The Hyperdodge: How Users Resist Algorithmic Objects in Everyday Life

Abstract

This paper asks what we can learn if we research algorithms via a bottom-up methodology from a users’ perspective to see how everyday users can resist algorithmic objectives. In doing this, this paper theorizes the framework of agency in which users can shape and reshape algorithmic outcomes. The argument draws on theoretical knowledge grounded in empirical data produced in 10 in-depth interviews, Heidegger’s phenomenology of experience, and De Certeau’s notion of practices in everyday life. It explains how the phenomenology of experience can render algorithms visible for users by asking not what algorithms are, but by reflecting upon their meaning and how these reflections can transform into practices of everyday resistance. Finally, this article speculates about the potential implications of (meta-)data on machine learning that is purposely being manipulated by users, creating the possibility of what I am labelling a “hyperdodge”.