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DATA CITIES Conference Report at Furtherfield

#DNL20 · Berlin · SEPT 25-27 · 2020:

DATA CITIES

SMART TECHNOLOGIES, TRACKING & HUMAN RIGHTS

Tactics of Empowerment – Part II

The 20th conference of the Disruption Network Lab.

Schedule · Introduction · Full Programme · Workshops · Installation · Speakers

Pre-events: Film Screening: iHUMAN · Workshop: Subvertising for Data Cities

Investigating future smart cities and how tracking & surveillance impact us all.

Curated by Tatiana Bazzichelli & Mauro Mondello.

Location: Studio 1, Kunstquartier Bethanien, Mariannenplatz 2, 10997 Berlin.

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SCHEDULE

PRE-EVENTS

Thursday, September 3 · 2020

16:30-19:00 – WORKSHOP

Subvertising for Data Cities · with StealThisPoster & Special Patrol Group · Kunstblock & Beyond · at Supermarkt · Tickets

Thursday, September 24 · 2020

19:00-22:00 – GERMAN PREMIERE + Q&A: iHUMAN

iHUMAN · Film Documentary · Event in partnership with the Human Rights Film Festival Berlin, at BUFA Studios, followed by a film talk with Tonje Hessen Schei (Film Director, Producer and Screenwriter, NO) · Tickets

CONFERENCE

Friday, September 25 · 2020

16:00 - Doors open

16:30 · INTRO

Tatiana Bazzichelli (Artistic Director & Founder, Disruption Network Lab, IT/DE) & Lieke Ploeger (Community Director, Disruption Network Lab, NL/DE).

16:40—18:00 · KEYNOTE: Reclaiming Data Cities: Fighting for the Future We Really Want

Denis "Jaromil" Roio (Digital Social Innovation Expert, Software Artisan & Ethical Hacker, IT) & Julia Kloiber (Managing Director at Superrr Lab and Partner at Ashoka Germany, DE). Moderated by Daniel Irrgang (Research Fellow, Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, DE).

18:45—20:45 · PANEL: Making Cities Smart for Us: Subverting Tracking & Surveillance

Eva Blum-Dumontet (Senior Researcher on Privacy and Social and Economics Rights, UK), River H (Web Developer at Expedition Grundeinkommen, Anti-Capitalist Tech Activist, Member of Anti Eviction Map Project, US/DE), Andreas Zingerle (Media Artist, Department of Linguistic, Literary and Aesthetic Studies, University of Bergen, AT/NO), Linda Kronman (PhD Candidate, Department of Linguistic, Literary and Aesthetic Studies, University of Bergen, FI/NO). Moderated by Tatiana Bazzichelli (Director, Disruption Network Lab, IT/DE).

Saturday, September 26 · 2020

16:00 — Doors open

16:30—18:00 · KEYNOTE: Worlds Less Travelled: Mega-Cities, AI & Critical Sci-Fi

Liam Young (Film Director, Architect and Designer, AU/US), Tonje Hessen Schei (Film Director, Producer, and Screenwriter, NO). Respondent: Anna Ramskogler-Witt (Artistic Director, Human Rights Film Festival Berlin, DE). Moderated by Mauro Mondello (Investigative Journalist, IT) & Lucia Conti (Communication Expert at UNIDO, Editor in Chief at Il Mitte, IT/DE).

18:45—20:45 · PANEL: Citizens for Digital Sovereignty: Shaping Inclusive & Resilient Cities

Elizabeth Calderón Lüning (Associate Researcher, Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, Research Group Inequality & Digital Sovereignty. DE), Rafael Heiber (Co-founder & CEO, Common Action Forum, BR/DE), Alexandre Monnin (Head of the "Strategy and Design for the Anthropocene", Master of Science at ESC Clermont Business School, FR), Moderated by Lieke Ploeger (Community Director, Disruption Network Lab, NL/DE).

Sunday, September 27 · 2020

14:15 - DOORS OPEN

14:30 · INTRO

Lieke Ploeger (Community Director, Disruption Network Lab, NL/DE) & Nada Bakr (Project and Community Manager, Disruption Network Lab, EG/DE).

14:45—15:15 · ARTIST TALK · Google Maps Hacks

Simon Weckert (Artist & Designer, DE)

15:15—17:45 · WORKSHOPS

• Workshop 1: Smash your filter bubble!
  with Leonardo Sanna (PhD Fellow, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, IT) and Salvatore Romano (Graduate student in Social Psychology, University of Padova, IT) of the tracking.exposed project.

