Aral Balkan @aral@mastodon.ar.al
Admin
Cyborg rights activist, designer, developer.
Joined Apr 2017
Folks, for years: We have a problem called Surveillance Capitalism, it’s a systemic problem arising from socio-economic factors…
Ex-Googler: Hmm, this problem, very exotic… what shall I call it without criticising either surveillance or capitalism? Time well spent?
Folks: SURVEILLANCE CAPITALISM! It’s the feedback loop between accumulation of information (surveillance) and accumulation of wealth (capitalism)
Ex-Googler: …human downgrading?
🤔
https://www.wired.com/story/tristan-harris-tech-is-downgrading-humans-time-to-fight-back/
The Internet belongs to us all and yet our names are owned/controlled by commercial entities. Isn’t it time to put an end to this ridiculous rent seeking for what are essentially rows in a database? @OpenNIC has a free/open alternative. We should mandate all browsers support it.
If you do want me to open your conference with a talk on Small Technology (the antidote to surveillance capitalism), here’s a bootleg recording of my keynote from Hamburg last month so you know ~ what to expect:
To inquire, see https://ar.al
(And, on a personal note, I’ve been giving talks for over two decades, I’ve won awards for them, and they consistently get rave reviews. So, if you do your research, you’ll know what you’ll get from me an excellent keynote on a timely/important subject that goes best in the opening spot and causes lively debate for the rest of your conference.)
Supporting the cause we fight for and our tiny not for profit doesn’t mean inviting us to speak at your conference for free. We don’t need the exposure. It means paying us to speak so we can keep doing the work we do that you want us to present about.
As someone who helps run a tiny not for profit (@indie) with no corporate funding that in part relies on my speaking fees (which 100% go to Ind.ie, not into my personal account), I simply cannot afford the time to fill out talk proposals or do unpaid talks.
Dear conferences organisers,
Don’t write to potential speakers asking them to submit a talk proposal for your conference. Take the time, do your research, and if you’re going to invite someone to speak, invite them to speak. Or just issue an open call for proposals.
So, anyway: “The result will be displayed in a stand for the event Imperdible 04: Planeta … organized by Cotec in Madrid on June 7. People at the event will digitally interact with the map discovering stories like yours, changing the system, in different parts of the world.”
Just recorded a short video to be included on an interactive map of technology initiatives for sustainable development. Mind you, I’ve little faith in the UN – everyone I’ve spoken to from there sounds like a mini Eric Schmidt. Very neoliberal…
(And while they’re quick to praise our initiatives, do we get any funding or support from them? Nope! Why did I record this again…?) 🤔
Aral Balkan
boosted
We just finished recording today’s edition of Inside Story on the Christchurch Call and how to regulate tech giants on violent extremism. In my own contributions, I tried to draw attention to the failure of imagination and lack of understanding of technology being displayed by our governments and tried to outline what a truly free and open Internet would look like.
It will be broadcast on Al Jazeera at 17:30 GMT / 18:30 UK/Ireland time. You can watch it live online at:
We just finished recording today’s edition of Inside Story on the Christchurch Call and how to regulate tech giants on violent extremism. In my own contributions, I tried to draw attention to the failure of imagination and lack of understanding of technology being displayed by our governments and tried to outline what a truly free and open Internet would look like.
It will be broadcast on Al Jazeera at 17:30 GMT / 18:30 UK/Ireland time. You can watch it live online at:
The petition has shot past 75,000 signatures now. Please lend your voice if you can.
Aral Balkan
boosted
Bhavani Esapathi (https://twitter.com/@bhaesa) is my friend and a dear, wonderful person who has been battling autoimmune disease for as long as I’ve known her and doing so while helping others. Now the Tories want to hand her a death sentence and deport her. We cannot let this happen.
Read about her ordeal:
Sign/support this petition and help save her life:
https://www.change.org/p/home-office-grant-bhavani-esapathi-a-visa-so-she-can-live
Tell your friends, call your elected representatives, make some noise.
Aral Balkan
boosted
Sharing more of the pie does not solve the problem, if the pie is the problem. @aral writes about regulating surveillance capitalism.
https://ar.al/2019/05/11/the-dos-and-donts-of-tech-regulation/
Aral Balkan
boosted
Persino @aral, sul suo blog, l'altro ieri ha scritto che l'introduzione di una digital tax sarebbe una delle armi fondamentali per andare a colpire il capitalismo di sorveglianza.
Secondo me ha ragione. Le tasse sono uno dei modi in cui lo Stato regola un fenomeno, e la regolazione è nemica del capitalismo.
https://ar.al/2019/05/11/the-dos-and-donts-of-tech-regulation/
Bhavani Esapathi (https://twitter.com/@bhaesa) is my friend and a dear, wonderful person who has been battling autoimmune disease for as long as I’ve known her and doing so while helping others. Now the Tories want to hand her a death sentence and deport her. We cannot let this happen.
Read about her ordeal:
Sign/support this petition and help save her life:
https://www.change.org/p/home-office-grant-bhavani-esapathi-a-visa-so-she-can-live
Tell your friends, call your elected representatives, make some noise.
Aral Balkan
boosted
@aral 👋I wrote a long article on surveillance capitalism and your work. It's in French, but maybe you'd be interested 🙃
Admin
Cyborg rights activist, designer, developer.
Joined Apr 2017
