D E C E N T R A L I Z E D · A U T O N O M O U S · O R G A N I Z A T I O N S¶
04.05.23
During this class we spoke about technology and understanding our relationships with it, the black box, marketing strategies behind it, advances in technology, how we understand it less, and want to learn less about it, but that we still want to use it, although as quick as possible and directly, like for example using your phone, if you needed one day to learn how house an app, would we then use it? We want everything to stay easy and directly usable.
It has evolved from something we couldn’t control or see, to then visualising it thorugh numbers, as a start with for example post numbers, to telegrams in numbers and now we are talking about neural networks and the black boxes are even more present, where we don’t know what’s going on inside, we don’t know exactly what is happening or why combinations are happening.
Technologies are in a sense just cultural artefacts, which can be very confusing when we think of them as alienated or magical something that happens far away from us.
Decolonising technologies - We need a new way to talk about technology, it is something that we interact with all the time in our everyday lives and to again understand what it actually is. We have always made tools and artefacts (technologies) to survive. How can we start understanidng technology as a tool again? Can doing this also let us understand how different technolgies and methods are working or not working in favor of a better future for all, moving from extractive to regenerative technologies.
Protocols and platforms, Collected Intelligence and the ‘Promise of the Web’. We are spending more time interacting and watching others through technology than we are interacting with other people in real life. The web that we thought would be a new place to be, without hierarchies etc are still owned by a few big companies that take decisions and earn money from things we cant control.
How can we promote different ways of using the internet, empowering individuals to reclaim control of their own content and privacy? How could we use tools that the status quo wouldnt?
In class we mapped out the wirings and paths when using the app Whatsapp to in a simplified way visualise what is happening.
C O L L E C T I V E · I N T E L L I G E N C E S 10.05.23
During this session we were introduced to Mar Canet Soa and how Varvera & Mar work with technology and code as artistic materials, creating tools that dont exist yet. We were shown some of their works and then introduced to NFTs and Block Chain.
N F T NFT stands for ‘non-fungible token’ which is basically a unique digital identifier recorded in a blockchain. There’s a unique and non-interchangeable unit of data stored on a digital ledger using blockchain technology to establish proof of ownership, as with cryptocurrenices like bitcoin. It is decentralised and open to scrutiny.
The blockchain technology means an NFT cannot be copied, substituted or subdivided, so it can be used to certify ownership of any kind of digital file, from art to music, games, videos and more. As well as establishing ownership, the fact that it prevents copies means that the technology creates scarcity, something that had been missing from digital art. A concept that began as an experiment in new technology and became a way for artists to take ownership of their work and control its value. https://www.creativebloq.com/features/what-are-nfts
B L O C K C H A I N Blockchain is a system of recording information in a way that makes it difficult or impossible to change, hack, or cheat the system.
A blockchain is essentially a digital ledger of transactions that is duplicated and distributed across the entire network of computer systems on the blockchain. Each block in the chain contains a number of transactions, and every time a new transaction occurs on the blockchain, a record of that transaction is added to every participant’s ledger. The decentralised database managed by multiple participants is known as Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT).
Blockchain is a type of DLT in which transactions are recorded with an immutable cryptographic signature called a hash (https://www.euromoney.com/learning/blockchain-explained/what-is-blockchain#:~:text=Blockchain%20is%20a%20system%20of,computer%20systems%20on%20the%20blockchain.).
During class we created our own Wallets where we received an amount of currency to create a profile on Tzk and then upload our own NFT on Objkt.
The concept around NFTs is an interesting reflection on what it means to ‘own something’. What do we really own and does the feeling of owning soemthing have to be connected to holding the physical object in our hands? One can think so, yet many of the things we ‘own’ are fictional owning - a phone as an obejct we can hold in our hands but seemingly we are borrowing it where we cant change what is inside or decide what information will be shared, or owning land, creating a fictional boundary of a space we have decided to ‘own’, are we also owning what was on the land when purchased? The plants and insects, animals that were there before us? In a way an NFT is dort of just a projection of the world and fictional ownerships we have decided exist.