Social change does not simply result from resistance to the existing set of conditions but from adapting and transforming the technical apparatus itself. Walter Benjamin in his essay "The Author as Producer" (written in 1934) recommends that the `cultural producer' intervene in the production process, in order to transform the apparatus in the manner of an engineer.This collection of essays and examples of contemporary cultural practices (the second in the DATA browser series) asks if this general line of thinking retains relevance for cultural production at this point in time - when activities of production, consumption and circulation operate through complex global networks served by information technologies. In the 1930s, under particular conditions and against the backdrop of fascism, a certain political optimism made social change seem more possible. Can this optimism be maintained when technology operates in the service of capital in ever more insidious ways?

Great mix of contributors including Esther Leslie Cutting-edge critical theory - includes an analysis of the film 'The Yes Men' Explores how & why new technologies - like the internet - have changed the relationship between mass culture and high art Focuses on the economics of cultural production - the power relation between producers and consumers The interaction between culture and economy was famously explored by Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer. They coined the term 'Kulturindustrie' (The Culture Industry) to describe the production of mass culture and power relations between capitalist producers and mass consumers. Their account is a bleak one, but one that continues to be relevant, despite being written in 1944. Today, the pervasiveness of network technologies has contributed to the further erosion of the rigid boundaries between high art, mass culture and the economy, resulting in new kinds of cultural production charged with contradictions. On the one hand, the culture industry appears to allow for resistant strategies using digital technologies, but on the other it operates in the service of capital in ever more complex ways. critical texts that explore issues at the intersection of culture and technology. The editorial group are Geoff Cox, Joasia Krysa, Anya Lewin, Malcolm Miles, Mike Punt & Hugo de Rijke.