In the Gig Economy, you've got to get the job done- or risk automation. In a world where Amazon, Uber, and Facebook are looming mega-opolies, you need to work, 'like', and subscribe to stay alive.
Tap your phone screen to deliver boxes and defend your minimum-wage job against impending automation in quick-paced, casual gameplay. If you make it to the end of your shift, you rack up points after-hours by using the company's social media app. Gigco: Escape the Gig Economy explores the games that are behind our work.
Tap your phone screen to deliver boxes and defend your minimum-wage job against impending automation. If you can't maneuver around the robots and complete your task, the lights dim; the warehouse transitions to fully automated, machine-vision. If you make it to the end of your shift, you rack up points after-hours by using the company's social media app.
Looking critically at how technology is shaping the ways we work, Gigco uses gameplay as an analogy for civic participation, inverting the logic of contemporary 'gamifying' trends.
Life is a headlong stumble through the grey mists of work and toil; a clockwork monotony of lift the box, put the box down. Moments flit before me, reminders of the space between clocking off and clocking on - text messages, fragments of conversations like brilliant fireflies, their dances meaningless on the factory floor.
-Harry Slater, Pocket GamerI wouldn't call it a fun game. It is frustrating, cruel even. There is no winning. Success yields no special reward — only that you get to keep your job one day longer. Still, I find myself returning to better my score. That's how GIGCO — and, to some extent, the labour market it represents — gets you.
-Chris Hampton, CBCThis game makes me feel hopeful that games in the future aren't about loot boxes, but about moving boxes from place to place.
-con.orb, userAddictive tap and dash gameplay where the looming shadow of complete obsolescence hangs over your player's every waking moment. The moment when PRIME replaces primate.
-milescollyer, user
Gigco: Escape the Gig Economy is a project by Cat Bluemke and SpekWork studio. You can get in touch at cat@spek.work, and get more information through their websites and social media linked below.
