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Making Hacked: Labor, Free Culture & Citizen Science

Making Hacked: Labor, Free Culture & Citizen Science

11/20/2014 — 3:00pm to 5:00pm
Space 2435, North Quad, 105 S. State St.

Panel discussion about Making with Cory Doctorow, Irina Aristarkhova and Matt Kenyon
Panelists: Cory Doctorow, Irina Aristarkhova, Stefanie Wuschitz
Moderators: Silvia Lindtner and Matt Kenyon

This panel will discuss the provocation: Making is not a grassroots movement. Makers invent products that draw hundreds of million USD investment, the White House sponsors its own maker faire, and DARPA funds MAKE Media to shape new educational programs. Cheaper and smaller hardware, open sharing, and crowdfunding are celebrated as the means to democratize hands on tinkering, citizen science, and fabrication. While making” can empower some in providing access to education, resources and production techniques, others – in particular those on the factory floor – remain outside geopolitical configurations of investment flows and global networks. As making moves into the heart of modes of capitalist production, can we still speak of DIY and what happens to visions of free culture, individual empowerment and liberation.