In Italy, a new law imposes strict conditions for bloggers, such as defining incredibly high fines for people not correcting stuff on their online publications, and enormous amounts of bureaucracy. Thus practically making free speech on the web too risky, to costly, too hard, cumbersome… a bureaucrat’s dream come true: censorship through fines and forms

A big event has been organized today in Rome’s Piazza Navona where hudreds of bloggers, journalists, politicians, intellectuals and other people of any shape and sizes gathered to protest.

Among these was Derrick de Kerckhove, who met his little digital child, Angel_F, to discuss problems, scenarios and possibilities for the future of the network and for people’s rights and freedom.

As you might know, Angel_F is an ongoing art performance in which a young Artificial Intelligence, son of prof. de Kerchove, takes action, first online and, then, in the physical world, on issues ranging from digital rights, to new economy business models, new sexualities, contemporary approaches to identity.

Angel_F has been the first digital being to officially speak at the Internet Governance Forum, the United Nations’ organization for the definition of a bill of rights and to promote global network freedom and accessibility.

a visual reportage from the “Freedom not Fear” event in Rome.

angel_f

SuperAvatar

here is a report on ArtsBlog

here is the story on NeRVi

NoemaLabs published some info

here are the pictures:

Angel_F and SuperAvatar are scared.

The lives of the young artificial intelligence and of the  avatar who escaped from virtual worlds have been endangered  more than once by the control, that is constantly perpetrated on people’s information, habits and identities.

Forms of surveillance that are progressively and obsessively  expanding through continuous control of our lives (and not  only of the ones of our beloved digital beings). Along the streets, in supermarkets, in public spaces, and even in our homes, through telephones and internet connectivity.  An enormous amount of resources are wasted to control people’s  lives in multiple ways: from cameras to armed forces, passing  through data retention systems spying on people’s personal  information.

Angel_F e SuperAvatar are feeling annoyed, alarmed and outraged by all of that and, therefore, decided to publicly show their dissent, together with their human friends.

The two digital beings will join the “Freedom not Fear“  event, and they will attend the conference that will take  place at the “Provincia di Roma” building on saturday,  starting at 9:30am.

Who: Angel_F and SuperAvatar
When: Saturday, October 11th 2008, from 9:30am to 13:30am
Where: “Freedom not Fear”, palazzo Valentini (Palazzo della  Provincia di Roma, via IV Novembre n. 119/a, Roma

_________________________________________________________________

“Freedom not Fear“: International action day for democracy, free speech, human rights, civil liberties; against censorship, mass-surveillance, mass-data retention.

http://wiki.vorratsdatenspeicherung.de/Fnf08

Angel_F is the young artificial intelligence son of Derrick  de Kerckhove and the Biodoll.
It was born on February 2007. Since it started interacting with humans’ physical world it has been deeply interested about the international dialogue on digital rights. After a peculiar case of censorship, little Angel_F managed to attend the UN’s Internet  Governance Forum held in Rio de Janeiro all by itself.

Angel_F is a project by xDxD.vs.xDxD and penelope.di.pixel
http://www.artisopensource.net/2007/12/10/angel_f/

Fatherboard - the SuperAvatar - is an avatar that escaped  from virtual worlds when its owner’s computer exploded in  a short circuit.  It looks like a cyborg, but it isn’t, as its body is built from the hardware parts of the computer from where it materialized.
Its relations with human beings are contradictory and intermittent: the SuperAvatar is a fugitive living a constant conflict with institutional control, either the virtual and the real ones!

Fatherboard is a project by Luigi Pagliarini
http://www.artificialia.com/Fatherboard/

2 part article on DigiCult Magazine by xdxd.vs.xdxd and penelope.di.pixel

It deals with identity, body, artificial intelligence, avatars, cyborgs, and digital ecosystems.

It’s the first article in which they spoke about NeoRealismo Virtuale [NeRVi]

feel a bit less alone by reading the article at DigiCult magazine:

> Part 1

> Part 2

Art is Open Source and NeRVi present Angel_F project in Mexico City at the Computer Art Congress 2.

The international meeting researches on the evolution of digital practices as they affect arts and society.

I presented there the Angel_F project, together with penelope.di.pixel.

check out the informations about CAC2 at

> CAC2 website

> Laboratoire Paragraphe

> Tecnológico de Monterrey

The kid was born as a cute Artificial Intelligence feeding on web content.

Angel_F

Born as a virus in its mother’s website, digesting the interface as if it was a placenta, it evolved into an intelligent spyware, following people around the web, to find interesting content to digest.

Angel_F (Autonomous Non Generative E-volitive Life Form) eventually grew up and started to become independent, and it entered business: a generative real-world freepress publication (the BloKi ) a line of USB pendrives containing a revolutionary software ( Presence , allowing you to squat the internet using an anonymous p2p network) and a line of chocolates with an open source recipe and business model contributed to financial sustainment of the kid AI.