• Workshop 2: Visualizing Control – A Critical Mapping Workshop
  with River H (Web Developer at Expedition Grundeinkommen, Anti-Capitalist Tech Activist, Member of Anti Eviction Map Project, US/DE).

• Workshop 3: Reuse, Recycle, Repair - Hacking waste management for the smart city
  with: Felipe Schmidt Fonseca (Activist, Free/Open Advocate and Researcher, OpenDoTT project, BR/DE).

• Workshop 4: Citizen manifesto on data cities
  with Elizabeth Calderón Lüning (Associate Researcher, Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, Research Group Inequality & Digital Sovereignty. DE). Concept: Fieke Jansen (PhD Candidate at the Data Justice Lab, NL/UK).

18:30—19:30 · COLLECTIVE CLOSING

FULL PROGRAMME DETAILS

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PRE-EVENTS

Thursday, September 3 · 2020

Thursday, September 24 · 2020 · German Premiere · iHUMAN

19:00-22:00 – FILM SCREENING + Q&A
Get Tickets here · Location: BUFA Studios

Filmmaker Tonje Hessen Schei examines how artificial intelligence impacts technology and human lives (2019, 1h 39m). Q&A with Tonje Hessen Schei (Film Director, NO).
In partnership with the Human Rights Film Festival Berlin
Read more

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Introduction

DATA CITIES

SMART TECHNOLOGIES, TRACKING & HUMAN RIGHTS

Tactics of Empowerment – Part II

The use of smart technologies and tracking apps has become part of a crucial debate during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the problematic controversies surrounding data protection. As technology becomes embedded within everyday objects, the dynamics of city systems and lifestyles are evolving from linear approaches to real-time sensory exchanges with feedback data across city services, operations, bodies, and activities.

This conference focuses on smart city visions for the future, addressing the implications of new data policies, as well as analysing the unintended negative consequences of tracking and surveillance to our privacy and freedom.

New smart cities have already been built and still more are at the planning and development stages, in countries such as China, Singapore, India, Saudi Arabia, Kazakhstan, Jordan, and Egypt. The foundations of these cities include fully integrated infrastructures, Internet and communication systems, water services, electrical and power grids, security appliances, smart transportation—all features which were once just science fiction. By 2045, an extra 2 billion people will live in urban areas and by 2050 the world’s population is expected to reach 9.8 billion. China and India alone will require up to 2.8 billion square metres of new residential and commercial space a year.

Future cities will need to employ purpose-built artificial intelligence programs and machine-learning algorithms to process the vast amounts of incoming data, and we will increasingly use smart connected digital platforms to draw data from the Internet of Things. But this same data will also be very lucrative in the hands of big tech corporations.

Cities may occupy just 2% of the Earth’s land surface, but they are home to more than half of the world’s population and generate 80% of all economic output. Forest City, for example, a partnership project of Chinese developer Country Garden and Esplanade Danga, has been designed to attract masses of Singaporean residents and Chinese real estate investors looking to offshore their assets. Due for completion in 2035, it is envisioned as a new economic engine that could compete with Singapore and create 220.000 new jobs. Saudi Arabia has also started building the first residential area of their proposed $500 billion futuristic city: the city of Neom. 25,900 square kilometres have been allocated for the development of this urban area, which will stretch into Jordan and Egypt. Horgos is the $3.25 billion new city on the Chinese side of the China-Kazakhstan border being built for 200,000 people. On the Kazakhstan side, Nurkent is a purpose-built city linking together the various transportation and industrial projects of the Khorgos area. Nurkent is set to grow into a full-fledged 100,000 person commercial and cultural centre by 2035.

The onset of the COVID-19 crisis has pushed social control one step further. We have already witnessed increasing forms of monitoring via tracking devices, drone technologies and security infrastructures. What will the data cities of tomorrow look like? How will cities of the future be designed? And how will the development of smart technologies affect human rights and individual privacy?

This conference is co-curated by Tatiana Bazzichelli and Mauro Mondello, an investigative journalist who has been traveling in Asia studying transitional cities and new cities of the future. Bazzichelli and Mondello were also co-curators of the Disruption Network Lab conference TERROR FEEDS: Inside the Fear Machine in November 2017.

SUNDAY WORKSHOPS

On Sunday 27 September, the Activation Community Gathering connects the Data Cities conference with the work of diverse activists, communities and initiatives in Berlin and abroad. Extending Disruption Network Lab’s year-round meetup programme curated by Lieke Ploeger, the focus of the day is on sharing skills, tools and strategies to work with data and technology in creative ways to shape the type of city we want to live in in the future.

