The Glass Room: An Investigation And Intervention Into Our Online Lives Pops-Up In New York On CyberMonday

NEW YORK, Nov. 29, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- At first glance, The Glass Room looks like another slick tech store offering the latest shiny digital consumer products. Go inside, and you'll find something more unusual on the tables - an "UnFitBit" for fabricating exercise data, a facial recognition system to monitor event attendance, and the Socio-Metric work badge, an activity tracker that monitors workplace activity, such as how often employees sit, stand or raise their hands in meetings.

Launching on CyberMonday, The Glass Room is actually a faux storefront where the 'products' are artworks, investigations and activist projects designed to provoke personal reflection and public commentary on personal data, privacy and security. Some, like the Socio-Metric badge and the Churchix facial-recognition attendance tracker, are real products in the market today. The onsite volunteer store team is a helpful group of hoodie-wearing "inGeniouses." Rather than upsell visitors on more memory or extra gadgets, the inGeniouses engage visitors in an examination of their online lives and offer strategies to better control personal data and privacy.

The Glass Room exhibition includes 54 objects and artworks spread across four tables:

• Open the Box - a visualization and exploration of what our personal data looks like
• Something to Hide - a look at how personal data is captured that forces us to consider whether we actually have nothing to hide
• Normal is Boring - an exploration of ambitious and alarming moonshot projects U.S. tech giants are pursuing with their vast wealth
• Big Mama - a look at tech innovations that normalize surveillance under the mandate of care
• And a Data Detox Bar - a drop in bar that teaches visitors how to better control their online data and privacy

A whimsical yet sobering interlude to the holiday shopping season, The Glass Room is presented by Mozilla, the makers of the Firefox browser, and curated by Tactical Technology, a Berlin-based non profit, working at the intersection of tech, activism and politics. Spread across a spartan space in NoLita, The Glass Room is a space to explore our own data traces, spark examination of our own online lives, and find out how – using a selection of free, alternative apps and a Data Detox guide – to take back some control over our digital selves.

The Glass Room
https://theglassroomnyc.org/ 
Location: Nolita, 201 Mulberry Street, New York, NY, 10012
Dates: November 29, 2016 - December 14, 2016
Regular Hours: Daily 12 - 8 PM Special Hours: Tue. November 29, 2016 Noon - 4 PM

About Mozilla
Mozilla has been a pioneer and advocate for the open web for more than 15 years. We promote open standards that enable innovation and advance the Web as a platform for all. Today, hundreds of millions of people worldwide use Mozilla Firefox to experience the Web on computers, tablets and mobile devices. For more information, visit www.mozilla.org. 

About Tactical Tech
Tactical Tech is a non-profit organization, working since 2003 to advance the use of information and digital technologies by advocates and activists worldwide. Based in Berlin, we work with an international network of partners and collaborators to help rights, accountability and transparency advocates and the communities they work with to use information and digital technologies effectively in their work. Working at the intersection of tech, activism and politics, Tactical Tech reaches more than three million people worldwide annually through exhibitions, events, training and online resources. www.tacticaltech.org, @info_activism

SOURCE Tactical Tech

Related Links

https://tacticaltech.org/