Short Abstract

This making & doing explores new vocabularies for thinking differently about algorithmic futures using the research-based REAL card deck. We introduce the deck, and participants can use it to engage in conversations about the values embedded in algorithmic systems and their social impacts.

Description

Thinking about algorithmic systems and our futures with them tends to follow well-traversed paths. Contributing to this stuckness are the concepts and vocabularies we employ to think through, discuss, and deliberate the social aspects of algorithmic systems. AI ethics discussions, for example, tend to focus on abstract principles that few would dispute. Yet they offer limited practical guidance on how to proceed. There is a pressing need for more open-ended and flexible means to explore varied algorithmic futures.

In this making & doing, we invite participants to explore new vocabularies to think differently about algorithmic futures. We present a research-based tool, the REAL card deck (available at https://real.datafiedlife.co). The deck introduces seven concepts: codability, replacement, threshold, responsibility, repair, steering, and friction. It prompts users to explore them with a series of questions designed to stimulate open-ended thinking and conversations about the values embedded in algorithmic systems and their social impacts. The deck is a powerful tool to assess algorithmic systems and think through their implications in our world, and to highlight crucial human aspects that are often overlooked.

Participants can familiarise with REAL cards and the concepts, and will have an opportunity to use the card deck in smaller groups to explore concrete cases of algorithmic systems. Convenors can seed discussions with reserach-based cases, and participants may also explore their own.

The REAL card deck and this making & doing are intended for researchers, teachers, critics, designers, and practitioners who can benefit from a tool that facilitates creative engagement in collaborative and multidisciplinary encounters with algorithmic systems. The participants can expect to depart with a new vocabulary to think about the use and effects of algorithmic systems, and a new thinking and facilitation device in their toolkit.