Calculated Play? Games as a metaphor, medium and method

The panel will be structured around two projects created by artists known for their work on sociopolitical games.

Today's algorithmic world looks more and more like a well-calculated game. Its set rules are meant to delimit the field of open possibilities towards the most precise possible predictions of all moves, preferences and interactions. Is this however for the benefit of the user/ the worker/ the citizen? Do gameful logistics change the way power structures function or do they rather intensify asymmetries pointing to an unfortunate impasse?

To respond to these questions, the panel turns to new game projects created by artists and theorists working in this direction. Placing the player against the algorithm, different game scenarios that speculate on the future of algorithmic work and life can be discussed. Can cracks in the system still be located and exploited or do humans progressively lose all control? Does contingency, an integral element of the algorithmic logic, still allow room for the unexpected or is the battle already lost? Perhaps the algorithm can still be played as Alexander Galloway once wrote.