E/ACC? D/ACC? P/ACC?

How to imagine an alternative digital future?

How can we strive towards living a life outside of capitalistic extractions?

Why is it easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism? (Fisher, 2020, Capitalistic Realism)

1. A brief Introduction:

   Technologies have profound impact on shaping the experience of being human. It is not a novelty to consider innovation of science of technologies embedded with cultural factors. However, as David Harvey reminds us with his invitation to “disenchantment of technology”, it is not enough just to comment that “technology shapes human experience”, there is an emerging need to unpack the real role of technology while not mystifying it.

   Bridging industry insight, tacit knowledge, academic research, ethnographic encounters, curating expertise, and inspirations from all the exciting conversations that took place here at edge city Lanna. we’re asking: what can we learn from past experiences and histories in Web1 and Web2; How can we think beyond current hegemonic frameworks and co-build something better?

2. What the Session will look like:

   We aim at presenting the ideas of continuous dialogues between people from Web3, Web2 and social science academia that took place in the last three weeks. We’re following a de-centralized organising format, we’ll start with a list of questions to provoke your thoughts, followed by brief presentations by the speakers. The key speakers will share their input on these questions, followed by round table discussions and a mutual dialogues among the audience.

   We’re not opting for reductive and result-driven conclusions, but open-ended inspirations. Together with everyone in this space, let’s co build and co create, with the hopes to inspire new conversations and connections.

   The list of topics we’re covering:

   • Overview of the key concepts: E/ACC? D/ACC? P/ACC? (Evolving, Degenerating, or Post-Accelerationism).

   • Questioning the dominance of current tech paradigms and their impact on society.

   • What would a digital future look like that serves people and communities over profit and exploitation?

   • How can technology support a shift towards more equitable and sustainable living?

   • How can these lessons inform the development of Web3 to create a more democratic and inclusive internet?

   Speakers:

   Luo (researcher, Curator, and Alternative Community Builder. Founder of Webpsy.labs)

   Leon (Ex-principal engineer in silicon valley, ex-Google/Oculus/FB/Amzn/MSFT; Diver; Pilot; Investor; Father-of-two; Life-long Learner; World-traveler YT:@GlobalTravelerFamilyex)

   Fei (Anthropologist, RAI fellow, freediver, salsatera, Afro-Cuban dancer, https://www.fei-liao.com/)

   Commentator:

   Michel Bauwens (founder and director of the P2P Foundation, expert in peer production, governance, and property, research director of CommonsTransition.org.p2p foundation)

3. Extending an Invitation:

   As half of the Pop-up month went by, we want to take this chance to reflect on some critical questions: How can we take what we’ve co-learned, co-built and co-created from this space into our everyday life and back into the different fields we come from? How can we shift from “pop-up” to “long-term” and “real world”?

   We have no concrete answers, but an invitation:

   This session is the result and continuation of an intense 3 week collaborative dialogue and research. The four of us met at various pop-venues across Chiangmai for the first time. Coming from completely different backgrounds and without former affiliation, we bonded through our shared morals imaginings and visions. We hope it would be the start of something else.

   Inspired by the the spirit of Macy Conference and the research method of “Myco-net”, made possible through connections we found at Edge City Lanna and other pop-ups, cultivated a mixer of different expertise, we want to co-create a vision for continuous cross-boundary dialogues — a “Galangal” mixer network.

   Galangal (https://t.me/webpsyorg/129) is a common name for several tropical rhizomatous spices, also known as Thai ginger. Its rhizome networks as the inter-product of underground mycelium and the forest vegetation, thrive through their interconnected and intersubjective network. Just like fungals growing in a human-disturbed forest, we, the commons of this world, find ourselves in an era ridden by the hegemonic narrative of capitalism and legacies of the colonial order.

   Let us rethink Deleuze and Guattari’s “rhizome”. All things in the world — are rhizomes, or rhizomatically interconnected. Only through a interconnected, cross-lifeworld, intersubjective, pluralistic perspective can we start to address those questions posed in the beginning.

   We want to build a mixer network with fellow Web3 developers, Web1 tech industry workers, internet corporate drones, NGO wokers, balding social scientists, media hacks, burnout academics and artists to engage in historical and political-economic conversations. Different from conventional paradigms, our research-mixer draws from anthropological spirits: participatory-observation-creation, play, affect, empathy. Through what we built, we hope to help to export ideas flourishing in this space, collaborate and find solidarity with other individuals communities not in this space, and to help each other during times of crises and burn out.

   Us, You and I, the friendly acquaintances, the strange faces, those we know and don’t know: we are the global majority that live and die namelessly in the history written by structural and hegemonic powers. Casting away the boundaries and borders drawn by nation states, by central banks, by all entities of the capitalistic realism, we shall thrive through re-finding our intersubjectivity.