DIY has been a crafty movement that has been a response to capitalistic industrial movements. It might be an extension of craft or an expansion to the point assembling or creating your own furniture. The concept of DIY has an idea of being an individual and doing it by “yourself”. This individualism movement is then augmented to DIWO. DIWO is when you are joined by others who have the same goal as you but not too many, to “rebel” against a normative movement. Participants in this movement are individuals brought together to do what DIY was brought to do but with more hands and more brains.
Marc Garrett mentioned E-mail Art, an activity where artists create art in real time through mail platforms, creating a quick and fast system to develop the artwork. By doing so, the work is documented and the final product and the process can be presented seamlessly. This is very similar to the reddit art making process here
Apart from the example, Garrett was also working on to create a flourishing DIWO movement by using digital networks and creating an art platform to help flourish through quick communication and interactions between individuals of cross-disciplines.
On a personal basis, I am intrigued by post internet and internet art. While the world is vast, creative networks all over the world are able to swiftly communicate through networks and social media. Creating work across the globe is much easier and more efficient. This allows work to be made across timezones and using the creative energy from others with different cultural backgrounds to collaborate.
While DIWO is led by an altruistic, artistic process, the concepts are no different to outsourcing and decentralisation (although at no cost). Headquarters in large corporations are also decentralising work across the world to individuals, only requiring meetings via webcam. Although less capitalistic in nature, the idea is not very new, although the efforts and the intentions are.
Conclusively, this movement can be improved and the productivity can be increased in a social, art making setting but also in decentralising corporate work. However artistic altruism is not common. While there are artists that are happy to work with the DIWO movement, not many would be willing to do it for free or for altruistic purposes. At the end, it’s no different from a limited liability partnership and the grey areas of ownership would be brought up again.