Featuring talks from Christie Morgan on Softer Digital Futures, Nadia Piet on alternative AI practices and Calum Bowden on collaborative system change. Followed by Workshops that invite collective exploration, concluding with a final reflection.

The process culminated in a collective work, Remarkable Dreamers, a deep-sea universe that exists in the borderland between fact and fiction, between the recognisable and the foreign.

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Explore the infinite darkness and meet mysterious and mythical creatures — beings that are normally inaccessible to us humans. We know that we are incompatible by nature; we cannot survive in their world and they cannot survive in ours, and therefore we must attempt to approach each other in this digital no man's land.

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In a world with increasingly black-boxed technologies and rapidly growing AI models, cyberdecks feel like a safe haven, a breath of fresh air, devices that give us hope for brighter tech futures built on playfulness, participation and decentralisation.

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For more details and to apply, please read more on our blog.

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Artwork by Sian Fan

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We cannot wait to spend a long weekend with new and old friends exploring softer directions for digital futures.

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Softer Digital Futures is a conference for actions and for taking part in a larger narrative. It’s a conference for collaboration, participation, for dreaming, feeling hope and creating change.

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Ticket sales will open in May, you can sign up for our newsletter to be the first to know.

1. Another Internet Manifesto
Through playful exercises, we map the digital territories we inhabit: the software, the hardware, the invisible infrastructures that shape how we speak, see, and are seen.

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2. Weaving Webs of Wonder: An HTML Workshop
This workshop will show how to self-learn HTML, provide resources, and subtle guidance creating a simple webpage using HTML and CSS. Using the principles and ideas drafted in the manifesto as our raw material, we will build web pages, side by side.
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SOFTER was born from a longing for a community and learning space where we could see ourselves and our values reflected. Our community hosted events encourage volunteer peer-to-peer learning and the soft exchange of knowledge, ideas and skills. 

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The tutorial introduces the core components of a computer and walks through the process of selecting compatible parts and assembling the machine step by step.

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The build is designed with creatives in mind and supports workflows such as 3D rendering, motion design and video editing.

The full tutorial is available on Softer’s YouTube channel from March 23.

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In this workshop, we’ll explore our current relationship with technology, imagine what a desirable digital identity could look like, and create a symbolic avatar to guide that becoming: a seed, a talisman, a small signal from a future you.

Through reflection, guided meditation, and creative making, we’ll rethink how we want to show up online, with more softness, honesty, and care.