Language: English (mozilla)
A paradox haunts the open ecosystem: openness, which usually serves to challenge the concentrations of power, can also enable them.
In 2022, we faced the advent of a new field of open, driven by AI and ML research: the development of open AI systems like Stable Diffusion or BLOOM models and the proliferation of open training datasets like LAION.
We want to explore this field through the conceptual lens offered by the Paradox of Open. In this session, we will discuss how openness will develop and with what impact in the space of AI systems. Will it serve to democratize the tools or make responsible use more difficult?
The paradox can be addressed by advocating for more robust governance of the AI systems, which entails distributed, collective action to establish and enforce norms. We will begin our discussion by asking about the governance of datasets used for AI training and validation. This is frequently the starting point of an AI lifecycle, and good governance must address how the data is handled. After discussing dataset governance models, we will talk about new developments in open and responsible licensing (including RAIL licenses) and the role that online platforms that support the information commons can play in such governance.
dr Alek Tarkowski is a digital activist, strategist and sociologist of technology. He is the co-founder and Strategy Director at the Open Future think tank. He also sits on the Board of Directors of Creative Commons and chairs the Oversight Board of Centrum Cyfrowe, a Polish digital think-and-do tank. His previous experience includes strategic advisory role in the Polish Office of the Prime Minister and positions in advisory bodies to the Polish Minister of Digital Affairs.
His work focuses on strategies and public policies through which digital technologies are shaped to maximize public benefit. In recent years, he has focused on understanding the future of openness, and on new advocacy and movement strategies.
Zuzanna is the Director of Research at Open Future. Zuzanna spent more than eight years with the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights, where she has gained experience in advocacy and policy work. She holds a Ph.D. in International Law and an M.A. in American Literature from the University of Warsaw. She has been involved in interdisciplinary research and innovation projects, exploring the ethics of new technologies and their impact on human rights and freedoms. Zuzanna passed the bar exam in April 2017. She is a member of the Women’s Rights Group by the Polish Bar Council. Since 2019 she has been acting as an independent expert to the European Commission, where she is involved in the ethics monitoring of research projects. She is a lecturer at the School of Ecopoetics, established at the Reportage Institute in Warsaw.