Future DiverCities

Survival Kit for the Age of Technology

BEK 01.07.2019 31.07.2019

Published

What would you take with you in a “survival kit” for the age of technology? How can we imagine and act for the future? How can we act in everyday life, here and now? After a week’s LAB at BEK in June 2019, we are proud to give you our two suggestions for a survival kit: A video book co-created by 14 artists and Strategies for Action – tips on how to take control of your own existence on the internet.

Survival Kit for the Age of Technology – a co-created video book

MADE BY
Michael Ang (CA/DE), Rocio Berenguer (ES/FR), Samuel Brzeski (GB/NO), Anne Marthe Dyvi (NO), Stine Gonsholt (NO/DE), Yana Gorbalenya (RU/NO), David Guez (FR), Tarik Hindic (NO), Paul Johannesen (AU/NO), Åse Løvgren (NO), Linda Kronman (FI/NO), Vilde Salhus Røed (NO), Sara Salamon (HR), Andreas Zingerle (AT/NO)

STRATEGIES FOR ACTION

Don’t let yourself be exploited and used. These three tips will help you make informed choices.

Opt out of global data surveillance: Prism Break
We all have a right to privacy, which you can exercise today by encrypting your communications and ending your reliance on proprietary services. Prism Break helps you too choose safe software and digital communication services like operating systems, e-mail clients, web browsers, file storage and more.

Help make mass surveillance of entire populations uneconomical! Opt out of global data surveillance programs like PRISMXKeyscore and Tempora.

Digital freedom: Framasoft
Remain control of your digital tools. Framasoft offers, mainly online, a set of concrete and practical tools like free software (directory, USB sticks, installer…); free cultural creations (blog, translation, publishing house…) and free services (more than 30 free services in the project De-google-ify Internet (https://degooglisons-internet.org/ ).

An emancipatory digital world is possible through actual actions in real world and online, with and for you.

Exposing the Invisible: The Kit
The Kit is a starting point for anybody who is curious to question information that is false, find information when it is scarce and filter information when it becomes overwhelming.

In The Kit you’ll find step-by-step methods such as scraping information from websites, using maps to uncover hidden details, and investigating a supply chain to see the journey of a product. Whether your motive is to seek corruption, verify an article or just get to know your neighbourhood, The Kit will teach you how to do so in a safe, and thorough way.

Download Strategies for Action here (pdf).

Background

We wade around in terminology, technical gadgetry, new and old habits of communication, all of which have been spawned by technological developments. There have been so many new developments in such a short span of time, that we have not yet come to a conclusion about what the whole of it means in practice, theory or interaction between ourselves. We may all have felt – at work, in one’s private life, in all relations that we are a part of – that our understanding of technology is not enough. What it means to us and what it does to us is not easy to get an overview of, especially if we are up to our knees in it.  Our time is scary, frustrating and can move in many directions. What should we know, what should we do and what ought we to master?

With this as a starting point we made a video book together; a Survival Kit for the Age of Technology. The video book was co-created by artists, creatives and experts suggested within Future DiverCities (FDC) for this LAB at BEK. Read more about the LAB here.