dgi – doctorow & eno – 12 8 25
cory doctorow and brian eno at dgi events
from site [https://davidgraeber.institute/poetic-technologies-with-cory-doctorow-and-brian-eno/]:
Poetic technologies with Cory Doctorow and Brian Eno
Event date: December 8 / 2025
“By poetic technologies I refer to the use of rational and technical means to bring wild fantasies to reality. Poetic technologies, so understood, are as old as civilization.” — David Graeber
Cory Doctorow has worked for a long time at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, advocating for digital human rights. An excellent science fiction writer, blogger, and journalist, he also coined the term ‘enshittification’, which really captures how all of us have experienced the decay of online platforms and services.
Brian Eno is one of the world’s most creative and inspiring musicians, visual artists, thinkers, and activists. A founding member of the British band Roxy Music, he coined the term “ambient music” and is a pioneer of electronic and generative music. He founded the Long Foundation and has been an important activist and advocate for human rights worldwide, whether it is the genocide in Gaza or divisive politics in the UK.
Their talk will be a public hybrid event — both offline and online — streamed live across all our platforms and social media channels. We have a broad audience on Twitter (X), Bluesky, Instagram, and Facebook, and the conversation will be streamed simultaneously on all of them. The recording will also be made available online.
James Schneider and Nika Dubrovsky will join us from the West Indies University in St. Vincent in the Caribbean, where we’re currently building a Spirulina farm inside a prison and setting up a 3D printer lab. The discussion will explore social technologies — how technology and social relations shape each other. This project is part of our broader public outreach, linking conversation and theory with practical projects and artistic initiatives. Our next similar project is scheduled to take place in East Africa next year.
notes/quotes from event:
brian: *(now to topic.. poetic techs) interested in outsider art.. people who didn’t go to art school.. people didn’t even know they were doing this work.. i think being creative is as essential to human beings as being hungry.. t to make things that didn’t exist before.. to nail varnish.. and how i walk.. and.. what makes a job bs is that you know you’re not making anything.. if it doesn’t come out in what you nominally do it will come out in another way.. one way is rage.. sincwe more/more people trapped in lifestyles preventing them from what they want or that makes alts so convenient.. all that energy doesn’t just dissipate.. it goes somewhere else.. whole rise of fascism due to frustration of so many people who want to do something.. makes them join groups.. et al that promise to fufill that.. i want to belong to something.. i want to be in something.. the left has failed to offer that.. so i think the techs mentioned in the question.. i don’t know if i understand what that means
so *we need a means for everyone to do whatever they want.. whatever their art/poeticism is.. if we want to see what legit free people are like..
art (by day/light) and sleep (by night/dark) as global re\set.. to fittingness (undisturbed ecosystem) via a sabbatical ish transition
ie: the thing we’ve not yet tried/seen: the unconditional part of left to own devices ness
brian: which jobs give people satisfaction and which don’t.. comparison was people making w wood and w metal.. wood pieces diff.. so worked random.. preferred that.. something you could have a relationship with.. *something about non ambiguity of material.. t
need deeper than that.. need to get to itch-in-the-soul
*because it’s a form of people telling other people what to do
cory: woodworking is job where boss can’t exert same control over you.. you can be more creative.. from david.. digital form explodes form filling.. sky is the limit.. i suggest poetic techs where you don’t throw everything out first
q&a
cory: (to – do you think ed as is keeps us from engaging in poetic techs).. went into common core.. and benefit of standardization.. ie: makes it easy for lots of people to make lots of things to work.. way to *enable collab.. and none of that exists in the common core.. then about maths teachers.. means of students constrained.. **i would want to start a commons for common core
oi.. way to *enable collab.. tech as it could be.. ie: nonjudgmental expo labeling
**oh my.. seems someone like cory (familiar with online ness).. would see wikipedia and google et al as commons.. why link it to ‘common core’.. that just outs brian’s nail varnish person and his way to walk person and his way to whatever person.. brian negates it as well.. just in thinking we have to live thru ed ness.. ed/common-core/et-al.. all just ie’s of people telling other people what to do
we need to let go of ed system ness.. of any form of measuring, accounting, people telling other people what to do
you guys are talking of desire for gershenfeld something else law: possibly one of the best/most significant impacts of tech is tech that gives people something else to do – neil gershenfeld
brian: (on having a goal of changing ed) guys idea was to find poorest people and give money to them directly.. gave each family 1000/yr.. power to do something for themselves..t
now talking desire for ie: a sabbatical ish transition
again.. to facil the thing we’ve not yet tried/seen: the unconditional part of left to own devices ness
more on that via bsky after [https://bsky.app/profile/davidgraeberinst.bsky.social/post/3m7kwtzzlpk2w]: Brian Eno on how Lula Da Silva’s policy (in Brazil) of giving money to the poor both helped those poor families and stimulated the economy (with 2 min video clip)
brian: you invoked a word that has become very important to me.. first heard it in doe.. schismogenesis: where something evolves in reaction to something else.. becomes in interest to distinguish selves.. so become more polarized.. people who violently disagree with everybody become quite friendly
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be you. 