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Grow Your Own Cloud is concerned with proposing alternative data futures, which allow the trajectory to deviate from the path of Data Warming we are currently following. We think this begins with an ‘ethics and environment first’ approach to developing new technology.
GYOC is born out of a critical examination of current data practices. We look beyond conventional human-centred models to a more-than-human ecosystem based approach, to propose data storage alternatives that ensure we treat the planet and nonhumans with respect.
In our work, we are asking “should we?” at the same time as we ask “can we?” - What would the world look like if all technology companies did the same? The work raises more questions than it answers, inspiring us to collaboratively develop more desirable data futures.
Imagine if trees could store all of our data? Then we would certainly plant a lot more of them! That's why our ambition is to help inspire a transition from dirty data farms to truly green data facilities. Rather than cutting down trees and clearing green spaces for yet more urbanization, we seek to create a rationale for the regeneration and proliferation of nature. By working with nature as a technology, we see futures in which the carbon emitting data farms of today are replaced by carbon absorbing Data Forests.
Cloud today
Capacity: 1013bits/cm³
Errors: Negligible
Duration: 5-10 years
Read/Write: Real-time
Emissions: CO²
Elements: Lanthanum, Lutetium, Neodymium, Yttrium
Grow Your Own Cloud
Capacity: 1019bits/cm³
Errors: 0-0.1%
Duration: 10,000 years
Read/Write: Speed of life
Emissions: Oxygen, Water
Elements: Carbon
Location: Data Farm
Location: Data Forest
This might be viewed simultaneously through figurative and literal lenses, yet our down-to-earth aim is to develop an initiative from the ground up, built through an ethics first approach, with an innate respect for nature and a strong sense of climate justice guiding everything we do.
We would like to help construct a future in which technology is a living organism in the wider ecosystem of the earth. Shifting human models from the exploitative to cooperative and unified, in full awareness of the deep, pervasive relationships that connect everything.
Grow Your Own Cloud is concerned with proposing alternative data futures, which allow the trajectory to deviate from the path of Data Warming we are currently following. We think this begins with an ‘ethics and environment first’ approach to developing new technology.
GYOC is born out of a critical examination of current data practices. We look beyond conventional human-centred models to a more-than-human ecosystem based approach, to propose data storage alternatives that ensure we treat the planet and nonhumans with respect.
In our work, we are asking “should we?” at the same time as we ask “can we?” - What would the world look like if all technology companies did the same? The work raises more questions than it answers, inspiring us to collaboratively develop more desirable data futures.
Imagine if trees could store all of our data? Then we would certainly plant a lot more of them! That's why our ambition is to help inspire a transition from dirty data farms to truly green data facilities. Rather than cutting down trees and clearing green spaces for yet more urbanization, we seek to create a rationale for the regeneration and proliferation of nature. By working with nature as a technology, we see futures in which the carbon emitting data farms of today are replaced by carbon absorbing Data Forests.
Cloud today
Capacity: 1013bits/cm³
Errors: Negligible
Duration: 5-10 years
Read/Write: Real-time
Emissions: CO²
Elements: Lanthanum, Lutetium, Neodymium, Yttrium
Grow Your Own Cloud
Capacity: 1019bits/cm³
Errors: 0-0.1%
Duration: 10,000 years
Read/Write: Speed of life
Emissions: Oxygen, Water
Elements: Carbon
This might be viewed simultaneously through figurative and literal lenses, yet our down-to-earth aim is to develop an initiative from the ground up, built through an ethics first approach, with an innate respect for nature and a strong sense of climate justice guiding everything we do.
We would like to help construct a future in which technology is a living organism in the wider ecosystem of the earth. Shifting human models from the exploitative to cooperative and unified, in full awareness of the deep, pervasive relationships that connect everything.