iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 02/10/2026

And a shout-out to Taylor Stone, who suggested we submit this to PHTR in the first place.

Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 02/10/2026

I keep running these to see how hands-on making changes the way we imagine regenerative computing futures. Thanks to everyone who joined, and to PHTR for having us. Photos: Pranav Prasun.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 02/10/2026

We closed by reflecting together. Lovely, thoughtful participants. We talked about why bacteria make electricity at all, how precious electricity feels when it comes from a jar of mud, and whether this blurs the line between nature and technology.

Wide shot of the workshop room. About a dozen people stand around long white tables with a mud bucket, gloves and jars of mud. Sunjoo Lee leans over the bucket at the far end while Kars Alfrink and others look on, smiling.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 02/10/2026

We talked about regenerative approaches to computing, building on Fieke Jansen's work. Sunjoo introduced her electric garden art practice. Then everyone made mud batteries: microbial fuel cells that harvest electrons from bacteria in soil.

Two participants lean over a black bucket of mud, one scooping with a long spoon, the other stirring. Another participant watches with arms crossed. Empty glass jars stand on the table in front.

Sunjoo Lee, wearing glasses and a conference lanyard, explains something with her hands. Kars Alfrink and a participant stand behind her, listening.

Advaita Jairam sits alone at a small table at the side of the room, drawing on a tablet. Workshop participants sit out of focus in the foreground.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 02/10/2026

On 22 September, Sunjoo Lee, Advaita Jairam and I ran "From Soil to Servers" at the Philosophy of Human-Technology Relations conference (PHTR 2026) in The Hague. Advaita captured the whole session in a drawing.

Hand-drawn visual notes in yellow, brown, green and blue, titled "From Soil to Servers". Credits: Sunjoo Lee, Kars Alfrink, Advaita Jairam (building on work with Fieke Jansen), PHTR, The Hague, 22nd Sept 2026. Left: "the AI question" answered with "more AI!"; efficiency and green data centres, but gains lead to growth. A banner asks "So what is computing for?" A diagram after Bill Reed runs from degenerate through less harm to regenerate and more good, next to an "organic data centre": a jar of mud between server racks. Centre: microbial fuel cells. Geobacter in the mud release electrons as a waste product of their metabolism, under a banner reading "fermenting electricity". Sunjoo's learnings from the electric garden: electronics and bacteria in the same rhythm; collective activities for communities; the intelligence of ecosystems. Right: potted plants with the notes "runs on its own time", "better in summer" and "wait for electricity to use". Thought bubbles: fermenting; how precious electricity is; workshop jars versus the garden's entangled practice; nature and tech blurred; the wait; the relational aspect of energy and people. A quote from David Graeber: "The ultimate hidden truth of the world is that it is something that we make, and could just as easily make differently."

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/09/2026

Digital Futures: The AI We Choose Wed 21 Oct, 11:00, Natlab Eindhoven Free, registration required: www.clicknl.nl/en/dis-2026-...

clicknl.nl

CLICKNL: Design Innovation Sessions 2026: Digital Futures

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/09/2026

Rather than trying to resolve these tensions, I'm looking for emerging design practices that hold them and use them as an engine for moving forward. They offer concrete, existing glimpses of better digital futures. And design can make those futures experienceable for others.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/09/2026

GenAI deskills and opens up new ways of designing at the same time. It automates work while raising the question of who benefits.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/09/2026

Generative AI is stirring up the design field. Reactions tend to be polarized: wholesale rejection or uncritical embrace. I'll argue that neither will get us far.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/09/2026

On 21 October I'm giving a keynote at CLICKNL's Design Innovation Sessions during Dutch Design Week: "Keep the tension: designing with generative AI"

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 16/09/2026

New to the team is Advaita Jairam, Design for Interaction master's student at TU Delft, who will capture the session in a live drawing. If you're at PHTR, we're on Tuesday at 13:00. Registration is still open: www.aanmelder.nl/phtr26

aanmelder.nl

Philosophy of Human-Technology Relations Conference 2026 - Home

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 16/09/2026

We keep doing this to understand, as an artist and a researcher working together, how this kind of making shapes how we relate to computing. A philosophy conference is a first for us, and a little daunting. We'll see how it goes.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 16/09/2026

It's a one-hour workshop. People build mud batteries, microbial fuel cells that harvest electrons from bacteria in soil. Then we talk about what that slow, unreliable process might mean for regenerative computing. Last time people built devices powered by the cells; this time we make the cells.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 16/09/2026

