I’m getting ready to head to FutureEverything in Manchester, an amazing festival of art/technology/ideas that runs from May 12-15.  The conference/ideas stream features several interesting tracks including discussions on open data, local broadband, and collaboration.  I’ll be speaking on DIY citizenship, social media and social change.

Since my panel collaborators Mushon Zer-Aviv and Alexandra Deschamps-Sosino are probably more connected to how revolutions in design and availability of technologies are connected with innovation and participation, I thought I’d talk a bit about how social media affordances have provided us with new models for citizenship, and what we can do with these models.  I’ll provide a bit of history about how citizens role in discussing and participating in politics have been thought about – and organized – in the past, and how media have played a role.  Then I’ll discuss the current media environment, hopefully asking some hard questions about how we use the participation that our environment offers to sustain our citizenship and work for social change.

I’m also a speaker blogger, and am looking forward to exploring the explosive world of art, thought and music that the festival promises to be.  More later . . .