Primary theme: Vulnerability and courage
Talk description
I want to talk about Death.
If there is one thing that has caused fear in every living creature from dawn of history to present day is death. Fear and pain are the basis for our self-preservation instincts but accepting our own mortality is so hard that we've created a whole set of "immortality systems" -national identities, art, religion, work and social structures- to delude ourselves (cf. Ernest Becker) and forget we're mortal.
However, as technology reshapes every corner of human relationships, the very concept of what it means to be dead is transformed too. The uncanny valley of afterlife will be soon paved by venture capital, with promises of online executors for your digital legacy, content creation to please your social audience in the hereafter and bots trained to mimic you for eternity (or at least until the startup's buyout/exit).
Are these eerie interactions bound to be creepy? Can they be tuned and provide therapeutic effects? Are our digital memories a faithful representation of ourselves? What kind of relationships could be built on top of these identities?
It's a difficult conversation for which I don't have all the answers, but I've many questions I'd love to share with you.
Learning objectives
- The current status of digital legacies and some possible evolution paths.
- The effects of software and digital identities on the concept of Death.
- The long-term implications of digital clones.
There are a few talks on SXSW Interactive that you can dig up in this topic that could expand your proposal. I could not find one that I listened to where some archivists tried to collect all the digital legacy for the 9-11 memorial. It was quite interesting I remember. They talked about accessing the information in multiple source formats. How they had to upgrade or emulate the format in order to retrieve an the side effects of it. Much like the brain, accessing the content modifies it. They also talked about how open source is great for archiving things.
I also see another angle missing here. Do digital natives actually care about preserving this content? I personally try to control as much as possible my digital presence but I know that is not true for younger generations. They leave traces all over the place and they do not care about it. Some exploration on generations could add another angle to your thesis.