The Office is easily one of the most popular comedy shows of all time, thanks to it effectively capturing the soul-destroying spirit of the workplace and how co-workers often get up to crazy things to make their work lives more bearable. It also helps that the show cast includes a bunch of insanely funny characters who are a delight to watch.
The biggest problem with The Office though, is that it isn’t realistic. And no, I’m not referring to all the crazy workplace antics that happen, but rather the way that everyone communicates. After all, who still chats face to face these days? When people engage in small talk, its often via the company’s chosen instant messaging app – because real small talk and pranks take place in an environment where everything is easily monitored.
Jokes aside though, it turns out someone has actually had this thought and decided to go and replicate all 201 of The Office episodes inside of Slack. The creative collective MSCHF have gone and created a live Slack channel for Dunder Mifflin where different channels are dedicated to various departments, including accounting, warehouse, and a general office room. These channels will then post messages playing out the different episodes as if everyone spoke to each other over Slack. I’m sure not every episode will translate so well, but still, you need to admire their commitment to putting this all together and no doubt some fans can delight in seeing their favourite episodes play out via a series of lack chats across different slack rooms.
Viewers are requested to avoid posting in the “company” channels but are encouraged to pop in and out of channels to keep up with the episodes as they don’t all play in one. Since it is a live Slack, inappropriate messages and images do pop up, but the MSCHF team has a number of moderators working to keep it as troll-free as possible, as the company revealed in an interview with The Verge:
Since The Office aired, the nature of work and office culture has changed drastically, a lot of which is centered around the way we use technologies. This is a live experience by real people Mondays through Fridays, nine-to-five. We have an incredible business that has been growing very quickly and that will continue to do so for many, many years to come. We provide a platform that is going to become even more useful to the world in the years to come.
The company hasn’t revealed how long they intend to keep this up for, as it no doubt takes a lot of manpower to keep going, but I guess it’s the perfect project to work on while we’re all in some form of quarantine and an ideal time to relive The Office while reminiscing on the fun you’d be having if you were back with all of your co-workers again.
Last Updated: May 13, 2020
