THE PARADOXICAL AND THE REVERSIBLE: TOWARDS A CRITIQUE OF PERVASIVE COMPUTING AND THE INTELLIGENT NATION 2015 (IN2015) MASTERPLAN IN SINGAPORE

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH

'The emotional wardrobe': a fashion perspective on the integration of technology and clothing

Since the Industrial Revolution, fashion and technology have been linked through the textile and manufacturing industries, a relationship that has propelled technical innovation and aesthetic and social change. Today a new alliance is emerging through the integration of electronic technology and smart materials on the body. However, it is not fashion designers who are exploiting this emerging area but interaction design, performance art and electronic and computing technologists. 'The Emotional Wardrobe' is a practice-based research project that seeks to address this imbalance by integrating technology with clothing from a fashion perspective. It aims to enhance fashion's expressive and responsive potential by investigating clothing that can both represent and stimulate an emotional response through the interface of technology. Precedents can be found in the work of other practitioners who merge clothing design with responsive material technology to explore social interaction, social commentary and body responsive technology. Influence is also sought from designers who investigate the notion of paradoxical emotions. A survey of emotion science, emotional design, and affective computing is mapped onto a fashion design structure to assess if this fusion can create new 'poetic' paradigms for the interaction of fashion and technology. These models are explored through the production of 'worn' and 'unworn' case studies which are visualised through responsive garment prototypes and multimedia representations. The marriage of fashion and technology is tested through a series of material experiments that aim to create a new aesthetic vocabulary that is responsive and emotional. They integrate traditional fashion fabrics with material technology to enhance the definition of fashion. The study shows that the merger of fashion and technology can offer a more personal and provocative definition of self, one which actively involves the wearer in a mutable aesthetic identity, replacing the fixed physicality of fashion with a constant flux of self-expression and playful psychological experience. The contribution of the research consists of: the integration of technology to alter communication in fashion, a recontextualisation of fashion within a wider arena of emotion and technology, the use of technologies from other disciplines to materialize ideas and broaden the application of those technologies, and the articulation of a fashion design methodology

The BG News May 1, 2006

The BGSU campus student newspaper May 1, 2006. Volume 96 - Issue 147https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/bg-news/8604/thumbnail.jp

A Framework for Digital Emotions

As new media become more ubiquitous, our emotional experiences in digital space are increasing exponentially as well. While there is much talk of “affective” computing and “affective” new media art, a disconnect exists between networked emotions and the popular media that they inhabit. This research presents a theoretical framework for assessing “digital emotions”—a term that describes the feedback process between digital technologies and the body with respect to short, networked inscriptions of emotion and the (re)experience of those inscriptions within the body and through digital space. Digital emotions display five basic characteristics that can be applied to a variety of media environments: (1) They describe a process of feedback that link short, emotive inscriptions in digital environments to users and their (re)experiences of those inscriptions; (2) This feedback process includes, but is not limited to, the inscriber, the medium, and the receiver and the emotive experience fuels the initial connectivity and any further connectivity; (3) The emotional value varies depending on the media, the community of users, and the aesthetic experience of the digital emotion; (4) Digital emotions influence our emotional repertoire by normalizing our paradigm scenarios; and (5) They are highly malleable based on changes in technologies and their ability to both expand and contract emotional experiences in real time. The core characteristics of digital emotions are applied to three broad and overlapping categories: technology, community, and aesthetic experience. Each of these aspects of digital emotions work together, yet they exist along the massive spectrum of our online, emotional experiences—from our casual click of the “like” button to digital community artworks. Applied to digital spaces along this spectrum, digital emotions illuminate the feedback process that occurs between the media, the network, and the environment. The framework ultimately suggests that the process of digital emotions explicates emotions experiences that could only occur in digital space and are therefore unique to digital culture

THE MACHINE ANXIETIES OF STEAMPUNK: CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHY, NEO-VICTORIAN AESTHETICS, AND FUTURISM

