7 SECONDES SEL-SERVICE STORE
(7 SSSS)

Artists/Designers: Xiaolin Yuan, Cuiyi Liu, Jiaxin Wu
Digital Programmer: Junpeng Qiu
Instructor: Carol MacGillivray, Kate Kneale, Antoine Hacheme

A self -service machine.
A TV screen displays videos that we designed to attract the audience's attention, mimicking the short videos on th social platforms. The videos will be set to 7-seconds each.

Once the audience stands in front of the machine and is detected by the kinect, the kinect starts to record and capture the audience's real-time body image.

In return, the receipt printer will print out a receipt at the end, as a proof of how much time they have used to pay.

“Thank you for paying with your time.”

STATEMENT:

“Seven Seconds Self-Service Store” aims to open up discussion on “Attention Economy” on short video platforms. Capitalism captures human’s natural instinct—Laziness, and enlarges this instinct with a flood of short videos on video platforms. One may think they are relaxing and enjoying themselves for free. However, we are actually paying with our time—the most valuable possessions we have in the world. Capitalism makes profits from the time we paid on their platforms. Unlike making a purchase in an actual physical store, where you surely get the products that you paid for, whereas on the short video platforms, the same product is sold to every customer or viewer. The receipt serves as a visualization of the time we paid to the capitalism unconsciously. Please remember, “If you’re not paying for it, you’re not the customer. You are the product being sold.”