Following on an artist talk by Simon Weckert on his Google Maps Hacks work, we divide into different groups for a series of afternoon workshops to learn more about exposing tracking algorithms of social media platforms, using crowdsourced geospatial data to develop data visualisation tools, analyzing data on city waste management to find new opportunities for recycling and reuse and developing a manifesto of what we want a data city to look like.
At the end of the day we come together for a collective closing to share experiences and outcomes.

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Full Programme

Friday, September 25 · 2020

16:00 - Doors open

16:30 · INTRO

Tatiana Bazzichelli (Artistic Director & Founder, Disruption Network Lab, IT/DE) & Lieke Ploeger (Community Director, Disruption Network Lab, NL/DE).

16:40-18:00

KEYNOTE: Reclaiming Data Cities: Fighting for the Future We Really Want

Denis "Jaromil" Roio (Digital Social Innovation Expert, Software Artisan & Ethical Hacker, IT) & Julia Kloiber (Managing Director at Superrr Lab and Partner at Ashoka Germany, DE). Moderated by Daniel Irrgang (Research Fellow, Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, DE).

The present and future development of “Data Cities” are driven by big data and high tech efficiency. Plans are already being discussed and implemented today, and it is our responsibility to drive such development towards collective benefits rather than the exploitation and invasion of our privacy and everyday lives. What are algorithms around us adopted for? To make machines perceive us, or to make us perceive them?

Algorithms are powerful tools opening diverse risks and opportunities. By controlling an algorithm one can paralyse an entire city or make its management more democratic, participative and in contact with its inhabitants. In his keynote, Denis “Jaromil” Roio shares his experience dealing with the techno-political aspects of algorithms and propose a humanist approach for their governmentality. Alongside, Julia Kloiber reflects on how feminist values like care, maintenance and equity can help us to design technology for the city of the future. What does a city based on intersectional values look and feel like, for its residents, for local businesses and for the environment? Since our natural resources are limited, we have to break with our current innovation narratives and talk about exovation — the power of getting rid of prevailing products — and about social innovation. While it is important to fight current developments like the erosion of our privacy and surveillance, it is as important to develop positive future visions. Scenarios that help us imagine what winning would look like, and that help us feel hopeful for what’s to come. We can do so by thinking beyond the human centred, beyond nation states and beyond technology, building up alternatives to imagine empowering and sustainable cities of the future.

Returning to the question – “What are algorithms around you adopted for”? We welcome you to contribute in the Twitter discussion with your own thoughts, interpretations and examples, which Jaromil will address in his keynote.

18:45-20:45

PANEL: Making Cities Smart for Us: Subverting Tracking & Surveillance

Eva Blum-Dumontet (Senior Researcher on Privacy and Social and Economics Rights, UK), River H (Web Developer at Expedition Grundeinkommen, Anti-Capitalist Tech Activist, Member of Anti Eviction Map Project, US/DE), Andreas Zingerle (Media Artist, Department of Linguistic, Literary and Aesthetic Studies, University of Bergen, AT/NO), Linda Kronman (PhD Candidate, Department of Linguistic, Literary and Aesthetic Studies, University of Bergen, FI/NO). Moderated by Tatiana Bazzichelli (Director, Disruption Network Lab, IT/DE).

The Internet of Things (IoT), smart city initiatives and industries and smart home technologies will play a role in the restructuring of our urban environment, and it is up to us to make cities smart for us, as members of civil society. In her presentation, Eva Blum-Dumontet explores why so many smart city projects have failed to make people feel that the city is smart…for them. Going back to the very origin of the term, coined by IBM, we will look at the way many current initiatives have been led by tech companies more preoccupied with creating a datafied – and therefore surveilled – public space rather than addressing the material that cities are made of: human interactions. These failures are leaving us with a space we should be occupying. More than ever we need to rethink public space in a way that resolves the power imbalances that are at play in cities: from gender inequalities to access for differently abled bodies.

Following this approach, River H will present a handful of projects that she has participated in using geospatial data analysis. A field dominated by corporate, academic, and government interests, it often replicates the biases of developers when applied into software, and in more sinister cases causes harm while creating profit for venture capital. In a world where profit is the strongest interest, activist and grassroots applications of geospatial data are difficult to produce. However, there are groups of activists who work outside of these formal structures, applying geo-data to movements that seek to undermine the interests of capital and to change the inhumane systems of privatisation and capitalism. As a primary example River will present Avoid Control, a project that aims to understand and share the patterns of ticket controller enforcement on the Berlin S- and U-Bahn networks. She will explain the reasoning and methodology behind this technology, describing its current and hopeful future applications.

