Christmas! New Year’s Eve! First Weekend Reading!
Chaos Communication Congress consists of two parts: the talks and the social. Out of almost 200 talks, all of which are recorded, let me recommend four that I found particularly interesting – and all of them full to the last seat. A little bit more on the social later.
A fine talk was given by Fefe, known for his yellowpress blog, the tabloid newspaper of the IT nerd-community. Why are so few bugs fixed in software? Is it actually good if I get many updates for a program? Has software got better or worse in the course of general technical development? With amazingly clear and understandable examples and without too much tech talk. And no sidestepping into politics.
Impressive the talk by Ruben and Fee (who spoke live on site in Rojava via Skype) about the situation in the Kurdish part of Syria and the effect of wrong and incomplete “news”, which, intended to mislead the warring parties, leads to misleading the civilian population.
Right on top was the talk by Arne Vogelgesang. (Premiere at Theater und Netz ;-). Full house at midnight – with current examples of right-wing gamification, up to a part without livestream, when Arne showed us which game the IB (Identitäre Bewegung) is working on. Plus some interesting theses about the concept of games. In a socio-political context take a look at the comments in the youtube commentary section.
From an actvistic point of view I recommend the Talk of Extinction Rebellion, whose representatives got a bit defensive in front of a left-wing antifascist audience, interestingly enough without Q & A. But there was a follow-up talk with the presenting women in Komona Dome. The focus was always on questions of framing and communication. And about inner composure. Of course Roger Hallam could not be left out.
In addition a short comment in regard to the XR talk: again Fefes Blog , in order to get a taste for the reception of a genuine IT nerd, if it concerns the clima topic.
Apart from that, everything was as colourful and warm as always, 17,000 visitors*, many children, many women and 26% female speakers – which is a real achievement for the CCC. It’s also great that more and more assemblies come with refrigerators and offer their guests (i.e. everyone) food and drinks to avoid the friendly but megaexpensive trade fair catering.
Heise online has put together all numbers, i.e. 11 Tons (!) of CO2 have been produced, all compensated for by buying certificates. Old switches have been reused to cut lime producing the Mate-Coktail “Tschunk”.
As well 36c3 has its own anthem now, Berlins own “Datasecurity-Post-Electropunk” Duo “Systemabsturz” presented their Smash-Hit “Verdächtig”
Let me close with the hope, that Spiel && Objekt will organise their own Assembly next time at 37c3, maybe together with likeminded fellows.