In the autumn of 2009, a group of exchange students in the University of Applied Sciences of Utrecht got a task to make a research project on the current situation of Social Media. The group consisted of 5 people with really different backgrounds and opinions. Two Finnish, one Austrian, one Belgian and one Taiwanese put their heads together to explore the enormous world of Social Media. In this paper, Social Media stands for Online Social Media in other words: websites that allow people to communicate with each other, share opinions and ideas, public or semi-public profiles for the users and possibility to view those profiles. Most known examples of Social Media at this moment (2010) would be Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Flickr, flixter, LinkedIN, Tagged, Twitter and Plurk. There are hundreds and hundreds more of Social Media websites and each of them has its own purpose and idea. Some of them concentrate on one topic or subject and some websites are more expanded. Most of the Social Media websites give the opportunity to their users to upload pictures, videos and other data but the most important thing is that social media allow people to communicate ‘one-to-many and many-to-one’ and not as the old fashion media ‘one-way communication’ only.
In the context of the designers responsibility for the impact of technology, ethical considerations are important. However, these considerations are often seen as limiting innovation and the freedom of the designer. Is it possible, on the contrary, that ethics can also foster creativity in design? The research project Tech-Wise is about a practice oriented approach in ethics; developing tools to engage people with ethical deliberation on the impact of technology. One result of the project is a workshop format for stimulating ethical deliberation that can be tailored to particular technologies and design disciplines. We argue from the results of one particular instance of this workshop format that such an approach to ethics has a fruitful reciprocal effect. It can stimulate creativity in design by enriching the question about the purpose of an innovation, and the other way around enrich ethical reasoning by opening up to often surprising impacts of technologies.
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Artificiële Intelligentie (AI) speelt een steeds belangrijkere rol in mediaorganisaties bij de automatische creatie, personalisatie, distributie en archivering van mediacontent. Dit gaat gepaard met vragen en bezorgdheid in de maatschappij en de mediasector zelf over verantwoord gebruik van AI. Zo zijn er zorgen over discriminatie van bepaalde groepen door bias in algoritmes, over toenemende polarisatie door de verspreiding van radicale content en desinformatie door algoritmes en over schending van privacy bij een niet transparante omgang met data. Veel mediaorganisaties worstelen met de vraag hoe ze verantwoord met AI-toepassingen om moeten gaan. Mediaorganisaties geven aan dat bestaande ethische instrumenten voor verantwoorde AI, zoals de EU “Ethics Guidelines for trustworthy AI” (European Commission, 2019) en de “AI Impact Assessment” (ECP, 2018) onvoldoende houvast bieden voor het ontwerp en de inzet van verantwoorde AI, omdat deze instrumenten niet specifiek zijn toegespitst op het mediadomein. Hierdoor worden deze ethische instrumenten nog nauwelijks toegepast in de mediasector, terwijl mediaorganisaties aangeven dat daar wel behoefte aan is. Het doel van dit project is om mediaorganisaties te ondersteunen en begeleiden bij het inbedden van verantwoorde AI in hun organisaties en bij het ontwerpen, ontwikkelen en inzetten van verantwoorde AI-toepassingen, door domeinspecifieke ethische instrumenten te ontwikkelen. Dit gebeurt aan de hand van drie praktijkcasussen die zijn aangedragen door mediaorganisaties: pluriforme aanbevelingssystemen, inclusieve spraakherkenningssystemen voor de Nederlandse taal en collaboratieve productie-ondersteuningssystemen. De ontwikkeling van de ethische instrumenten wordt uitgevoerd met een Research-through-Design aanpak met meerdere iteraties van informatie verzamelen, analyseren prototypen en testen. De beoogde resultaten van dit praktijkgerichte onderzoek zijn: 1) nieuwe kennis over het ontwerpen van verantwoorde AI in mediatoepassingen, 2) op media toegespitste ethische instrumenten, en 3) verandering in de deelnemende mediaorganisaties ten aanzien van verantwoorde AI door nauwe samenwerking met praktijkpartners in het onderzoek.
The IMPULS-2020 project DIGIREAL (BUas, 2021) aims to significantly strengthen BUAS’ Research and Development (R&D) on Digital Realities for the benefit of innovation in our sectoral industries. The project will furthermore help BUas to position itself in the emerging innovation ecosystems on Human Interaction, AI and Interactive Technologies. The pandemic has had a tremendous negative impact on BUas industrial sectors of research: Tourism, Leisure and Events, Hospitality and Facility, Built Environment and Logistics. Our partner industries are in great need of innovative responses to the crises. Data, AI combined with Interactive and Immersive Technologies (Games, VR/AR) can provide a partial solution, in line with the key-enabling technologies of the Smart Industry agenda. DIGIREAL builds upon our well-established expertise and capacity in entertainment and serious games and digital media (VR/AR). It furthermore strengthens our initial plans to venture into Data and Applied AI. Digital Realities offer great opportunities for sectoral industry research and innovation, such as experience measurement in Leisure and Hospitality, data-driven decision-making for (sustainable) tourism, geo-data simulations for Logistics and Digital Twins for Spatial Planning. Although BUas already has successful R&D projects in these areas, the synergy can and should significantly be improved. We propose a coherent one-year Impuls funded package to develop (in 2021): 1. A multi-year R&D program on Digital Realities, that leads to, 2. Strategic R&D proposals, in particular a SPRONG/sleuteltechnologie proposal; 3. Partnerships in the regional and national innovation ecosystem, in particular Mind Labs and Data Development Lab (DDL); 4. A shared Digital Realities Lab infrastructure, in particular hardware/software/peopleware for Augmented and Mixed Reality; 5. Leadership, support and operational capacity to achieve and support the above. The proposal presents a work program and management structure, with external partners in an advisory role.
Steeds meer organisaties vinden het belangrijk om ‘ethisch verantwoorde’ AI-toepassingen te ontwikkelen. Maar wat is precies ethisch verantwoord? En hoe ontwerp je AI-systemen die aan ethische richtlijnen voldoen? In dit coöperatieve spel ontwerp je samen, op basis van de ethische principes opgesteld door de EU, ethisch verantwoorde AI-toepassingen.