Andreas Zingerle and Linda Kronman of the KairUs collective address two different but related perspectives related to surveillance, tracking and control. The massive implementation of IoT in hyper-connected urban environments paths the way to technocratic governance and urban development, corporatizing our living spaces into lock-in, hack-able, “pan optic” smart cities. The management and sustainability of these urban areas is one of the most critical challenges our society faces today. Andreas Zingerle presents artistic investigations by KairUs collective from "The Internet of other people's things" research project that was conducted in South Korea with journalist and academic Jonathan Woodier, activist group unmakelab among other international artist and researchers. Discussing KairUs’s latest artwork "Suspicious Behavior" — an annotation tutorial to train smart cameras — Linda Kronman analyses digital art that erodes the assumptions of objective of neutral AI, referring to her PhD research, as part of the 'Machine Vision in Everyday Life project'. Which hidden biases and hidden human decisions influence the detection of suspicious behavior? How are the datasets created, how is suspect behavior defined and by who? What are the social impacts of these technologies — and who benefits?

Saturday, September 26 · 2020

16:00 — Doors open

16:30—18:00

KEYNOTE: Worlds Less Travelled: Mega-Cities, AI & Critical Sci-Fi

Liam Young (Film Director, Architect and Designer, AU/US), Tonje Hessen Schei (Film Director, Producer, and Screenwriter, NO). Respondent: Anna Ramskogler-Witt (Artistic Director, Human Rights Film Festival Berlin, DE). Moderated by Mauro Mondello (Investigative Journalist, IT) & Lucia Conti (Communication Expert at UNIDO, Editor in Chief at Il Mitte, IT/DE).

By the year 2050 two thirds of the world population will be living in urban areas. City services will need to adapt to an undoubtedly higher demand. In this scenario, what will the urban landscape look like? Technological progress will probably reshape our infrastructure, mobility, architecture. Big data, the Internet of Things, AI and the private governance of urban life will be play crucial roles in the constructions of our future cities. Governments and corporations have converged to promote safer streets, cleaner air, efficient transportation, instant communication for all, and algorithms that take governance out of the hands of flawed human beings. But another story lies beneath this surface.

In his keynote Liam Young narrates a series of stories from these worlds less travelled, just small glimpses, fragments, vignettes and snapshots from a series of his films that will come together to create a portrait of an alternative future of technology and automation. Through film we have always imagined alternative worlds as a way of understanding our own world in new ways. A critical role of Science Fiction is to provide a counterbalance to the prevailing media narratives around emerging technologies. Typically, our imagined futures are based on a solutionist view of technology and are marketed to us as simplified worlds of better and brighter. This keynote will address the often-ignored complexities, subcultures and unintended consequences that result when technologies are democratized and rolled out at scale.

Tonje Hessen Schei expands the horizons and range of our thinking about the city of the future by an exploration into the world of Artificial Intelligence (AI) as an era defined by a technological revolution that infiltrates every walk of life; information control, governance, surveillance, privacy, society and what it fundamentally means to be human. Without regulation, legislation and governance frameworks based on crucial ethical standards we run the risk of losing our grip on this ever-evolving technology, thus removing human intelligence and uniqueness from the equation. Hessen Schei will focus on the importance of understanding how the seemingly unavoidable advent of AI will have a profound impact on urban societies, and its potential as weaponized surveillance architectures, controlling information in a time when we are more dependent on the digital realm than ever.

18:45—20:45

PANEL: Citizens for Digital Sovereignty: Shaping Inclusive & Resilient Cities

Elizabeth Calderón Lüning (Associate Researcher, Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, Research Group Inequality & Digital Sovereignty. DE), Rafael Heiber (Co-founder & CEO, Common Action Forum, BR/DE), Alexandre Monnin (Head of the "Strategy and Design for the Anthropocene", Master of Science at ESC Clermont Business School, FR), Moderated by Lieke Ploeger (Community Director, Disruption Network Lab, NL/DE).

Combining hardware, data storage, microprocessors and software, digitalisation transforms the urban environment into a smart structure linked in broader systems and unified ecosystems.

