iMine (2010)
Mobile phone app, networked environment, website Acknowledgements: Axel Hunstock and Juan José Pezzutti for extra math; the staff at SummerLAB
Photo: Marcos Morilla
iMine, an informational networked game for mobile technology, designed to give mobile users a palpable understanding of the real material conditions at play in the material genesis of their technology of convenience. This is a work about the “persistance of hardware” in new media, exploring the difficult territory between the hopes of a networked future and the physical contemporary reality of mining and industrial production. Commemorating the 4+ million victims of the conflict-mineral wars in Central Africa, iMine integrates real-time models of the production conditions of technology seamlessly into the use of that technology.
iMine is a model for a hybrid informational mobile media activity. It can function as a game, however it can also function as a portal to more information and understanding about the physical reality of the production of new technology, even so far as giving up to date mineral prices. In this way, iMine shows the paradox of the avant garde in raising consciousness and attempting to improve the lot of humanity it relies on, and affords the perpetuation of conditions of injustice and despair. The minerals used in mobile devices are some of the most hard-fought on the planet. Check the latest mineral prices on the high performance mobile CPU running iMine and get to know the miner who will bring them from the earth!
