A caution has come from IT expert Steven Williams and Venezuela’s Charge D’Affaires to Barbados Martha Ortega to young Black Barbadians to turn out to be creators of content and never just consumers.
It was against the backdrop that if young Black Barbadians will not be creators or owners throughout the field of data technology, they could just be those to be an element of recent day slavery.
Ortega and Williams were an element of a panel discussion on the Speightstown Branch Library for the opening of the primary art exhibition of the Speightstown Global Freedom Festival entitled “Programmed“.
“Are we truly free if we keep counting on other platforms and never our own? We run and provides all of that content to those foreign platforms which have little interest in monetizing it on our behalf nevertheless it is owned by foreign interests.
All we’re doing is consuming Tik Tok videos and Facebook and we will not be creating that balance. For individuals who have a story to inform, I’m in search of that content and the world is just too,” he said.
Williams explained that there are obstacles in the best way of individuals of African descent. He also argued that it is simply natural for foreign creators of content to develop software that’s representative of their experiences.
“Now we have to create our own and what happens is that the people in overseas countries get a level of capability and mental property [to support them]. If not we will probably be held to those systems since you’re either going to take what they provide you with and hope it isn’t flawed. They will create images in their very own nature — that’s normal. You would like these people to do something for us and I don’t get it,” Williams said.
Ortega spoke to digital freedoms while asking in regards to the implications of tech owned by those that are in privileged positions.
“Technology may be very vital for our lives but to be free we’ve got to know and ask how much we depend upon technology. Who’s the owner of the data and the way can that change our society? The owner of the technology, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram — how can we are saying that we reside free if we don’t [own the technology],” she argued.
Minister of Labour Colin Jordan said that the panel discussion got here about as a part of the We Gatherin 2020 celebrations.
He explained that a lecture series was held, entitled From Cuffy to Owen and the idea of that lecture was the continuing struggle of Black people for democracy, for the appropriate to find out their very own future and for freedom.
“Now we have come along with the Center for Hybrid Studies which is de facto within the vanguard for promoting this festival. We in St Peter are joyful to be an element of the method. We imagine Speightstown was the place where the struggle for freedom manifested. We imagine that we must always even be the middle for discussion on freedom,” Minister Jordan said.
The artists on the showing, curated by award-winning visual artis Evan McDonald, displayed pieces showing their human engagement with technology and its implications for freedom.
Jaron Griffith, an artist who had his work on display, said that he felt honoured to be a a part of the exhibition as McDonald reached out to him first.
“I’m all for transhumanism, futuristic settings and so they thought my work was pretty interesting and reached out to me so I’m very honoured,” he said.
Content creator Xavier Jhon-Clair, who had NFT art on display complete with QR codes for scanning, said his pieces on Errol Barrow and Bussa, the Lion at Gun Hill and Sir Grantley were all about breaking away from colonization.
He said his pieces, while very Bajan, are inclined to be well received on the international market.
“I hope that more Barbadians can turn out to be aware of the opportunities that exist with mental property and with the ability to create and have access to that content,” he said. (MR)
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