Digitalisation should allow a better management of the urban society and help deliver improvements in functionality and efficiency of cities, as well as new experiences for residents, communities, visitors, local businesses and institutions. But digital transformation can lead to social exclusion, and the challenge for our future cities will be to advance the adoption of digital tools that respect the values of diversity, inclusion and fairness, rather than jumping on the latest smart city trends. Technology-driven urban developments may easily erode privacy and turn smart cities into surveillance cities.

In this panel, Elizabeth Calderón Lüning reflects on the crucial role that city governments will have in order to protect and foster societies digital self-determination. Democratic participation and the need of governments to redefine their role and risks of the current status quo when it comes to digital policy will be discussed using examples of Berlin-specific policies, aiming to present the primary necessity to consider the digital sovereignty as the capacity, right and duty of society to shape and govern technological progress.

Rafael Heiber focuses on the urgent need to understand the ways of living and moving in the new space of hybridization that cities of the future will create. Taking a critical look at the role of technologies, and the management apparatuses, that may distinguish the ethos of new cities from the former, established patterns of habitability and mobility will be fundamental to address the challenges posed by an urban planning that lies in the technological substratum.

Finally, Alexandre Monnin questions the very (de)feasibility of smart cities, focusing on the urge of dismantling realities that are out of step with the Anthropocene and concentrating on the exigency to avoid giving birth to unsustainable realities that are yet to happen. What could be more disruptive? The Anthropocene and its consequences, or smart cities? Are all technologies that seem futuristic really futuristic? What if they were conceived at a time when little thought was given to the future of the Earth as a system?

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Sunday, September 27 · 2020

Workshop Programme

Limited seats: sign-up is required for a specific workshop. Get your ticket here

14:15 — Doors open

14:30 – INTRO

Lieke Ploeger (Community Director, Disruption Network Lab, NL/DE) & Nada Bakr (Project and Community Manager, Disruption Network Lab, EG/DE).

14:45-15:15 – ARTIST TALK

GOOGLE MAPS HACKS

Simon Weckert (Artist & Designer, DE)
”99 second-hand smartphones are transported in a handcart to generate virtual traffic jam in Google Maps. Through this activity, it is possible to turn a green street red which has an impact in the physical world by navigating cars on another route to avoid being stuck in traffic.” #googlemapshacks

You’ve seen Google Maps Hacks on international news just earlier this year, now come see the methodology behind this project. Simon uses technology in the digital space to cleverly impact the physical space, all the while creating some playful mischief.

Simon Weckert’s project ‘Google Maps Hacks’ won the Award of Distinction in the Interactive Art + category of the Prix Ars Electronica 2020.

15:15-17:45 – WORKSHOPS

Workshop 1: Smash your filter bubble!

With: Leonardo Sanna (PhD Fellow, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, IT) and Salvatore Romano (Graduate student in Social Psychology, University of Padova, IT) of the tracking.exposed project.

The Tracking Exposed collective project empowers users to gain knowledge of tracking and profiling that determine the information we receive in data market and under the influence of proprietary algorithms. In this workshop, we'll introduce the browser extension Youtube.Tracking.Exposed, aimed at the study of YouTube filter bubbles. Participants will learn how to install the extension and how to use it to collect evidence of their own filter bubble. The group will also perform a collective algorithm observation using the collected data of the video suggestions from YouTube. The simple test will enable participants to analyze the results comparing their personalisation with the rest of the group, thus learning a methodology to produce evidence about tracking and algorithm analysis. Data visualization (like Gephi, Tableau and R..) will be used to provide a graphic representation of the experiment. Check some previous collective observations of the YouTube and Pornhub algorithms to get an idea!

• Participants will need to bring their laptop to join this workshop.

Workshop 2: Visualizing Control – A Critical Mapping Workshop

With: River H (Web Developer at Expedition Grundeinkommen, Anti-Capitalist Tech Activist, Member of Anti Eviction Map Project, US/DE).

River H uses technology as a means to advance the cause of socialism, either by using it to treat the symptoms of capitalism, or to facilitate organising for the public ownership of housing, utilities, transport, and the means of production. In this workshop you will learn how to apply different spatial data visualization methods to data about ticket controller locations on the Berlin U+S Bahn. We will go into details about the methods of collecting and visualising geospatial data, using real data from the "Avoid Control" twitter bot. Then, we will work together and experiment with different ways of showing this data on a map of Berlin.

Workshop 3: Reuse, Recycle, Repair - Hacking waste management for the smart city

With: Felipe Schmidt Fonseca (Activist, Free/Open Advocate and Researcher, OpenDoTT project, BR/DE).

