Don't Cancel "Exhibit of Non-Freedom of Expression・Thereafter" at Aichi Triennale

[Toshimaru Ogura]

Hi all.

Please sign on the campaign against censorship in Japan.
Detail of artists' profiles are
https://censorship.social/artists/
Official website of the "Exhibit of Restricted/Non Freedom of
Expression・Thereafter"(In Japanese)
http://fujiyu.net/fujiyu/

toshi

https://www.change.org/p/don-t-cancel-exhibit-of-non-freedom-of-expression-thereafter-at-aichi-triennale

Complaints or criticisms against such exhibits as the Statue (of Girl) of Peace 
or the portraits of the emperor as something too political/blasphemous to be 
exhibited have been reaching the executive committee, many of which asking to 
remove or cancel the exhibition.

There also being a threat hinting at a possible fire-setting, the cancellation 
of the exhibition was announced at the press conference on the evening of 
August 3rd.

While Nagoya Mayor Kawamura announced the removal and cancellation of the 
exhibition, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga ,after the cabinet meeting 
on the morning of Aug.2 rd, stated, "I would like to confirm the facts and 
examine them properly and respond appropriately when deciding on subsidy 
grants."(Asahi Newspaper), both ending up in public declaration of possible 
governmental censorship on artistic expressions. Politicians are getting ready 
to launch outrageous moves to require every artistic expression to be 
restricted or censored by the state or to expect self- restrictive attitudes of 
artists themselves.   

We do not live looking at artistic expressions with certain people's points of 
view or from a certain unitary perspective, but we understand and think of 
artistic expressions from diverse and pluralistic perspectives.

When a piece of art is visualized in front of our eyes, whether positively or 
negatively, it should be judged or considered in each and every way. Taking the 
visualized piece out of our sight and smashing it is exactly the same 
suppressive way the pre-war regme imposed its unitary view on the people. On 
the contrary, the visualized display will generate a variety of opinions and 
ideas which in turn will activate discussions based on each for the first time. 
Here lies the significance of continuing this exhibition.

Protecting the freedom of expression and exhibition also means securing a forum 
for discussion and dialogue that brings together diverse views and ideas both 
positive and negative arising from the visualization of freedom of expression. 
That is why this space should not be covered up. Therefore don't remove or 
cancel the "Exhibit of Restricted/Non Freedom of Expression・Thereafter" at 
Aichi Triennale so that we are left with a space where we can visualize 
expressions and think about them in each and every way
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Call for participants and speakers: Imagining an AI Commons: A One-Day Workshop on AI and the Commons

[Fenwick Mckelvey]

Please circulate widely. We are looking for a participants and a couple
more speakers. Happy to answer questions from the list too. Its a rolling
deadline, but we're hoping to make a decision about attendance by late
September.
AI Commons Workshop

*Imagining an* *AI* *Commons: A One-Day Workshop on* *AI* *and the*
*Commons*

6 December 2019

Montreal, Quebec

*Hosted at Machine Agencies, Milieux Institute, Concordia University*

(Please find the submission form
 below)

How can artificial intelligence be oriented toward the common good? The
belief in AI for good has widespread acceptance in the industry and among
governments. Declarations from around the globe—Canada, China, South Korea,
France, and more
—call
for the development of AI to have a social purpose. But what is that
purpose?

The workshop seeks to develop a vision for a commons-based approach to the
future of AI. It is an intervention to develop democratic approaches to
digital disruption and understand transformations in citizen
engagement. The workshop will produce a public report on the possibility of
an AI as well as a series of video interviews capturing the discussion.

Without clear direction, AI risks becoming privatized and at odds with a
common world. In a recent study, researchers calculated the costs of
training a deep neural network model for use in natural language
processing. Their findings are alarming. The energy required can result in
CO2emissions equal to the lifetime emissions of five cars. Meanwhile, the
financial cost of the computing needed to carry out this research has
become so high that academic researchers cannot participate, enclosing
AI innovation
within the profit-oriented technology industry.

A commons approach to AI seeks to mitigate these harms, just as
commons approaches
in other areas have intervened in environmental devastation and the
privatization and commodification of knowledge. The term “commons” was
initially rooted in theories about the conditions and consequences of
sharing resources. But theorists and activists have worked to broaden it,
naming new commons in order to advocate for their protection while
developing praxis to govern them. This shift in understanding has been
greatly informed by indigenous scholarship and indigenous people’s
histories, epistemologies, and practices, which offer a wealth of
approaches to the management and preservation of common resources, material
and otherwise.

In this workshop, we invite you to reflect broadly on artificial
intelligence and its relation to the commons as you consider the following
questions:

   1. What should an AI Commons be?
  1. How could a commons-based approach guide the development of AI?
  2. How does a commons approach differ from proposed ethical or
  rights-based frameworks?
   2. How could the development of AI today—including the infrastructure
   and knowledge at its foundation—become a commons?


   1. What forms of collective action and governance would be necessary?
  What movements and efforts already exist?
  2. What latent commons or undercommons might we find in thinking about
   AI?
   1. Could AI reshape how we think about the commons, leading to new
   theories or practices?


   1. How might related (or unrelated) approaches to the commons be
  understood through AI and the commons (e.g., making kin, new
  materialism, infrastructures of care, or platform cooperativism)?
  2. What histories and instances of the commons does an AI commons require
  for context and inspiration?
   1. How might we imagine a future common world for the machines,
   environments, humans, and other life drawn together by the industrial
   efforts around AI?


   1. How can humans, AI, and other agents collaborate equitably in these
  commons?
  2. How might AI reproduce sustainably within the natural commons,
  unseating extractive and settler approaches to common worlds?

We invite people from diverse professions and communities to contribute as
either a workshop participant or a speaker. Participants are expected to
prepare a short 500-word position statement on one of these questions to be
shared before the workshop then workshopped in groups to draft a shared
response to these questions to be integrated into a public position paper.
Speakers are expected to prepare a short 15-minute presentation,
participate in a roundtable and animate around 1-2 of these questions.

The workshop is invite only. Some travel funds will be available for
speakers.

Please apply at: https://machineagencies.org/events/aicommons-cfp/

*This workshop is supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research
Council of Canada, the Center for the Study of Democratic Citizenship and
the Milieux Institute for Arts + Technology at Concordia University.*
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