‘Networks out of Hands?’ [event]

:: panel discussion : curation/moderation : 1208

(i): labSurlab 2012 @ Quitto | aembit.lerone.net >
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fr. 24 aug 2012 :: 16:30 - 18:30
@ Kunstraum Bethanien>


Since the 1990s networked electronic communication has risen to become an indispensable fact and resource of all social and political spheres. Alongside the spread of the Internet, we witnessed a dual and paradoxical sense of the post-medial condition: we saw the empowerment generated by easy access to ‘crowd communication’ alongside a simultaneous realisation of a loss of autonomy and integrity in regard to ‘our’ communication systems. Where ‘the Net’ was once envisaged as universal infrastructure for democratic emancipation by emancipatory visionaries and early contestants of net-culture, a new disillusionment has arisen in the light of proprietary platforms, inter-state governance and sophisticated surveillance technologies put in place by private-state-conglomerates. Some declared ‘We lost the War’ some time ago, while others - like telecomix or ZaMir - extended infrastructural help for networked communication in moments of criticality to social actors on the move. In the light of this, we want to (re-)assess questions and initiatives of initiatives providing socio-technical ‘patches’ (infrastructural complements, hacks, supplements or alternatives) of the internet in view of social movements recently seen - or still to come.

With: Christopher Kullenberg/Stephan Urbach from Telecomix (se/de); Rena Tangens from FoeBuD (de); Lonneke van der Velden/Daniel Reusche via Unlike Us (nl/de); Alejo Duque from labSurlabl (co/ch).

Moderated by Oliver Lerone Schultz from the Post-Media Lab (de)