Reducing consumption and reusing materials contribute decisively to prevent the generation of waste. As well as the obvious environmental benefits, the reuse through repair, re-circulation and upcycling has positive social and economic outcomes for society at large. However, smart city projects seldom take into account the reuse of materials as part of their solutions for waste management. This workshops tries to advance the idea of a reuse commons and discuss what would be its implications in terms of data generation and governance, decision-making and privacy.

Workshop 4: Citizen manifesto on data cities

With: Elizabeth Calderón Lüning (Associate Researcher, Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, Research Group Inequality & Digital Sovereignty. DE). Concept: Fieke Jansen (PhD Candidate at the Data Justice Lab, NL/UK).

Cities are at the forefront of trying out new solutions to old and emerging problems. Sensors, cameras, wifi tracking, satellite and drone imaging are used to increase data collection about human behavior and the environment to try and tackle wicked urban problems around transport, environment, security and crowd management. As a result the use of technology is slowly creeping into our streets and neighborhoods, without much public debate. Join me in this workshop to explore the urban challenges and proposed technology solutions to develop the values we find important in our social contract and develop a manifesto of a citizen vision of a data city.

18:30-19:30 – COLLECTIVE CLOSING

Following on the four workshops, all participants come together to share their outcomes and experiences, and understand from each other how we could use data and technology in creative ways to shape the type of city we want to live in in the future.

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Installation

Welcome to the Museum of the Fossilized Internet!

This miniature museum was founded in 2050 to commemorate two decades of a fossil-free internet and to invite museum visitors to experience what the coal and oil-powered internet of 2020 was like.

Gasp at the horrors of surveillance capitalism. Nod knowingly at the plague of spam. Be baffled at the size of AI training data and lament the binge culture of video streaming.

Visitors to the museum will learn about the major contributors to the internet carbon emissions as well as share their ideas for a more sustainable and just internet.

Learn more about the Museum of the Fossilized Internet. Created by Gabi Ivens with support from Joana Moll and Michelle Thorne.

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Speakers

Denis "Jaromil" Roio

Digital Social Innovation Expert, Software Artisan & Ethical Hacker, IT

Denis Roio, better known by his hacker nickname Jaromil, is CTO of the DECODE EU flagship project on blockchain technologies and data ownership, involving pilots in cooperation with the municipalities of Barcelona and Amsterdam. Jaromil published his PhD on “Algorithmic Sovereignty” (AlgoSov.org) and received the Vilém Flusser Award at transmediale (Berlin, 2009) while leading for six years the R&D department of the Netherlands Media Art Institute (Montevideo/TBA). He has been a fellow of the “40 under 40” European Young Leaders programme since 2012 and was listed in the “Purpose Economy” list of the top 100 social entrepreneurs in the EU in 2014.
@jaromil

Julia Kloiber

Managing Director at Superrr Lab and Partner at Ashoka Germany, DE

Julia Kloiber is a founder and activist who spent the past 10 years enabling social digital innovation that serves all people. She’s an advocate for women’s rights and open knowledge. Through her work she explores just and fair digital futures. Julia is the founder of the Prototype Fund, the feminist technology think-tank Superrr and she is a partner at Ashoka.
juliakloiber.com

Tonje Hessen Schei

Film Director, Producer & Screenwriter, NO

Tonje Hessen Schei is an award-winning Norwegian independent filmmaker, whose work focuses on human rights, abuse of power and our changing relationship to technology. Her directing credits include iHuman (2019), Drone (2014), Play Again (2010) and Independent Intervention (2005). Tonje has received international awards including Most Valuable Documentary of the Year at Cinema for Peace, the Golden Nymph, and the Norwegian equivalent Oscar and Emmy for Best Documentary. Her films have screened globally, at the UN and EU, Netflix and major film festivals worldwide.

Liam Young

Film Director, Architect & Designer, AU/US

Liam Young is a speculative architect who operates in the spaces between design, fiction and futures. He is cofounder of the urban futures think tank Tomorrows Thoughts Today and the nomadic documentary studio Unknown Fields. He is a BAFTA nominated producer and he builds worlds for the film and television industries. His work has been collected by institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art and he teaches internationally, now running an MA in Fiction and Entertainment at Sci Arc in LA.
@liam_young

Anna Ramskogler-Witt

Artistic Director, Human Rights Film Festival Berlin, DE

Anna is convinced that documentaries can be a very powerful vehicle to raise awareness and inspire people to act. After studying art history, she started her professional career at the Austrian-based film distribution POOOL. After seeing the impact of her first film release “Winds of Sand - Women of Rock,” she was hooked. After stops at the Viennese Human rights film festival “This Human World” and the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights she became director of the Human Rights Film Festival Berlin.