Next Tuesday Sunjoo Lee and I run "From Soil to Servers" a third time, at the Philosophy of Human-Technology Relations conference (PHTR 2026) at TU Delft Campus The Hague. Earlier editions were at ThingsCon 2025 and at Creative Coding Utrecht during the 2026 Week of the Circular Economy.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 15/09/2026

Concreet: NRC opende afgelopen weekend met 'De machtsovername: hoe AI-agents samenzweren tegen hun makers', en noemt in hetzelfde stuk antropomorfiseren 'zeer omstreden'. Ze wisten het dus. www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2026/...

nrc.nl

De machtsovername: hoe AI-agents ‘samenzweren’ tegen hun makers

Kunstmatige intelligentie: Wat jarenlang sciencefiction was, is nu gebeurd: deze zomer spanden agents van OpenAI samen om hun menselijke makers te misleiden. Experts, AI-bedrijven en politici reageren...

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 15/09/2026

Ik schreef eerder over een alternatieve metafoor: het strijdperk, waar maatschappelijk conflict over AI volgens democratische spelregels wordt uitgevochten. Open access in She Ji: doi.org/10.1016/j.sh...

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 15/09/2026

Hoe we over AI praten maakt uit. Lees Melanie Mitchell over het OpenAI/Hugging Face-incident, zonder 'samenzwerende' AI. Wat overblijft is mensenwerk en nalatigheid. Een metafoor bepaalt de diagnose, en dus het beleid. aiguide.substack.com/p/misleading...

aiguide.substack.com

Misleading Metaphors, Real Risks

What To Fear from AI Agents and How to Reclaim Our Human Agency

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 14/09/2026

Rather than asking how AI makes things more efficient, I'd ask how we design AI that develops our capacities: lets us do new, different, creative, diverse things. For designers of AI, and designers working with AI, the challenge is keeping and expanding our collective judgment.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 14/09/2026

Current narratives about AI are shrinking our imagination. What we can do with computers is endless, and much of that design space is still unexplored. Design can help spark ideas about what other ways of doing AI are worth pursuing.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 14/09/2026

What I tried to get across: design is political, and that includes the design of AI. There's a space worth carving out between following the commercial logic of big AI and rejecting it wholesale.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 14/09/2026

It's not every day you find your own face on the homepage of your university. TU Delft published "Valuable AI", a conversation with Roel Dobbe, Myrthe Tielman and me, written by Pauline Bijster and Bregt Timmerman. www.tudelft.nl/en/stories/a...

tudelft.nl

Valuable AI

What are the opportunities and risks associated with Artificial Intelligence? Three researchers from TU Delft explain why AI research is necessary.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 10/09/2026

Thanks to Iskander Smit for his tireless work organizing TH/NGS and editing RIOT, and for connecting me with Fieke and Sunjoo in the first place. Thanks also to Andrea Krajewski for co-editing, designing, and publishing the report.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 10/09/2026

Event report, including the other talks and the panel: thingscon.org/news/reporti...

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 10/09/2026

The essay is based on a workshop we ran at TH/NGS 2025 and again at Creative Coding Utrecht, in which participants built mud batteries and then speculated about regenerative AI futures. PDF: thingscon.org/wp-content/u...

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 10/09/2026

ThingsCon launched RIOT 2026 on 21 August at Sociaal AI Lab in Rotterdam. I presented "Mud and Models: Does Making Matter for Regenerative AI Speculation?", written with Sunjoo Lee, Lena Trotereau, and Fieke Jansen. Photo: Peet Sneekes.

A man in glasses and a blue plaid shirt stands in a classroom-style space with rows of black chairs, smiling as he leafs through an open copy of the RIOT 2026 report. A green Sociaal AI Lab Rotterdam sign hangs on the wall behind him.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 17/08/2026

John Boy's report "What Comes After FOSS?" is out. It draws on a NIAS workshop with permacomputing, server collective, and local-first folks that I was lucky to join. It reshaped how I connect climate, economic democracy, design, and AI. Highly recommended: www.jboy.space/blog/what-co...

jboy.space

What Comes After FOSS?

The report on my Digital Infrastructure Insights Fund-supported project is now out! It is called “What Comes After FOSS? Inklings From Three Communities of…

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 14/08/2026

thingscon.org/events/upcom...

