Prototypes for a Lighter Internet with TUMO
| Prototypes for a Lighter Internet with TUMO | |
|---|---|
| Name | Prototypes for a Lighter Internet with TUMO |
| Location | TUMO |
| Date | 2023/06/26-2023/07/07 |
| Time | [[]] |
| PeopleOrganisations | TUMO |
| Type | Meetup |
| Web | No |
| No | |
Introduction
The project Prototypes for a lighter internet describes a collaborative exploration across the Netherlands and Armenia that resulted in a two week-long workshop for kids and teenagers at the [https://tumo.org/ TUMO Center for Creative Technologies] in Yerevan – a free-of-charge educational program that puts teens in charge of their own learning.
[Tumon Bay Cable Landing Station]
The aim of the project was to pay attention to the challenges that come with building and participating in contemporary internet culture in a manner that is sustainable and equitable. Data centers, cable networks, and always-on devices (e.g. routers and phones) that allow us to be connected via the Internet have huge energy requirements. Moreover, the mining required to source materials for required chips inside our hardware is exhausting the earth and is the cause for geopolitical tensions. With Prototypes for a lighter internet, we took a hands-on approach to exploring the social and environmental implications of internet technologies from the perspective of those who will be most affected by the rising threats of climate change – kids and youngsters.
Our collaborative mission!
Participants joined the H&D collective for two weeks for an intensive research trajectory and worked together on developing prototypes for a lighter, less wasteful internet. The learning lab was process-driven, giving space for playful trial and error, guided by hacking principles.[2] The question we researched is:
"Why is the internet so heavy? (And what can we do about it?)"
Through hands-on prototyping we worked our way towards building and imagining a lighter, less wasteful internet, and explored the limits and unexpected possibilities of such a small internet. Along the way, we proposed many exercises to reduce kb, and traced every step of the collaborative research project, documented successful and failed experiments, to share with each other and the world.