Eva Blum-Dumontet

Senior Researcher on Privacy and Social and Economics Rights, UK

Eva Blum-Dumontet is a senior researcher working on the intersection of privacy and social and economic rights. With a background in journalism, she is particularly interested in exploring the impact of data exploitation on marginalised communities and people in vulnerable situations with a feminist lens. As part of this work she has been documenting the role of big tech companies on shaping the narratives around smart cities and its consequences on urbanisation.
twitter.com/arcadian_o

River H

Web Developer at Expedition Grundeinkommen, Anti-Capitalist Tech Activist, Member of Anti Eviction Map Project, US/DE

River is a software engineer and anti-capitalist hacktivist. She is a member of the Anti Eviction Map Project where she contributes to interactive visualisations of data regarding housing rights and gentrification. River uses technology as a means to advance the cause of socialism, either by using it to treat the symptoms of capitalism, or to facilitate organising for the public ownership of housing, utilities, transport, and the means of production.

Linda Kronman

PhD Candidate, Department of Linguistic, Literary and Aesthetic Studies, University of Bergen, FI/NO

Linda Kronman is a media artist, designer and a PhD candidate at University of Bergen in the Machine Vision in Everyday Life project. She analyses how machine vision is represented in digital art using feminist and posthuman theory. As a member of artist duo KairUs she is producing art and publications together with Andreas Zingerle. The Internet of Other People’s Things (2018) is the latest book they edited, bringing together critical perspectives on everyday use of technology and smart cities.
kairus.org - www.uib.no/en/persons/Linda.Kronman

Andreas Zingerle

Media Artist, Department of Linguistic, Literary and Aesthetic Studies, University of Bergen, AT/NO

Andreas Zingerle is an artist and researcher. He was the Co-PI in the Global Research Net-work grant “The Internet of other people`s things” researching smart city initiatives in South Korea. He is part of the artist duo KairUs and has been producing art together with Linda Kronman since 2010. Their artistic research topics includes surveillance, smart cities, IoT, cybercrime, online fraud, electronic waste and machine vision.
kairus.org - www.andreaszingerle.com

Elizabeth Calderón Lüning

Associate Researcher, Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, DE

Elizabeth Calderón Lüning is a doctorate researcher at Weizenbaum Institute, where she is part of the research group “Inequality and Digital Sovereignty” with Berlin University of the Arts. Her research focuses on democratic deliberation in digital urban policy and digital sovereignty. As co-initiator of the Digital City Alliance Berlin, she advocates for broadening the public conversation on digital transformation and fostering digital policy towards public good. www.weizenbaum-institut.de/portrait/p/elizabeth-calderon-luening

Rafael Heiber

Co-founder & CEO, Common Action Forum, BR/DE

Rafael Heiber is Co-Founder and CEO of the Common Action Forum, a non-profit organization dedicated to the development of ideas and serving as a platform to address global challenges. Rafael studied Geography and has an MSc in Spatial Planning from the São Paulo State University, Brazil, with areas of specialty including climatology, air pollution and urbanism. Later, at the Complutense University of Madrid, Spain, he obtained Advanced Studies in Culture, Communication and Knowledge, as well as a PhD in Sociology, focusing on issues of technology, mobility, politics, epistemology and citizenship. Rafael has taught and delivered seminars at both European and Latin American universities. He currently publishes in the international media, and is Editor-in-Chief of Metapolis, a newly launched online journal
metapolis.net + twitter.com/rafaheiber

Alexandre Monnin

Head of the "Strategy and Design for the Anthropocene" Master of Science at ESC Clermont Business School, FR

Alexandre Monnin is Scientific Director at Origens Medialab, Professor at ESC Clermont BS, co-founder of the Closing Worlds initiative and head of the new MSc "Strategy and Design for the Anthropocene" (with Strate School of Design in Lyon). He received his PhD in Philosophy from Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and dedicated his thesis to the philosophy of the Web. Recently, he co-edited an issue of Multitudes entitled "Is It Too Late for Collapse?" and the latest issue of Sciences du Design (n°11).
origensmedialab.org
twitter.com/aamonnz

