Transcribblers was originally founded in 2011 as a way to support my artistic career, primarily focused on theater at the time. Over the years, as the practice has broadened to include conceptual, digital, and performance art, Transcribblers itself has become a platform for some of my more experimental ideas.
Listed below are artistic initiatives that represent the past, present, and future, respectively, of the Transcribblers business entity.
Currently under construction, the Transcribblers Commission Catalog is a full chronological database of every document produced by Transcribblers since its founding in 2011. The Catalog will detail over 5,000 documents and an estimated ~40 million words transcribed.
In 2018, Transcribblers became the world’s first “publicly managed”, gamified small business when I launched Transcribblers: The Game! as a live “performance of labor” as I completed work on stream.
Set up as a mix between a digital co-working space, mechanical keyboard ASMR, and experimental gaming, viewers watch as I race myself to complete as much work as possible in 25 minute periods, following the Pomodoro technique. Co-workers, “managers”, and trolls join me from all over the world, and their constant attention helps keep me from getting lost on internet (or artistic) procrastination.
(Note: NO client recordings are ever seen or heard on stream; your confidentiality remains a top priority.)
Currently in the beginning of the research and development stage, The Transcribbler is a proposed free-to-use, open-source AI transcriber and translator that is trained and refined by worker-owners of the Transcribblers co-op, and presented as an alternative to commercial software and “free” transcription offered by Big Data operators.
The Transcribbler is envisioned as an eternal, evolving art project, forever creating readymade art objects from people’s speech, rather than products and commodities. Along the way, transitional work can be provided to transcribers, and any revenue generated through traditional business practices can be used for job retraining and other mutual aid services as The Transcribbler approaches full competence.