A lecture of the Bydgoszcz Academy of Art

The year 2020 is a bit like the scenario of the ‘Black Mirror’ series – the coronavirus has changed our ways of life rapidly and unexpectedly. In addition to the war against the disease, there is another silent war going on. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, head of the World Health Organisation, said: “We are not just fighting a pandemic, we are fighting an infodemic.” The virus of disinformation (fake news) uses new technologies – deepfakes, AI, but also an omnipresent lack of responsibility, and we are no longer sure what is true and what is fiction and who we can trust.
Information influences our emotions, political and shopping choices. They polarise societies and lower the level of security.
Are we threatened by the “infocalypse” that Aviv Ovadya has been talking about for several years now, who has been following with concern the actions of major players such as Google, Facebook and Twitter, which earn money from clicks, sharing and viewing, but do not give priority to the quality of information?
Are we able to create restrictions for new technologies?
How can we learn to distinguish between truth and fiction on the Internet?
Is it not time to take care of the “information ecosystem?”
Or is it time to evacuate and abandon the social media world?
During the meeting, I will talk about the strategies the designers propose to deal with this situation.
We will consider whether design can help us solve the problems it has created itself.
Katarzyna Andrzejczyk-Briks – lecturer in art history and design at the School of Form in Poznań, the University of Humanities and Social Sciences at the SWPS and Collegium da Vinci. For several years she has been involved in trend watching – she visits festivals and design fairs, observes trends and changes in consumers’ lifestyles. She helps designers and companies understand the mechanisms and direction of these changes, and apply it to the creation of a new, valuable product, service or user experience. She cooperates as a consultant and coach of creative thinking with Concordia Design in Poznań, which combines design, business and creativity. She writes about design and architecture for Design Alive Magazine.

09.09.2020, 6pm
20 Gdańska St.