'Decoded Reality' will be a collaborative, critical exploration of the role of Power in the creation of Responsible AI. The workshop based on our creative piece of the same name (https://ai-ethics.github.io/decoded-reality/intro.html). The artwork is meant to provoke viewers to think about how societal structures and power dynamics intrinsically shape technology (AI in particular) and the associated workshop will have participants discuss the symbols and messages in the artwork as well as share personal anecdotes and speak to their lived experiences on the societal aspects of AI. Insights from the workshop will be used to create a complementary, follow-up art piece (with proper attribution given to the participants) that re-imagines how every stage of a 'sociologically-aware' and responsible approach to AI would look like. We intend to finish this piece within a month of the workshop and release it publicly.
We hope to have as diverse an audience as possible. In the case that we have only 3-4 participants we can dig deeper into the nuances of their experiences, whereas if we get 30+ participants we will go wider and cover various common/contradictory aspects of their anecdotes. The 'success' of our workshop does not depend too closely on the number of participants, but rather on the degree/level of their participation. We intend to use the artwork to provoke even the shyest of participants to voice their opinions and share their experiences and so we feel well-equipped to deal with varying numbers of participants.
We're hoping that many efforts and discussions will continue after Mozfest. Share any ideas you already have for how to continue the work from your session.:We intend to use the workshop as an 'ideation session' for a complementary piece on how technology (AI in particular) manifests Power. The idea is to take the discussion of the workshop and turn into a new, follow-up creative piece. We have deliberately designed the workshop in such a manner that the impact extends beyond the event. We hope to broaden the scope of the discussion on AI Ethics, to give a platform to the historically neglected/ marginalized to voice their perspectives and to create scholarship that reflects the nuances of their lived experiences. Once completed, this piece will be released as a collaborative, 'community' piece with the hope to enable more people to take part in such creative explorations in the future. It will be released publicly (free, open-source) and so we hope to share it as widely as possible to democratize the discourse around AI ethics.
Falaah is an Artist-in-Residence at MAIEI and at the NYU Center for Responsible AI and a Research Fellow at IIIT, Hyderabad.