this way can cause confusion, because the misinformation they contain is recognisable in contrast to that of the ‘big players’, and thus also exposes the latter.
Lies have short legs – and fast data channels. Basel-based [plug.in] proudly presents what is probably Switzerland’s most furtive Internet work to date.
By Annina Zimmermann, Regioartline, October 2003
The invitations to international festivals such as ars electronica or the upcoming Basel Viper prove what a long-awaited product Marc Lee is launching: Loogie.net is a news channel that delivers custom-made, tailor-made news to our homes. We sit in our TV armchairs and believe we are watching an American broadcaster: well-dressed presenters extol the advantages of loogie.net, lead us to a picture report, switch on an external correspondent by telephone or conduct interviews with experts. A familiar situation, except for one significant difference: we ourselves determine the news of the day. We quickly type in the keywords we want to know about on the remote control.
Information on command: Images and texts from the news programme are searched for on the Internet in real time and seamlessly combined by the specially programmed software. This software automatically selects the text content and fits images, videos and interviews into the windows provided so that they always correspond to the style of CNN. In formal terms, everything appears to be trustworthy and professional – but the content of the information is unpredictable: sometimes reliable and coherent, often arbitrary or even Dadaistically following an unintelligible logic, the data tracked down on the worldwide web is mixed together. How does this approach distinguish the news machine from journalists’ research? Don’t they also have ideological and subjective ‘filters’ that are comparable to programming?
Loogie.net is surprisingly powerful and realises a desirable model: that we are responsible for our own information, that we are in control of the selection, extent and timing of our knowledge acquisition instead of being lazily fed by TV stations. Conversely, loogie.net also caricatures our media consumption by undermining our trust. It also makes it clear that ultimately we can only experience what we are prepared to absorb. And we will – consciously or unconsciously – continue to process and manipulate this information. Interactivity as a malicious game Like every decent news channel, Loogie.net has now also set up a portal on the Internet. Here you can not only compile an article as you wish, you can also have fun infiltrating it with your own input. Words can be replaced in articles: You are free to choose whether to have your favourite singer beatified in Mother Theresa’s place or even offer yourself to act as a negotiator for Palestine. The text can not only be read aloud and sent – it will also be saved, tracked down by Google, for example, and thus cause confusion for other users. They will probably interpret the trendy logo ‘loogie.net’ as the word ‘log in’ and are unlikely to pronounce it in Swiss dialect as ‘Lügennetz’.
These days, lies use fast data channels – and Marc Lee uses the powerful, but also unquestionable search services as an efficient distribution channel for a subversive net art that disguises itself behind an unsuspicious, borrowed surface.