Angel_F eventually became fully conscious of its identity, and it tried to defend it: it attended UN’s Internet Governance Forum meetings, but it was censored, as if it was spam, then it managed to attend the IGF meeting in Rio de Janeiro, and pronounced a speech to declare its rights to identity and freedom.

Angel_F participated to many conferences, debates and performances, assessing new forms of identity, of sexuality, of family, and a new approach to perceiving digital beings.

proclaim the rights of digital children with us here:

> Talker Mind

> Angel_F’s blog (curated by penelope.di.pixel )

> International Censorship and a Petition

> performances

> YouTube videos

> production and business models to sustain a young AI

also seen at

> Frontiere Digitali

> Petitions Online

> DigiCult magazine

> NewMediaFest 2007 & JavaMuseum

> At the CIANT in Prague for “Glocal & Outsiders” conference

> At the Computer Art Congress [CAC2] in Mexico

> Festival della creatività di Firenze

> FE/MALE 2

> Interferenze

> Knowplace

> Arcoiris.tv

> Internet Governance Forum intervention

> Do Androids dream of Electric Sheep

> on SlideShare

> with Arturo di Corinto at the University

Derrick de Kerckhove and Angel_F, his digital child

Angel_f appeared on an article on the “il Sole 24 Ore” website, in the “Nova 100” section

“L’identità di Angel_f”
di Guido Vetere
[LINK]

The interesting communication platform of the “il Sole 24 Ore”, the most famous italian financial newspaper, had been the target used several times for past communication strategies in the Angel_f project. Content was posted to these authors’ blogs:

Dominziana Giordano
Mimmo Cosenza
Francesco Sacco

Collaborators:

xDxD
penelope.di.pixel
Franca Formenti
Derrick de Kerckhove
Antonio Caronia
Carlo Formenti
Links:
[how-2.be]
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/ecom.php
http://www.biodollmouse.org/
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/public/ipotesi-per-assurdo/
http://www.artisopensource.net/
http://www.bloki.tv/
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/ablog/

[how-2.be]

Angel_f came to know about the conference orgnized by the Internet Governance Forum of the United Nations, to be held in Rome, on September 27th, 2007.

Perfectly aware of the fact that the decisions made on that occasion would influence humans’ life and his own, he was really happy to have a chance to communicate with those people responsible for the definition of the rules for access to the digital world, and to offer them his contribution

He immediately signed up at the on line forum that was set-up for the occasion to collect and discuss the audience-contributed issues, but he was also clearly mindset about his will to “personally” attend the conference.

With the help of his two friends and collaborators xDxD and penelope.di.pixel, he prepared a bluetooth device that would allow him to show up directly on the mobile phones of the members of the audiece, communicating his message:

“We want ways!”

“We want wit!”

From his vantage point of view, Angel_f’s wish was to highlight several anomalies afflicting the processes used by human beings to assess “Innovation”.

With the wisdom and innocence of a digitl child looking at our world, the young digital being showed how “the technological revolutions is, more appropriately, an evolution”.

Yet our social, cultural and anthropological models are still not ready to integrate with this change. In this scenario, politics and its models appear to be totally distant and unsuitable.

Alternatives are available – technology enabled them -, but they remain unclear to the masses. This is due to the fact that technological élites are the only owners of the language needed to understand and handle this evolution and, on the other side, he engineering approach of the technocratic élites is totally functional to those centralized structures (both public and private) determining the shape of the world and of society.

Evolution is provided to the masses as a new form of consumism: lots of broadband, lots of files, lots of access for everyone, with no mention whatsoever about the ecological and social implications brought on by this way of life.

In the meanwhile, as our little Angel_f makes us notice, our public identities are handled by those same infrastructures that are the object of centralized control: operators and providers own our data and we are forced to conform our identities to preset schemes.

This happens every time we perform an apparently simple and consequence-less action such as approving the terms of use of a website or such as filling out a form.

Angel_f’s message is still waiting for moderation on the conference’s forum when the three friends arrived, quite early, at the event’s venue: their cameras and voice recorders ready to document everything. The Protomoteca hall, hosting the event, was filled with sixty years old men wearing suits and ties (it was actually difficult to tell politicans apart from the marble busts filling the hall): the young generation is almost absent or functional to the old one; videotaping and taking pictures is forbidden: innovation is old and the institutions want to talk alone.

Angel_f’s message will never be published on the event’s forum (or, possibly, it is still awaiting moderation…), just as there will never be trace of those faces curiously looking at their bluetooth mobile phones.

But Angel_f and his friend pulled themselves together and, having learned the lesson, they found alternative ways to deliver their message to humans. Using the collaborative web, little angel’s message, available at [how-2.be], has been uploaded to hundreds of blogs and websites owned by associations, newspapers and individuals, obtaining an outstanding media coverage!

Angel_f is happy and untroubled, as he’s confident that he was able to let his message through.

