The Unboxing Tech Blog Series

By this point, there has been much coverage about the ecological impact of our internet infrastructures and especially, Artificial Intelligence (AI). As digital consumption has increased across the globe, especially among young people, the ecological impact of our online lives has become impossible to ignore. The challenge is not merely technical; it is cultural, behavioural, and political. Young people are significant users of mobile data, streaming platforms, cloud storage,

In the last part of our Changemaker Blog series, we sat down with Katrin Fritsch , Senior Program Manager at The Green Web Foundation. Katrin is a researcher, writer, and consultant on technology, climate, and feminist perspectives. Katrin shared invaluable insights from her work, including her involvement with the Green Web Foundation’s open source tools and the CODES project, emphasising the need to materialise the internet and push for systemic change. In this interview, w

In the next part of our Changemaker Blog series, we share insights from our conversation with Dr. Tamara Kneese . Tamara is a Senior Research Scientist at the Partnership on AI. Tamara’s research focuses on investigating the material and social costs of digital technology; comparing and linking the past developments of computers and automated systems with current studies of people working on digital platforms and jobs involving care. In this conversation, Tamara unpacks the h

The conversation around Artificial Intelligence (AI) and sustainability is fragmented. While AI has the potential to push sustainability goals, we often ignore the massive and hidden ecological cost of its entire life cycle.  Behind every search query, every ChatGPT prompt, every Netflix binge and every scroll through social media lies a massive and surprisingly thirsty mechanism: the global data centre network.  These data centres consume huge amounts of electricity and wate

This is the next part of our Changemaker Blog series. Here, we share insights from our conversation with Geraldine de Bastion . Geraldine is a digital rights advocate, researcher, and policy expert working at the intersection of sustainability, digital infrastructure, and human rights. Geraldine is a member of the executive board at Global Innovation Gathering and has been deeply involved in work that seeks to reimagine the internet as a more equitable and sustainable space. 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the defining technology of this decade. It has captured headlines all over the world, and we see breakthroughs every day.    Did you know that time and again, scholars have talked about the relationship between technology and society? Literature suggests that technology never develops in silos; it shapes society, the way we behave and interact with it, and sometimes it even reinforces societal inequalities.   Similarly, AI’s evolution is not m

This is the first blog of our Changemaker Blog series for the Unboxing Tech Toolkit: Unboxing Internet Infrastructures. In this piece, we share insights from our conversation with Mike Jensen.  Mike is a pioneer in global connectivity whose work spans over four decades. He is a 2017 Internet Hall of Fame inductee and co-founder of Canada’s first non-profit ISP, The Web. Mike has contributed to work involving community networking and open-access internet development, with exp

In our everyday life, the internet often feels weightless - just a signal on a screen. But beneath this usability is a complex and energy-intensive infrastructure. This backbone of the digital economy is both intangible in user experience and concrete in its material and environmental presence.  The internet infrastructure is a vast system of hardware, software, and protocols that work together to connect billions of devices across the globe. It can be broken down into three

We live in a world where around 79% young people aged 15-24 use the internet and are perpetually online. Technology shapes how they learn, connect, create, and how they imagine their futures. However, beneath the convenience of our hyper-digital lives lies a complex infrastructure, energy consumption, and ecological costs that often go unseen. To help young people navigate this reality, we are excited to introduce a new module of the Unboxing Tech Toolkit. This new module is

We’re thrilled to share that the Unboxing Tech Toolkit: The Materiality of the Smartphone  is now available for download and print in...