Ask The Yes Men 53
Agit-prop? Absurdist pranksterism? Unsubtly subversive PowerPoint-based performance art? Yes, Yes, and Yes. Specifically, The Yes Men, whose brand of straight-faced media manipulation has raised eyebrows at staged events and on international news, have agreed to answer questions about their activities. These include social engineering of a certain peculiar variety ("Impersonating big-time criminals in order to publicly humiliate them"), and multi-media lampooning of major corporations and political bodies — and, sometimes, committing the results to film. (Their 2010 film The Yes Men Fix the World is CC-licensed; the torrent version includes a bonus short, the making of which is the subject of a lawsuit by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the target of a mock press conference it depicts.) So, please ask your questions of The Yes Men, bearing in mind (especially if you've never read them before) the Slashdot interview guidelines. (Major takeaway: for unrelated questions, please use separate posts.)
Do You Draw a Line at Who You Prank? (Score:5, Interesting)
Is this your day job? (Score:4, Interesting)
Do you actually make a living at what you do? If so, how?
The means and the ends (Score:2, Interesting)
Are you very comfortable with the means (impersonating people, companies and organisations to tar their image) as something that the public debate really could use more of in general, or do you feel that they are mainly justified by the ends of fighting for good causes?
Rival Culture Jammers (Score:5, Interesting)
What was it like getting busted by the Bureaucrash guys in front of the Cato Institute? Do you just hate those guys or is there any sort of camaraderie or at least friendly rivalry among culture jammers, even those with different ideological motivations?
Voteauction.com (Score:4, Interesting)
You purchased the brilliant satire project "Voteauction.com" in 2000 for 1 euro. Any plans to resurrect large-scale web-based pranks like this? They seem to have more broad penetration than your videos, which go largely unnoticed save for the astute film-goer.
Re:Rival Culture Jammers (Score:4, Interesting)