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We will start our journey with a look into the basics of the interactions we have daily with our various technologies. It is imperative that we as digital artists and content creators hold ourselves responsible for understanding what the tools are using are comprised of, how they actually function and how we interface with them at a more professional and competent manner. We will cover hardware and software, as well as file types and formats.

It’s often overlooked how the launching of a small satellite in 1957 by the Soviet Union impacted the mindset of the United States and set in motion the development of a network computational system that would change the world.  

From calculators to the cloud.  How did we get here?  This week, we are going to explore how we have taken bits of metal, combined them with zeros and ones, and created machines that power our world.  We’ll have a look at just what this “Cloud” is, how it works, and how shared mainframe usage in the 1950s laid the foundation for today, a world where unfathomable amounts of data is stored, shared, and accessed virtually by millions of users every single second.

Every day billions of people interact in some way or another with digital devices whether they know it or not. Each of these electronic interactions creates a little bit of data that is sent off and stored somewhere, forever recorded in time. If it’s a quick check of Facebook before starting the day, or having a bagel and coffee scanned and paid for by a credit card, or walking past a surveillance camera on the corner of a building, or doing a load of laundry with your smart washer. This information is kept alongside all the other instances of the world in a massive web of servers and drives. There are plenty of useful applications of this data, and plenty of harmful ones. We will look at what Big Data is and how it affects us and the rest of the world.

Mankind has always been eager to make and build, design and create. It is also in our blood to take something that has already been made or created, and make it better or different, or even just tinker with it to see how it works. This is essentially the spirit behind the Maker Culture. In this session we will visit the ideas behind being a consumer vs a creator, tools vs toys, 3D printing and micro controllers, and talk about obsolescence in today’s tech era.

There is no doubt that the interactive media industry (primarily gaming) is a massive force in today’s world. It’s estimated that last in 2016 the money spent on games reached $92b, which is more than consumers spend on movies ($62b) and recorded music ($18b) combined. This means that the games industry is now five times larger than the music industry, and 1.5 times larger than the film industry. Last year the gaming industry directly and indirectly employed nearly 200,000 people with employees earning an average of $100,000 in comparison to the average US household income of $67,000. Surprising? Maybe not. There are many ways to game now, with the widespread use of mobile devices, on top of desktop gaming and dedicated consoles. So obviously we can’t ignore it – we must celebrate it, and be more in tune with how it works, where it’s going and how to get involved.

VR in this era spans across many genres: games, experiences, film, training in the science and medical fields, education, digital painting and sculpture, and so on. This session takes a look at this fantastic addition to our digital interactive experiences and explores where it got its start, how it works and where we think it might lead us in the next few years ahead of us.

The natural move from the tech of VR is to AR, Augmented Reality. The ideas behind this technology have been around for a very long time, and it has been only recently when we have started to see an attempt to tap into the mainstream of our culture. It’s been one of the more difficult innovations to find its way to catch on, but it’s definitely happening, and it’s going to be huge. This session will provide a look into the history, science and implications of augmented reality.

Digital content is being created at rates beyond our comprehension, meaning there is a vast sea of information out there that is available to virtually anyone. It is always difficult for early digital artists to resist the urge of grabbing a picture from here, sourcing a movie from there, inserting a hit song, etc. all without realizing the complex issue of licensing and legal usage. This session will focus on these important topics, as well as ways to make sure that we as artists know how to protect and share our own work.

In futures studies and the history of technology, accelerating change is a perceived increase in the rate of technological change throughout history, which may suggest faster and more profound change in the future and may or may not be accompanied by equally profound social and cultural change.

Big Idea: Technology Grows Exponentially. The doubling of computer processing speed every 18 months, known as Moore’s Law, is just one manifestation of the greater trend that all technological change occurs at an exponential rate.

There’s a hidden part of the internet that is much larger than the parts of the surface web you use every day – Facebook, Google, and Amazon. But do you really understand the information that is lying beyond those user-friendly and respectable websites? The Deep Web and the Dark Web, areas mostly used for hiding identities and sensitive data – usually for normal day-to-day housekeeping stuff. However the deeper you go, the more illegal and surprisingly awful and inhumane acts loom in much shadier, nearly invisible corners. But this vast ocean of content really isn’t invisible – you can access it – legally. But should you even want to visit the Deep or Dark Web?

In this session, we will discuss the definitions and realities of this portion of the web, as well as the topic of cryptocurrency/blockchain currency and the current trends in Bitcoin.

When Ray Kurzweil published “The Age Of Spiritual Machines” in 1999, he predicted a new era of thinking machines that will meet and then exceed human intelligence.  The idea, which seemed outlandish at the time, doesn’t seem so crazy anymore. Today, computers are taking over the work of humans and it appears that we are entering a new industrial revolution.  This session will look at biometrics, robotics, nano-bots, and transhumanism.

A digital citizen is defined as anyone who uses the internet and/or information technologies regularly in order to engage in social, political, and/or government-based activity. Digital citizenship ultimately begins when any person – child, teen or adult signs up for an email address, posts pictures online, uses e-commerce to buy merchandise online, etc. So, most likely that means you.

This session is intended to help create a positive digital culture that supports safe and responsible technology use. We hope to stimulate you to think critically, behave safely, and participate responsibly in our digital world through topics on security, private and personal information, spoofing and ethics.

Being a digital artist and creator comes with certain stereotypes : we play videogames; our day jobs are all about computers; and we consume huge amounts of media through many devices and outlets. That adds up to a lot of screen time. Balancing our health habits with our general habits can be been challenging, since computers and health don’’t naturally go hand in hand.

This closing session will be tackling how to balance your health with our tech-loving, hyperconnected world.