This dissertation examines the steampunk movement as a significant contemporary expression of the human condition. Although its aesthetic inspiration comes from the Victorian past, as re-tooled, re-imagined, and re-energized for the twenty-first century, steampunk’s underlying interest is in a speculative view of the future and a concern for the contemporary individual’s struggle to retain autonomy in a de-centered, deterritorialized world. As such the steampunk movement participates in, and contributes to, an important ongoing philosophical and aesthetic dialog. The project examines the motivations for steampunk’s visual inspiration in the Victorian. Technological and scientific advancements in that period greatly impacted societal traditions and the role of the individual within it. Economic, social, and political changes revolutionized daily life and the individual faced a new self-consciousness as she confronted, and adapted to, these significant changes. Today, similar technological advancements force new tensions between the individual and the world around her. Astounding developments in computing and artificial intelligence, and the concept of the cyborg and other hybrid beings challenge the contemporary individual’s sense of self. By looking to the past, steampunk seeks to recuperate the Victorian individual’s successful navigation of technological change. She does so in order to facilitate our own navigation of current waters. vii The project traces the movement’s modest roots as a literary sub-genre of science fiction, explores its sources in the Victorian, and describes the movement’s rapid evolution to global phenomenon. Today steampunk is fully integrated into contemporary culture as an aesthetic observed in visual, decorative, and fashion arts, comic books, movies, and television. The project explores the current landscape of art and philosophy in order to position the steampunk movement within the larger scope of the contemporary scene. A triad of prevailing philosophical trends—postmodernism, transhumanism, and posthumanism, help to reveal steampunk’s involvement in the contemporary philosophical and aesthetic dialog.https://digitalmaine.com/academic/1015/thumbnail.jp

Surveillance capitalism in the context of futurology : an inquiry to the implications of surveillance capitalism on the future of humanity

