I am delighted to announce that I am currently a resident at the prototype Lighthouse Studio along with Aral Balkan and Mark Simpkins. Here is part of the announcement that lays out the scope of the project:
“We are currently prototyping Lighthouse Studio in advance of a launch in Spring 2014. To do this, we are running two short experiments in 2013 and early 2014. Selected residents will work within a ‘scratch’ studio environment on their own practice, but will also help us answer many questions about how the Studio can and should work.The theme for the current prototyping phase responds to our post-PRISM digital world. The recent scandals relating to the NSA, the revelation of the PRISM surveillance programme, and the treatment of whistleblowers such as Edward Snowden and Bradley Manning, have revealed how fundamentally intertwined our civil liberties are with our technological infrastructures. These systems can both enable, and threaten, both our privacy and our security. Ubiquitous networked infrastructures create radical new creative opportunities for a coming generation of makers and users, whilst also presenting us with major social dilemmas. We are becoming more aware than ever that our data is a powerful resource and we need to think carefully about how we use it in the future. What happens to our data when we share it online? Who owns it? Who else is it being shared with, and how much control or oversight do we have over that sharing? How can we regain control?
The inaugural Lighthouse Studio residents are all exploring aspects of these questions, during the first phase of prototyping.”