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STAGES of TECHNOLOGY Performance and Production in The STAGES OF TECHNOLOGY Performance and Production in the Tech Industry Li Cornfeld Department of Art History and Communication Studies, McGill University, Montreal July 2017 A thesis submitted to McGill University in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy ©Li Cornfeld 2017 ii Abstract Stages of Technology: Performance and Production in the Tech Industry investigates live presentations of emerging technology under late capitalism. Employing feminist theories and methods, the dissertation proceeds through a series of case studies, analyzing how the work of promotional presentation transcends tech industry labor hierarchies. I examine tech demos delivered by (1) corporate CEOs at the pinnacle of the industry who unveil products during keynote addresses, (2) founders of startups just getting off the ground who craft pitches for funding competitions, and (3) models hired to represent companies at tradeshows who debut new technologies on the show floor. Forging connections between media studies and performance studies, this research shows how corporate unveilings of new technologies establish product narratives; how investors evaluate tech startups’ presentational aesthetics; and how the affective labor of tradeshow models creates the ambiance of tech exhibitions despite their exclusion from industry discourses of tech work. Across each of these studies, I argue that live performance shapes the meaning of emerging technology throughout its processes of production. Live demos promise unmediated access to media technologies, while cultivating shared sensibilities among select groups of people in the same room at the same time. Through spectacles staged at tech conventions, companies negotiate cultural meanings of emerging technology in advance of its commercial circulation. These presentations variously provide discursive frames for technologies without clear cultural resonances or rearticulate familiar technologies by supplying them with new valences. By attending to the role of promotional spectacle at tech industry events, the dissertation shows how live performance legitimates the industrial imagination of emerging technology. iii Résumé “Mises en scène de la technologie: Performance et production dans l'industrie technologique” étudient les présentations en direct des téchnologies émergentes dans le cadre du capitalisme moderne. Employant des théories et des méthodes féministes, cette thèse est organisée autours d’une série d'études de cas qui analysent comment le travail de présentation promotionnelle dépasse les hiérarchies du travail de l'industrie technologique. J'examine desdémos technologiques données par (1) des PDG d'entreprises leader de l'industrie qui dévoilent des produits lors de discours d'ouverture, (2) desfondateurs des jeunes startups présentant leurs idées durant des concours de financement et (3) des mannequins embauchés pour représenter des entreprises durant des salons professionels lançant des nouvelles technologies pendant leurs évenements . En formantdes liens entre les études médiatiques et les études de la performance, cette etude montre comment les dévoilements d’entreprise des nouvelles technologies établissent des récits à propos des produits; Comment les investisseurs évaluent l'esthétique de présentation des startups technologiques; Et comment le travail affectif des modèles de salon crée l'ambiance de l'exposition technologique malgré leur exclusion des discours industriels du travail technologique. Dans chacune de ces études, je soutiens que les performances en direct façonnent le sens de la technologie émergente tout au long de son processus de production. Les démonstrations en direct promettent un accès immédiat aux technologies des médias, tout en cultivant simultanément les sensibilités partagées entre certains groupes de personnes dans la même salle. Grâce aux spectacles organisés dans les conventions technologiques, les entreprises négocient les différentes significations culturelles de la technologie émergente avant leur circulation commerciale. Ces présentations fournissent soit des cadres discursifs variés pour des technologies qui sont sans résonances culturelles claires, soit des réarticulations de technologies familières en leur apportant de nouvelles valences. En étudiant le rôle des spectacles promotionnels dans les événements de l'industrie technologique, cette dissertation démontre comment les performances en direct légitiment l'imagination industrielle de la technologie émergente. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................................................... ii RÉSUMÉ ....................................................................................................................................................... iii LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................................................ v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .......................................................................................................................... vi PREFACE .................................................................................................................................................... vii INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................................... 1 CRITICAL APPROACHES TO SPECTACLE AND EXHIBITION: TRADESHOWS AND TECH DEMOS ................................................................................................................. 14 STRUCTURE OF THE DISSERTATION: RESEARCH METHODS AND CHAPTER BREAKDOWN ...................................................................................... 27 CHAPTER 1: PRODUCT LAUNCHES AND LIVE PERFORMANCE ............................................... 35 LIKE PULLING A RABBIT FROM A HAT: THE PRODUCT LAUNCH AS LIVE THEATER ................................................................................................... 41 OBVIOUSLY IT CAN TALK: LIVENESS AS ANIMACY ............................................................................................................................... 60 THE BLOOD IN THE MACHINE: LIVENESS AS VITALITY ................................................................................................................................ 73 ONE MORE THING: LIVENESS AS A PROMOTIONAL FORM .......................................................................................................... 93 CHAPTER 2: CONFERENCES AND CONTESTS ............................................................................... 101 A THREE-DIMENSIONAL THING TO WALK AROUND IN: CONFERENCES AND THE VALUE OF THE LIVE EVENT ................................................................................. 106 AND THE WINNER IS: CONTESTS AND CAPITALISM ..................................................................................................................... 119 PERFECT THEATER: SPECTACLE AND ENCOUNTER .................................................................................................................... 137 ANYONE WHO LOOKS LIKE ZUCKERBERG: INCLUSION AND EXCLUSION IN STARTUP PERFORMANCE CULTURE ........................................................... 155 CHAPTER 3: BOOTH BABES AND EXPO EROTICS ....................................................................... 172 AN ARMY OF 20-SOMETHING-YEAR-OLD FEMALES: BOOTH BABES IN THE TECH INDUSTRY ...................................................................................................... 176 MODEL/ HOSTESS: THE GREY MEDIA OF EXPO EROTICS .......................................................................................................... 191 HOT MANNEQUIN: PERFORMING THE EXPO SPECTACLE .......................................................................................................... 199 THE HANDMAIDEN OF TECHNOLOGY: EXHIBITION AND TECHNO-EROTICISM ....................................................................................................... 214 TOWARDS A THEORY OF PROMOSEXUALITY: A BOOTH BABE CODA ................................................................................................................................ 226 CONCLUSION: PERFORMANCE ON THE PERIPHERIES ............................................................ 233 BIBLIOGRAPHY ...................................................................................................................................... 250 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Steve Jobs demos the Macintosh, Apple Shareholders Meeting, 1984 ................................... 50 Figure 2: “The Wizard’s Search.” Thomas Edison cover of The Daily Graphic, 1879 ......................... 50 Figure 3: Tim Cook and Bono salute each other, Apple Special Event, 2014 ....................................... 83 Figure 4: Steve Jobs demos the iPhone, MacWorld, 2007 ..................................................................... 83 Figure 5: TechCrunch Disrupt SF auditorium, 2015 ........................................................................... 118 Figure 6: Michael Arrington interviews Mark Zuckerberg, TechCrunch Disrupt SF, 2012 ............... 118 Figure 7: Layer wins the Disrupt Cup, TechCrunch Disrupt SF, 2013 ............................................... 136 Figure 8: Startup Battlefield, TechCrunch Disrupt SF, 2015 .............................................................
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