Tiedekunta/Osasto – Fakultet/Sektion – Faculty Valtiotieteellinen tiedekunta Laitos – Institution – Department Sosiaalitieteiden laitos Tekijä – Författare – Author Sandberg Markus Roy Rikhard Työn nimi – Arbetets titel – Title Valvontakapitalismi tulevaisuudentutkimuksen viitekehyksessä: tutkielma valvontakapitalismin vaikutuksista ihmisyyden tulevaisuuteen Oppiaine – Läroämne – Subject Yhteiskuntapolitiikka Työn laji – Arbetets art – Level Pro gradu-tutkielma Aika – Datum – Month and year 18.5.2020 Sivumäärä – Sidoantal – Number of pages 105 Tiivistelmä – Referat – Abstract Tämä tutkielma ammentaa aiheensa parhaastaan Shoshana Zuboffin The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: A fight for a human future at the new frontier of power -teoksesta. Kirja panee pöydälle uuden teorian ajanmukaisimmasta kapitalismista ja esittää vallanvaihdoksen uusliberalismista valvontakapitalismiin. Ilmiön alkujuuret sekä seurannaisvaikutukset tulevat olemaan tämän maisterintyön polttopisteessä. Kirjallisuuskatsauksessa tulevaisuudentutkimuksen tieteenalan taustaa ja sitoumuksia puntaroidaan pintapuolisesti niin akateemisen- kuin kaunokirjallisuudenkin voimin. Rinnakkaisesti raotetaan valvontakapitalismin käsitettä ja tehdään juotos sen ja Yuval Noah Hararin dataismin välillä. Hararin näkemykset ihmiskunnan eilispäivästä ja huomisesta palvelevat piirtoheittimenä työn tulkinnoille valvontakapitalismista. Mielikuvitus, kardinaalivaltti, joka kuuluu tavaramerkkioikeudella ainoastaan Homo Sapiensille koko tunnetussa maailmankaikkeudessa, nostetaan tapetille olennaisimpana sotanäyttämönä, jolla valvontakapitalismi toteuttaa lannistavinta täsmäiskuaan. Tämä tutkielma oikeuttaa olemassaolonsa kertaamalla pääpiirteittäin kansantajuisen futurologian suuntauksia ja pyrkii tekemään selväksi, missä ja miten tieteenala on kulkeutunut kiertoraiteille, vieraantunut kiireellisimmistä kysymyksistä ja langennut kamariteoreettisiin kiistoihin keinoälystä jumaluusopin jalanjäljissä. Tutkielma puolustaa pulmanasettelua, jonka mukaan tämä sumentaa inhimillistä toimijuutta valvontakapitalismin kuliseissa ja toimii täten sen tehosteena. Maisterintyön kolmannessa kappaleessa esitetään kiteytys Sohail Inayatullahin syy-yhteyksien kerrostuneen tarkastelun menetelmästä sekä siitä, miksi se on omiaan tämän tutkimuskysymyksen tarpeisiin. CLA-metodologian vahvuuksia ja vajavuuksia ruoditaan ja lukija vihitään tasoja taaplaavaan tutkimusotteeseen, joka tulee sävyttämään tätä maisterintyötä pitkin matkaa, ennen kuin itse analyysi toteutetaan. Yhteenvedossa edessä on valvontakapitalismin tyhjentävä ruodinta, jota säestetään aprikoimalla ylimalkaisesti sitä, noinkohan valvontakapitalismi alkuunkaan välttää edustavasta markkinatalouden muunnelmasta, vai ilmentääkö se jotakin tyystin toisenlaista. Avainsanat – Nyckelord – Keywords Valvontakapitalismi Tulevaisuudentutkimus DataismiTiedekunta/Osasto – Fakultet/Sektion – Faculty Faculty of Social Sciences Laitos – Institution – Department Department of Social Research Tekijä – Författare – Author Sandberg Markus Roy Rikhard Työn nimi – Arbetets titel – Title Surveillance capitalism in the context of futurology: An inquiry to the implications of surveillance capitalism on the future of humanity Oppiaine – Läroämne – Subject Social and Public Policy Työn laji – Arbetets art – Level Master's Thesis Aika – Datum – Month and year 18.5.2020 Sivumäärä – Sidoantal – Number of pages 105 Tiivistelmä – Referat – Abstract This dissertation owes its research topic largely to Shoshana Zuboff's book, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: A fight for a human future at the new frontier of power. The work ushers in a novel theory of the contemporary strain of capitalism and posits a shift from neoliberalism to surveillance capitalism. The origins and ramifications of this phenomenon will be at the focus of this thesis. In the review of relevant literature, the background and the commitments of futures studies as a field are eclectically touched upon by the aid of both scholarly work and science fiction. Concomitantly, the concept of surveillance capitalism is unfurled and welded to Yuval Noah Harari's notion of dataism. Harari's thoughts on humanity's past and future shall also furnish the overhead projector for my interpretation of surveillance capitalism. Imagination, the foremost forte that Homo Sapiens enjoys the monopoly of in the known universe, is singled out as the main theatre of war, as it is the area where surveillance capitalism is carrying out its most crippling strafe. The raison d'etre for this treatise is lent support to by virtue of a once-over of popular futurology, as I seek to sort out, where and why the discipline has gone off at a tangent and detracted from acute matters, divagating into disputes over synthetic intelligence that echo theological dialectics. I propose the problematization that this befuddles the human agency at the core of surveillance capitalism and thus works as an adjuvant to it. In the third compartment a précis of the history of Sohail Inayatullah's causal-layered-analysis method as well as its viability and pertinence to this dissertation is presented. The boon and bane of CLA as an epistemology is audited as the reader is familiarized with the stratum-superpositioning approach which shall inform this thesis passim before the analysis itself is presented. In the summarization surveillance capitalism is sized up from top to bottom, accompanied by a cursory contemplation apropos of the question to what degree surveillance capitalism is equipped to emblematize capitalism in the first place, or perhaps rather something altogether outré. Avainsanat – Nyckelord – Keywords Surveillance capitalism Futurology Datais

Mapping utopian art: alternative political imaginaries in new media art (2008-2015)

