Glossary 5/6 - De-computing

With this glossary series, AMRO 2026 introduces concepts, terms, and practices that shape the festival’s thematic field. Rather than fixed definitions, these entries are invitations to approach shared questions through different critical vocabularies.

“De-computing” asks what happens when we reduce reliance on computational systems.

#AMRO2026 #BecomingUnreadable #Decomputing #linz #culture #kultur #festival #mediaarts

Interesting pre-print: "This paper treats #AI as diagnostic for the deeper changes taking place in the existing order of things. […] AI's scaling and accelerationism are taken as examples of the wider tactics being invoked by hegemonic power to maintain control under changing conditions. […] the massive build-out of data centres isn't simply a seizure of energy resources but a manifestation of an aggressive and misogynist technopolitics. The paper argues that a liberal push for digital #sovereignty doesn't interrupt these dynamics but plays into the hands of emerging technofascism. It proposes instead the prefigurative tactic of 'decomputing', which draws on #degrowth, deautomatisation and a #convivial approach to technology. It explores decomputing as a means to mitigate both material & relational harms and as a decisive turn towards infrastructuring the common good."

McQuillan, D. (2026). #AI, #Decomputing and the Interregnum. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18908529

https://www.danmcquillan.org/ai_decomputing_interregnum.html

RE: https://hachyderm.io/@thomasfuchs/116440570565467277

"These long-running, parallelized workflows can yield great value, but they have also challenged our infrastructure and pricing structure: it’s now common for a handful of requests to incur costs that exceed the plan price! These are our problems to solve. The actions we are taking today enable us to provide the best possible experience for existing users while we develop a more sustainable solution." — Joe Binder, VP of Product

If people are already _commonly_ exceeding set monthly quotas/costs with just a handful of requests, you all have got much bigger problems, customers/users too (i.e. becoming deeply dependent on externally controlled & rented infrastructure from day one of your project/startup, plus slowly damaging your own cognitive abilities and a fast growing maintenance nightmare)! And this all is just the beginning... 🍿

Keeping up with other news about growing mineral, energy & supply chain shortages, the illusion that this might just be very short term, and the resulting cost bumps needed to produce and provision all the outstanding data center capacities at the heart of the above decisions (and similar ones made by Anthropic just days ago), I really don't understand where this optimism of AI boosters/users is coming from or on what planet they're living on...

genAI/agenticAI is a shoddily implemented/managed/secured technology & mentality for a computing-illiterate consumerist society, for an age of infinite resource abundance with stable climate/politics, all of which we're leaving (or have never really been in)! And that departure is partially driven/accelerated by said tech...

Instead of funneling trillions into this particular tech, we need focus/investment into methods, infrastructure, research/education, relationships, and above all, a culture focused on how to make computing magnitudes more sustainable, accessible, independent and which allows us to do generally more with less. Or, at least not with magnitudes more, just for some dubious, unspecified (and meaningless) measure of improved "productivity gains"... With almost no one ever questioning what this supposed extra productivity is even good for...

#GitHub #AI #ResourceScarcity #Decomputing #HouseOfCards

Decomputing in a Processed World.

From Dan McQuillan
(https://www.danmcquillan.org/resisting_genai_highered_cjuu.html)

*Resisting GenAI & Big Tech in Higher Education*

I suggest we situate our resistance to AI inside and outside higher education as forms of decomputing.
Decomputing rejects scale because that drives carbon emissions,
but also because our agency is undermined by our immersion in a system of machinic relations, which includes the contemporary university
Decomputing is based on the principles of degrowth, care and conviviality.
We need systems that don't depend on continuous expansion, whether that's AI, universities or entire economies.
We need to start from care to counter algorithmic detachment and eugenicist abstractions.
Conviviality gives us ways to collectively assess tech's effects on relatedness and bio-interaction.
Wherever AI is proposed as ‘the answer’ there's already a structural problem.
One that's best addressed through the direct social relations of those most affected.

#airesistance #decomputing #datasociety #academia

"1. Decomputing is a prefigurative technopolitics,
2. which tries to enact changed relations in the here-and-now.
3. One organisational form for this is worker's and people's councils on AI.
4. These are self-constituting assemblies that push back against AI bullshit,
5. while using consensus and critical pedagogy to tackle the divisive binaries we've all been programmed with.
6. Because universities are on the AI frontline, we're seeing resistance popping up all over the place.
7. Solidarity is the first priority of any of these critical collectives.
8. Some of the questions facing this emerging movement more broadly are:
9. how to move beyond reformism with minimum wasted energy and burn-out
10. how to coordinate and develop strategies without imposing rigid structure
11. how to position the push against AI as part of a movement-of-movements,
12. as part of an ecology of infrastructural intersectionalities.
13. AI isn't inevitable, but there's no going back because the past was already built on injustice; what we need to work towards are livable futures worth fighting for."

https://danmcquillan.org/resisting_genai_highered_cjuu.html

#AI #GenerativeAI #BigTech #Decomputing

In these years we're seeing the big tech industry showing its true face: the issues and dangers of mainstream social media are well known by the broader society, "apps" are becoming more broken, bloated and riddled with trackers with every passing day, everything is becoming a subscription service, they're showing down our throats an expensive, polluting and often mediocre technology threatening to take most of our jobs with it... it was inevitable that these conditions spurred a backlash or how media calls it a #techlash.

I belive that's good, it was about time to wipe out most of the naivety many had towards big tech but its saddeing that the pendulum is already swinging in the opposite direction and nowadays many perceives all digital technology as the enemy and calls for getting rid of most of it dreaming of a Butlerian Jihad.

I'm a late 90s kid grew up during the Frutiger Aero era, one of my all time favourite movies is "Tron: Legacy" and I have lots of heartfelt memories of all the experiences and adventures that were possible only because of videogames.

In an era of #techlash and calls to #decomputing I still believe that computing can be a force for good, that the soft glow of an LCD or CRT screen can brighten some of your dull days, that sometimes the friendly words and interactions you need can arrive trough TCP/IP and that the virtual has the potential of significantly enhance (and not replace) the real life.

Like Tron I wanna fight for users.

" #AI performance is ludicrous, but its quite good at being distractive" @danmcquillan at #TechWontSaveUs

Learn more about #decomputing

https://danmcquillan.org/decomputing_as_resistance.html