Etoy is much more than your typical group of artist hackers, said author and National Public Radio host Douglas Rushkoff, who joined etoy s advisory board late last year. The boys who have volunteered for etoy have quite literally surrendered their lives to the technosphere. Etoy will do anything that gets a reaction, pretty much. It s a company that doesn t have any other purpose than to promote ourselves, agent Kubli told me last year at the Ars Electronica competition. There are certainly ironic aspects, or self-ironic . . .
Reactions are very polarized.
People love us or they hate us. Us are male artists in their early 20s who have grown up in a media culture whose ubiquitousness they not only accept but embrace. Together informally since 1992, and active since 1994, etoy artists see the media not just as a marketing tool but as part of their art. And etoy seeks to master the art form. The etoy artists understand that from a media perspective, nothing is worse than boredom.