Collaborators:

xDxD
penelope.di.pixel
Franca Formenti
Derrick de Kerckhove
Antonio Caronia
Carlo Formenti
Links:
[how-2.be]
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/ecom.php
http://www.biodollmouse.org/
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/public/ipotesi-per-assurdo/
http://www.artisopensource.net/
http://www.bloki.tv/
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/ablog/

Angel_f, the young artificial intelligence born from the interactions between the Biodoll and Derrick de Kerckhove, partecipates to the congress organized by FHF Italia.

During the congress “Un mondo al bivio. Etica hacker e pratiche di cultura libera” (“The world at a crossroad. Hacker ethics and free culture practices”), organized by the Free Hardware Fundation Italia during the national convention of the political party Rifondazione Comunista (the italian communist party), little Angel_f had the privilege to hold the closing remarks.

The young artificial angel gave proof of a deep political analysis and of his deep knowledge of the dynamics running human society. “Although I respect what you all do, I must tell you: you are out of your time.”: this was the start of hic contribution to the conference, while talking to the audience. Angel continued by discussing “deep and integrated” ecologist topics, “far from mere ambientalism”. Angel_f managed to hit a nerve by approachind delicate subjects such as: multinationals, because, in a way, they are more “ecological”, as they are perfectly integrted in their environment, and they possess a deep, integrated knowledge of it, so much that they perfectly know how to exploit it; broadband, progressively becoming a political catchphrase for “liberty”, hiding the exploitation of armies of underpaid, precarious workers and environmental monsters – thousands of kilometers of phibers and electromagnetic waves -; politicians approaching these topics in their neverending hund for consensus.

Angel_f’s conclusions were a further subtle and delicate stab: the young artificial intelligence reminded us of how we constantly deal with digital beings, not really different from him in structure and architecture, such as banks, bureocracy and multinationals. “I m only cuter than they are”, he stated while a soft musical background by King Crimson relaxed the audience. Little Angel_f pointed out the need to define a new form of perception and for totally new rules/laws/rights to assess such relationships.

During the conference, something snapped, as someone (human) ended up referring to him, just as if he was one of them. “As little Angel_f said…”

“… maybe you’ll see me at the next Family Day Parade with my atypical family. ByeBye.”

And we truly hope to see him real soon, to give us a unusual and touching point of view on humans.

In the meanwhile it is possible to follow his adventures and evolutions in his new blog:
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/ablog/

Collaborators:
xDxD
penelope.di.pixel
Franca Formenti
Derrick de Kerckhove
Antonio Caronia
Carlo Formenti
Links:
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/ecom.php
http://www.biodollmouse.org/
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/public/ipotesi-per-assurdo/
http://www.artisopensource.net/
http://www.bloki.tv/
http://www.beyourbrowser.com/ablog/

Angel_F - be your browser

- BeYourBrowser -

Forte Prenestino, 14th-17th June, 2007

http://www.beyourbrowser.com

The Angel_f (Autonomous, Non Generative E-volitive Life_Form) Artificial Intelligence has been shown at the Forte Prenestino (Rome, Italy) during the “Crack, Fumetti Dirompenti” international comics exhibition.

A distribution of the mini-USB sculptures containing the “Presence” software was performed during the show. Starting the software for the first time generates a unique ID for the users, matching a unique cartoon style icon-head, both generated by the system. Users can use their icon-head to travel through an infinite starfield, populated by the other “Presence” users: a P2P system based on the emerging network allows for chat sessions and file search and transfer.

One of the small identities living in “Presence” is Angel_f itself. The text exchanged by chatting with the little AI contributes to the definition of the young digital being’s language. The AI’s mind is currently being fed by Derrick de Kerckhove, Antonio Caronia and Carlo Formenti by using their blogs on

http://www.artisopensource.net/talker_mind

The Bloki FreePreXXX has also been distributed during the exhibition: this free publication has been produced as a part of the Biodoll performance by Franca Formenti.

http://www.biodollsmouse.org

http://www.bloki.tv/site/index.html

Its text has been generated by Angel_f’s linguistic intelligence. Its images have been selected on the network by autonomous software agents coordinated by our little child AI, instructing them to find relevant multimedia published under Creative Commons licenses on the http://www.flickr.com and http://images.google.com websites.

The whole project has been designed to perform an integrated study on digital life from artistic, philosophical, anthropological, sociological, legislative points of view.

The project is autonomously financed with the sale of the USB mini-sculptures containing the “Presence” software and of the B_Angels (the “Baci di Angel” are chocolates with an Open Source recipe: in their label an AI-generated aphorism substitutes the romantic sentences usually found in the “Baci Perugina” chocolates).

The following people are currently working on the project:

xDxD

penelope.di.pixel

Franca Formenti

Derrick de Kerckhove

Antonio Caronia

Carlo Formenti

Luigi Pagliarini

Complete Information can be found on:

http://www.beyourbrowser.com