The _X_MSG project_ is about sex-work activism, social telephony and rewired technology. The project is a collaboration between two amateur technological tinkerers and a group of sex-work activists. Together we have put forward our energy to create DIY SMS-based software system for women involved with the sex industry. Ultimately, the _X_MSG_ software system is the outcome of an ongoing experiment between amateur coding and the pedagogy of sex work activism that allows for a new exploration of media systems.

The premise of the _X_MSG_ system is simple: a piece of amateur-coded open-source software that redirects text messages to its networks of sex work activists, while only costing them the price of a single text message. The system operates via a cheap DIY telephony server and uses a second-hand mobile phone with an O2 pay-as-you-go “unlimited” texts service. The phone is connected via a USB cable to a recycled computer that operates the server.
This software assemblage has been developed in consultation and collaboration with the London-based sex-worker-led collective x:talk and is aimed at women involved with the sex industry. The system is designed to respond to the most prominent social problems that the women in the industry face. It meets the need for anonymity, considers language barriers and uses the most common, but private, technology: the mobile phone. As a key feature, the system overcomes the risks and difficulties of women meeting in a geographical location and avoids the safety issues connected to online environments. As our collaboration partner, x:talk members are the primary participants at this stage in the _X_MSG project_.

The _X_MSG_ system is evidence of a social coding practice that relies on a communal exchange between the programmer and the user group as its first premise. The aim is to investigate coding, not as a functional solution but as a political tool in its encounter with the social environment of the sex industry. Hence we share the feminist objectives and interests of x:talk, who “consider that a feminist analysis and practice is crucial to changing the sex industry. Women represent the majority of workers in the industry and gendered sexualised and reproductive labour have historically constituted a central part in the structures that subordinate and oppress women.” (www.x:talkproject.net) As a group organized from within the industry, x:talk seeks to break the license on sex-worker’s voices currently held by third-sector organizations and health professionals. Likewise, we seek to move beyond functional coding and design aesthetics and work with software by bringing back the user as a central component of development.

The core team of our project consists of Cliff Hammett, Alexandra Jönsson and the x:talk collective.

Links: http://xmsg.org.uk/

Cliff Hammett, Alexandra Jönsson and the x:talk collective have been collaborating on the _X_MSG project_ since 2009. They are technology tinkerers and critical media researchers in the field of socially engaged media art. They work to develop software methodologies to work with communities in a practical manner while they critically interrogate the norms and limitations of commercial software and services in order to subvert and rewire them. Sustainability is at the centre of their collaboration, both for their technical experiments and their engagement with communities.