Dear Philip E. Agre is a series of letters to Phil Agre, a renown scholar and professor in information sciences. Coming from a performance and writing background, I am deeply inspired by the way Agre uses examples of everyday behavioral routines to illustrate the way in which computation and communication technologies affect human interaction and privacy. Not necessarily expecting a reply, I decided to write him a letter to reflect on his essays. Herein, I meticulously describe brief, fleeting encounters with people in my daily life, while touching upon his writing on the obsession to constantly upkeep our always present, digital relationships as our "always-on world" requires. By approaching these activities, both improvised and routine, from a computational standpoint, I ask him if he thinks we could device a mathematical analyzation of all variables involved in my previous encounters as a hypothetical solution to figuring out how to connect and relate to people.
During my research, I found out he was reported missing by his former employer UCLA in October 2009, and found and deemed safe in January 2010 by LA's Sheriff's department. He requested to be left alone, and disappeared again. A few colleagues who feared for his mental and physical health teamed up to search for him. They updated those interested through Twitter, a website and a Facebook page. Countless people expressed their concern by posting messages on the very networks he chose to abandon. After searching for him for over a year, a member of the group was able to talk to him in person. Mr. Agre again expressed the desire to be left alone, to remain "offline."
My letters thus remained unanswered, and became more and more introspective. A talking to Phil while talking to myself. But then again, isn't that a big part of human interaction to begin with...
The project was published in Sniff, Scrape, Scrawl (Mute, 2012), and presented at the literature conference Meeting at the Crossroads in the form of a video lecture. Download the letters as a pdf.