A forum on Surveillance Capitalism and its alternatives.

Monday May 20 2019, 11-4,
Moore Auditorium, O'Brien Centre for Science, UCD.

We are, According to Shoshana Zuboff, living in the Age of Surveillance Capitalism “a new economic order that claims human experience as free raw material for hidden commercial practices of extraction, prediction and sales.” It is the dominant form of the digital economy, permeating all aspects of everyday life with its opaque algorithmic processes. The main players – Google, Facebook, Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft – are accumulating individualised data profiles of unprecedented granularity used to target, predict and ultimately shape behaviour. We have reached a point of crisis where issues of data, their governance and exploitation, go far beyond matters of personal privacy and seem to strike at the heart of the economy, civil society, and even democracy itself.

As concern about surveillance capitalism grows there is an imperative to more fully understand its mechanisms and practices and to develop alternative narratives that moderate the power of silicon valley while preserving the benefits of digital technology.

This forum, convened by Parity Studios / Insight Centre for Data Analytics artist in residence Conor McGarrigle, brings together experts from industry, the arts, academia, and journalism in an open forum to address these issues and present a view of what comes after Surveillance Capitalism

Speakers

Hannah Redler Hawes
Hannah Redler Hawes is an independent curator, specialising in projects which bring together art, science, technology and people. Collaborators have included Science Gallery London, FACT Liverpool, Institute of Physics & Tate Modern and the UK Digital Catapult. She is an ODI Associate and co-director of the Data as Culture art programme.
https://theodi.org/person/hannah-redler/

Rose Regina Lawrence
Rose Regina is a digital security educator with Tactical Technology Collective based in Berlin, Germany. She has worked with communities, human rights lawyers, programmers, and large tech companies to help them better understand the social and safety implications of technology choices from architecture design to individual use choices.
https://tacticaltech.org/

Karlin Lillington
Karlin is a columnist with the Irish Times focusing on technology, with a special interest in its political, social, business and cultural aspects. She also has written for publications including The Guardian, New Scientist, Wired.com, Salon.com, and The Scientist, and served on the board of RTE. She has a PhD from TCD.
https://www.irishtimes.com/profile/karlin-lillington-7.1837430

Johnny Ryan
Dr Johnny Ryan FRHistS is Chief Policy & Industry Relations Officer at Brave. His previous roles include Head of Ecosystem at PageFair, and Chief Innovation Officer of The Irish Times. He has a PhD from the University of Cambridge, and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.
https://brave.com/dr-johnny-ryan/

Roundtable debate chaired by Martin McCabe, Graduate School of Creative Arts and Media, TU Dublin