A recurring theme is an examination of our obsessive love of cameras and their ability to both seduce and manipulate. "I've always wondered what happens after these shows are transmitted," Phil explains to someone whose come to the hatch to ask the "Why reality TV?" question yet again. "You have to wonder what happens when, for instance, a transsexual hooker, who has effectively come out on national TV, pops down to the local bakery and bumps into friends and neighbours. How well equipped are people for these situations? And for how long, if at all, does the oft-spouted promise of counselling continue for?"In our induction we were all given a crash course in Phil's work (including a similar experiment conducted in Turkey in 2005). Whether it's stories of drunken sex parties on X-Factor, or boob jobs on From Lad to Ladette. By now more people are coming forward and we're hearing stories about loss of confidence, homelessness, drug addiction and families being torn apart. If people don't think we're real, they're not going to call.We start a cuttings file on reality-related stores and it only takes one set of Sunday tabloids to realise that the fallout from ordinary people appearing on TV is everywhere.

Our brief is to find roughly 15 people whose lives have been ruined by appearing on TV - on makeover shows, talk shows and reality programmes. "These people are so lazy it is just easier for them to believe it's a fake," he says. "They're so unbelievably entitled, the biggest surprise for the people I spoke to yesterday is that I actually go to my office every day and that none of us are actors I mean, really!"It's also annoying: we have work to do. Sat at his desk, side on, he thinks he looks a little like Rodin's The Thinker Others might say he resembles a small, baffled ape. I'm a little bitter that I feature virtually nowhere, aside from a piece by the Sun's esteemed arts critic, Toulouse le Plot. Jane, who is six months pregnant, isn't happy either: "If I'd known we were going to be all over the press," she says, "I would never have worn a bright pink curtain." (I do crop up on Newsnight later in the week though, and am so vain that I tape it and rewind it over and over again until I capture a perfect shot of myself and Phil on my phone.)But despite the blanket press coverage - far more than the other three exhibits - Phil is unhappy that most people in the art world seem to assume the office is a spoof. That evening, Shady Lane Productions features on most of the other TV networks and the following morning, on a local London station, there's a long, unfortunate shot of Max and myself sniggering behind our computer screens.By the time we get into the office on our second day, Max's ego is enormous His picture seems to feature in virtually every newspaper.

On the plus side, there's no eating or drinking in the office so, with afternoon grazing off the menu, it's going to be great for our diets.BBC News 24 gets its first report out quickly and by lunchtime calls are starting to come in from former reality-show contestants. Some people arrive and just leave their cameras rolling on us, which is particularly disconcerting, and Jane is convinced she has spotted someone else listening in on us, hiding in a blindspot. Thoughtfully, though, Phil has installed a privacy screen in one corner of the office so if anyone does lose it, they can do so away from the glare of the crowds I spend more time there than anyone else. Predictably, later on I bend over to pick some paper out of the bin to put it in recycling.Apart from momentarily forgetting how to switch on my computer, things run fairly smoothly. At this stage we are just setting up email accounts and giving people our contact details, but it is almost impossible to do even this under such intense scrutiny. His only instructions to us are to avoid bending over (cue "Art? My Arse" headlines) and not to fish anything out of the bin ("What A Load Of Rubbish!"). Max and I have made an effort to look nondescript, knowing that an enormous press pack was on its way to scrutinise our every move.