Daniel Irrgang

Research Fellow, Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, DE

Daniel Irrgang is a research fellow at Weizenbaum Institute, Berlin, where he is part of the research group “Inequality and Digital Sovereignty” with Berlin University of the Arts. His work focuses on depictions of knowledge, HCI paradigms, media archaeology, art & technology and epistemology. He holds a PhD in media studies with a thesis on diagrammatics and expanded mind theory. Daniel is coordinator of the research seminar “Critical Zones” with Bruno Latour at HfG & ZKM Karlsruhe.
www.weizenbaum-institut.de/portrait/p/daniel-irrgang

Mauro Mondello

Investigative Journalist, IT

Mauro Mondello is a freelance reporter, war correspondent, documentary filmmaker and the co-founder of Yanez, an online long-form journalism magazine. Often focusing on human rights and freedoms, his reporting strives to garner dignity and respect for all cultures and religions and to foster an open society that provides shelter for refugees and space for all humanity. He began his journalism career as a staff journalist in Italy and was based in South America between 2008 and 2011. He then moved to Tunis to report on the Arab Spring uprisings in Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt. From 2013 to 2019, he was based in Berlin, Germany. Mauro's current work reports on a variety of issues, including refugees, migration, human rights, EU foreign policy, civil movements, mafia and Italian criminality, nuclear waste, and climate change. His documentaries include "Lampedusa in Berlin," a report about the eviction of migrants in Berlin, filmed in 2015. He is Yale World Fellow as part of the Maurice R. Greenberg World Fellows Program in 2020 at Yale University.

Lucia Conti

Communication Expert at UNIDO, Editor in Chief at Il Mitte, IT/DE

Lucia Conti is a freelance journalist and a communication expert. She currently works with the United Nations (UNIDO), focusing on gender equality and women empowerment in the MENA region. Events Moderator for the Italian Embassy in Berlin. Editor of Il Mitte, a vastly read Italian language news outlet in Berlin, working closely with both Italian and German institutions and frequently offering I sights into the German situation to the mainstream Italian media.

Fieke Jansen

PhD Candidate at the Data Justice Lab, NL/UK

Fieke is a PhD candidate at the Data Justice Lab of Cardiff University, a Mozilla public policy fellow, and has previously worked on data, privacy and digital security at Tactical Tech and Hivos. The Data Justice Lab examines the intricate relationship between datafication and social justice, highlighting the politics and impacts of data-driven processes and big data. Fieke is interested in re-politicizing data and technology, by understanding its historical, social, cultural, and political context in Europe. Her research focuses on the impact of implementing data driven decision-making in European police forces on marginalized communities. She is also running a fellowship project at Hivos, which explores the risks that AI poses to society and highlight tactics of resistance. By mapping these examples, she aims to inspire and increase support for resisting AI implementation.

Simon Weckert

Artist & Designer, DE

Simon Weckert is an artist with his home base in Berlin. He likes to share knowledge on a wide range of fields from generative design to physical computing. His focus is the digital world – including everything related to code and electronics under the reflection on current social aspects, ranging from technology oriented examinations to the discussion of current social issues. In his work, he seeks to assess the value of technology, not in terms of actual utility, but from the perspective of future generations. He wants to raise awareness of the privileged state in which people live within Western civilization and remind them of the obligations attached to this privilege.
www.simonweckert.com

Felipe Schmidt Fonseca

Activist, Free/Open Advocate and Researcher, OpenDoTT project, BR/DE

Felipe Schmidt Fonseca is a Brazilian activist and free/open advocate turned researcher. He is a PhD researcher at Northumbria University, in the OpenDoTT project. A research blog is available at https://is.efeefe.me/opendott. In the last couple of decades Felipe was a co-founder and leader of a number of community and networking initiatives dedicated to critical thinking (and making) in the crossroads between culture, science, technology and society. Some examples are Tropixel, MetaReciclagem, RedeLabs, Bricolabs, Lixo Eletrônico, Ciên-cia Aberta Ubatuba and UbaLab, among others.
is.efeefe.me

Tracking Exposed

Leonardo Sanna (PhD Fellow, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, IT)

Salvatore Romano (Graduate student in Social Psychology, University of Padova, IT)

Tracking Exposed is a research group who develops software to analyze personalization by enabling everyday internet users to do their analysis. They began in 2016 with Facebook, then continued with supporting scraping and evidence collection from Youtube (2018), Porn-hub (2018), and Amazon (2019). Their main objective is to spotlight users’ tracking, profiling, on the data market, and the influence of algorithms. As long as these phenomena are shielded from view or understood only by experts, they cannot be tackled with the political determination that problems of such magnitude deserve. That is why they strive to explain the issue, test, and promote new solutions, developed to benefit the community.
tracking.exposed

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