This thesis investigates the proliferation of alternative political imaginaries in the Web-based art produced during the global financial crisis of 2008 and its aftermath (2008- 2015), with a particular focus on the influence of communist utopianism. The thesis begins by exploring the continuous relevance of utopianism to Western political thought, including the historical context within which the financial crisis of 2008 occurred. This context has been defined by the new political, social and cultural milieu produced by the development of Data Capitalism – the dominant economic paradigm of the last two decades. In parallel, the thesis identifies the “organic” connections between leftist utopian thought and networked technologies, in order to claim that the events of 2008 functioned as a catalyst for their reactivation and expansion. Following this analysis, the thesis focuses on how politically engaged artists have reacted to the global financial crisis through the use of the World Wide Web. More specifically, the thesis categorises a wide range of artworks, institutional and non-institutional initiatives, as well as theoretical texts that have either been written by artists, or have inspired them. The result of this exercise is a mapping of the post-crisis Web-based art, which is grounded on the technocultural tools employed by artists as well as on the main concepts and ideals that they have aimed at materialising through the use of such tools. Furthermore, the thesis examines the interests of Data Capitalists in art and the Internet, and the kinds of restrictions and obstacles that they have imposed on the political use of the Web in order to safeguard them. Finally, the thesis produces an overall evaluation of the previously analysed cultural products by taking into account both the objectives of their creators and the external and internal limitations that ultimately shape their character. Accordingly, the thesis locates the examined works within the ideological spectrum of Marxist and post-Marxist thought in order to formulate a series of proposals about the future of politically engaged Web-based art and the ideological potentialities of networked communication at large

The Development of Learning Regions in New Zealand: An ICT Perspective

The term "Learning Region" is used to identify a region which is innovative, economically successful, and inhabited by citizens who are active members of their local community. Such regions are characterised by strong links between local businesses, community groups, and education providers. Within a regional area interaction and exchange of information is easier and cheaper than in a national or international context. The success of an individual organisation is directly related to the quality of information available locally. Information technology can be an important tool in improving the flow of knowledge between the stakeholders within a region. The study examines the role that information and communication technologies (ICTs) play in the development of learning regions in New Zealand, and how they can be used to improve the quality of information flows both within the region itself, and between the region and the outside world. In particular the research considers what contribution ICTs make to organisational learning and innovation. Historical methods are used to build up a picture of the significant changes that have taken place within two contrasting regions of New Zealand between 1985 and 2005. The two selected regions are Southland and Wellington. Data was collected by searching regional newspapers, and conducting interviews with key figures in each region. A "6-I" framework of the "ideal" features of a learning region was developed from the literature review and this was used to analyse the data. The findings show a clear linear progression in terms of the development of hard ICT based networks, but a less clear pattern in terms of soft social networks where the same issues were revisited a number of times over the years. Though there was evidence of a relationship between the soft networks that existed at the regional level and the utilisation of hard ICT networks within a region it was difficult to quantify. Hard and soft networks evolve differently over time and the relationship between the two is nuanced. Both regions were successful in setting up high quality ICT networks. However, with the exception of the education sector, both regions struggled to co-ordinate their soft networks. Though good social capital existed in each region, especially in Southland, it was located in different interest groups and was not easy to bring together. This lack of co-ordination meant that the possibilities opened up by ICT infrastructure in terms of increasing innovation were not fully realised. Both regions demonstrated many of the characteristics of learning regions but neither region was able to bring all aspects together to reach their full potential. The thesis demonstrates the important role that soft social networks play in the successful utilisation of ICT networks within a regional setting

The Superfluousness of Big Brother: Charting the Evolution of Surveillance in Twentieth and Twenty First Century American and Global Anglophone Literature and Television

This dissertation charts the evolution of surveillance as presented in twentieth and twenty-first century American and Global Anglophone literature and television. It analyzes six exemplary works: 1984, The Circle, Black Mirror, Purity, The Reluctant Fundamentalist, and The Lowland. It seeks to move beyond the scope of Benthamite and Foucauldian approaches to surveillance studies in order to examine the post-panoptic structures of the synopticon and the banopticon. To this end, this dissertation argues the six illustrative works mentioned above help underscore the shift from the few watching the many to the many watching the few. It seeks to explain the paradox whereby the televisual capabilities have never been more powerful yet the need for them has been rendered superfluous by an attitudinal, paradigmatic shift in western society. Finally, this dissertation endeavors to explain how literature productively complicates the issue of watching and how, paradoxically, we have never been better connected while simultaneously never been more alone. It posits another paradox as a solution: that we can know someone better by reading their words than by connecting with them through “social media.