Amazon once patented a robotic cage that would transport workers within the warehouse. Meta filed one for a device that lets users type in mid-air. The tech industry spends billions to produce and defend these patents. Intellectual property codifies ownership over imagined futures, converting speculative potential into property, preventing the
Computational linguist Daniel Hardt (Copenhagen Business School) and science and technology studies scholar Nanna Bonde Thylstrup (Copenhagen University) are the invited speakers for the Franklin Lecture at the University of Toronto
Farhan Samir, Postdoctoral Fellow at U of T’s Department of Computer Science, explores how representational imbalances emerge within large information systems.
Maciej Chmara, designer and researcher, explores how a simple cultural technique like bread-making can become a site for scientific inquiry, therapeutic innovation, and philosophical reflection.
In her forthcoming book, Digital Queers and High Tech Gays, Dr. Alex D. Ketchum explores how queer communities have long shaped internet culture by organizing, sharing knowledge, and preserving their own histories.
The internet has always been feminist, just rarely archived that way. Mindy Seu presents Cyberfeminism Index, a collaborative, crowd-sourced project that gathers decades of feminist tech activism, art, and theory while challenging who gets remembered online and how digital histories are written.
On Thursday, January 29, 2026, Alan Galey and Brendan Allen visited KMDI to share how early web-based interactive fiction can be studied, preserved, and re-experienced, especially when the technologies that once made it work have disappeared.
On November 6, 2025, KMDI welcomed Dr. Aleena Chia (Goldsmiths, University of London) for a research talk that opened a wide lens on one of the most influential technologies shaping contemporary digital culture: the game engine.
On September 23, the Knowledge Media Design Institute (KMDI) welcomed Maurice Jones, PhD Candidate at Concordia University, for a research talk exploring new approaches to artificial intelligence grounded in Black studies and feminist technoscience.
Join us for a research talk to explore the literary and design dimensions of early web-based interactive fiction through the case of ApertureScience.com. Learn how emulators open new pathways for preserving and understanding born-digital artifacts.
Far from a distant or hypothetical force, the Rewiring Democracy demonstrates that AI is already influencing the drafting of legislation, regulatory enforcement, judicial rulings, and public discourse.
Artificial Intelligence ethics is often framed in universal terms — but what happens when we look beyond the Western contexts that shape those frameworks?
Join Professor Ishtiaque Ahmed for an ABC Seminar exploring how AI systems extend colonial legacies and how community practices across the Global South reveal alternative ethical perspectives.
Watch recaps now! The two-day workshop explored how workers and their organizations are shaping the governance of digital technologies — including platforms, data, and AI — through collective bargaining, co-operative formation, and policy reform.
Watch now! A recent virtual talk featured Jade Nixon, BRN’s postdoctoral fellow, and kara lynch, the artist-in-residence, both recipients of the Black Indigenous Waterways Fellowship.
This gathering brings together research groups working at the intersections of computing, design, and society — a chance to hear what others are exploring, share what you’re working on, and discover points of overlap or collaboration. Each presenter will have five minutes to introduce their work, followed by a short Q&A. We’ll wrap up with pizza and informal networking to keep the conversations going.
In recent years, tools like Unreal Engine have transformed how we imagine and build digital worlds. These “game engines” are more than creative software
The SRI Seminar Series welcomes Anastasia Kuzminykh. With a background spanning computer science, psychology, and ethnographic research, Kuzminykh’s work bridges human-computer interaction and the design of intelligent systems.
New changes are coming to KMDI. Affiliated faculty, new associate directors and more.
Watch now! Feeding the Machine tells the story of a global technology through the eyes of the people who produce it. The talk described the lives of the workers deliberately concealed from view, and the power structures that determine their future.
Maurice Jones will share insights from his participatory action research project ArtIA: Towards a Commons for AI in Digital Creation.
This two-day in-person event will bring together 20 invited speakers from Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Spain, and the United States to exchange insights on worker-led governance of digital technologies
The KMDI Makerspace is pleased to present a monthly event for Linux users (and the Linux-curious) to meet IRL.
KMDI is launching its public lecture series with a talk by Feeding the Machine authors Mark Graham (University of Oxford) and James Muldoon (University of Essex)
Created in collaboration with the initiative “Wilding AI”, this four-day lab will assemble a group of participants to learn about the application of generative AI in spatial audio, and collectively explore the wilder territories of AI.
Meet, co-work, and connect with fellow open source software users and the open source-curious. Drop in, bring a laptop, or try out the open source computer on-site. Everyone welcome!
“With Great Power Came No Responsibility: How Enshittification Conquered the 21st Centure and How We Can Overthrow It”
As AI technologies transform our societies, how can we build systems that earn and maintain our trust while preserving human agency and democratic legitimacy?
The entry of on-demand ridesourcing digital labour platforms (OR-DLPs) in Kolkata, India, restructured the local taxi-cab service industry’s economic geography and spatial practices.
Domestic work, such as house-cleaning, has traditionally been devalued, gendered, and delegated to marginalised immigrant populations. This paper explores the interplay between identity, collective action, and digital marketplaces among Latino house-cleaners in Toronto.
Understanding how trust is built between groups of people, institutions and technologies is essential for thinking about how AI systems can be trusted to reliably address human needs while mitigating risks.
Created in collaboration with the initiative “Wilding AI”, this four-day lab will assemble a group of participants to learn about the application of generative AI in spatial audio, and collectively explore the wilder territories of AI.