F.A.T. Lab’s Contribution to Creative Culture Online
Hello bloggers, for this post I will be noting an established leader of CCO (creative culture online).
F.A.T. Lab.
“What is there to be afraid of when we’re all in this together? When we all feel empowered, in control, able to participate in and guide culture? There is only fear when we feel disempowered, when we lack understanding,when we are censored, when we lack input or control and are instead being controlled.”
-F.A.T. Lab participent, Kyle McDonald
#F.A.T. Lab is more than a “research and development lab,” it’s an organization that is in favor of strengthening the public domain through captivating technology, & media intake. It stands for free art and technology. The “Fat Network” consist of artists like musicians, scientists, Bornas, engineers, and even lawyers. It supports open licenses which means they exclude secrecy, and engage in open entrepreneurship along with copyright monopolies and patents, as stated in the About of its website.
They conduct projects like, the “Obama Google Glass Prism Mask.” During a protest in Tiergarten district, Berlin, they wore a cut out-portrait of Obama “sporting” Google Glass :which was made by Prism.”Obama was impressed by its cutting edge features…Throughout the day he was spotted in different historic locations of the city. The press was all excited about getting the first pictures of Obama with Google Glass.” When they say they saw Obama throughout the day, they actually mean they saw F.A.T. Lab members lol. They even have a link on their website where you can make your own Obama prism glass mask.
Another one of their projects is called “Liberator Variations,” which confronts an interesting case of owning an unregulated 3d printed weapon, or living in a society where guns are completely banned. This project is a combination of CCO and a dose of reality.
“On May 6, 2013 a small pro-weapons organization called Defense Distributed shared a useless plastic gun called “The Liberator”, available for anyone to download and potentially harm themselves with. Assuming they have access to both ammunition and a very expensive 3d printer.A few days and 100k+ downloads later, the US Department of State got scared enough to order Defense Distributed to take down the file. Enthusiasts promptly moved the file to a torrent, tracked by The Pirate Bay, making it harder to regulate and creating significantly more publicity. Pirate Bay users could only maintain interest for approximately 4 pages of comments…The government’s reaction, and most peoples’ reaction to the Liberator, seemed primarily driven by fear. The fear of an undetectably lethal society, where forbidden objects can no longer be regulated. Where “society” itself breaks down, because access to 3d printers somehow tear up the social contract that keeps us at a distance from the objects that we can use to harm each other.” To find out F.A.T. Lab’s view on this topic, check out “Liberator Variations.” Also follow F.A.T. Lab on Twitter!
Thank you for reading this week’s post on CCO, for my next post I will be interviewing another leader of creative culture online. Stay tuned so you can hear this director’s explanation as to what called him to indulge in and contribute to CCO, what he partakes in, and what he would recommend to someone just beginning to engage in CCO.
Harnessed Energy 