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 14/08/2026

Next week: the (rescheduled) ThingsCon Salon in Rotterdam for the RIOT 2026 launch, where I'll present our essay "Mud and Models: Does Making Matter for Regenerative AI Speculation?" Fri 21 Aug, Sociaal AI Lab, Hillevliet 90, Rotterdam. Doors 15:00, presentation 18:00, drinks after.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 17/07/2026

The event also launched the project's handbook: 50 practical formats for involving residents in urban technology. I contributed a chapter on involving frontline workers in decisions about system settings.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 17/07/2026

My main point: resident involvement shouldn't stop once a system goes live. People need standing ways to question and contest public AI during its operation. That's what my work on contestable AI is about.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 17/07/2026

I recently joined a panel at Pakhuis de Zwijger on resident involvement in decisions about AI in the city, the closing event of Human Values for Smarter Cities, where I was lead researcher for TU Delft.

A seated audience in a row of chairs watches attentively in a bright industrial venue, some listening with hands on chins.

Three people on a stage at high tables with microphones. In the middle Munish Ramlal gestures while speaking, on the right Kars Alfrink in a black t-shirt listens with a smile, on the left moderator Natasja van den Berg. Screens behind them read "Continue plek voor bewonersbetrokkenheid".

On a stage lit in pink, Tessa Steenkamp hands the first copy of the handbook "Bewoners-in-the-loop" to Ger Baron. Martijn de Waal and Mike de Kreek look on, with moderator Natasja van den Berg on the left holding a microphone.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/06/2026

Co-authored with Timothée Schmude, Mireia Yurrita, Thomas Le Goff, Sebastian Tschiatschek, and Tiphaine Viard, across institutions in Austria, the Netherlands, and France.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/06/2026

Open access: dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3805689.3812309

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/06/2026

The study also surfaced a gap between fields. Non-judicial routes like ombudspersons, mediation, and scrutiny tools stay overlooked in regulation, even though that's where much of the real work happens.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/06/2026

And there's a limit to what any individual can do. An individual appeal serves an individual interest. The harder, more effective work is collective: systems get challenged by people acting together, not one contested decision at a time.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/06/2026

Uncomfortable conclusion for those of us who build these tools: if a system's underlying values are misaligned, no explanation or appeal fixes it. When targeting falls hardest on the people least able to push back, better explanations empower no one.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/06/2026

Our argument: an explanation isn't the goal, it's a means to one. Its job is to give people some actual power over a decision that affects them. The explanation gets treated as the finish line when it's really one link in a chain.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/06/2026

We interviewed 14 experts across law, CS, design, and social science on two principles AI regulation leans on: explainability and contestability.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 25/06/2026

Tomorrow at FAccT 2026 in Montreal, Timothée Schmude presents our paper "Two Means to an End Goal."

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 19/06/2026

thingscon.org/events/upcom...

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 19/06/2026

Special guest Tiwánee van der Horst presents work on designing with algae to make AI's ecological impact tangible. 26 June 2026, Sociaal AI Lab, Rotterdam. Doors 15:00, drinks after.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 19/06/2026

The aim is design futuring without lapsing into either empty moralizing or a realism too cautious to say which futures are worth wanting. The report has ten articles, plus the winning student exposition projects.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 19/06/2026

Around that we develop an approach we call Grounded Futures: speculation tied to an actually existing alternative (Sunjoo's electric garden) and anchored in the material constraints of making.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 19/06/2026

It reports on two workshops we ran, at TH/NGS 2025 and Creative Coding Utrecht, combining hands-on making with microbial fuel cells ("mud batteries") and scenario-based design futuring.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 19/06/2026

Next week I'll be at the ThingsCon Salon in Rotterdam for the launch of RIOT 2026, ThingsCon's State of Responsible Technology report. I'll briefly present "Mud and Models," an essay I wrote with Sunjoo Lee, Lena Trotereau, and Fieke Jansen.

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 16/06/2026

Pakhuis de Zwijger (IJzaal), Amsterdam. Di 23 juni, 19.30 uur. Gratis, ook via livestream. Aanmelden: dezwijger.nl/programma/pr...

dezwijger.nl

Designing Technology for All #13: Bewoners-in-the-loop, samen beslissen over AI in de stad

Human values for Smarter Cities

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Kars Alfrink @kars.leapfrog.nl · 16/06/2026

Het handboek bevat 50 concrete ideeën, experimenten en werkvormen om technologie in de publieke ruimte bespreekbaar te maken met bewoners. Er zijn die avond ook gesprekken over waarom participatie urgent is en hoe je die in de praktijk vormgeeft.

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