Artificial Sociality
Workshop on configurations of human-machine relationships
The rise of semi-autonomous agents, such as self-driving cars, voice assistants, industrial robots or generative machine learning models, shapes new forms of interaction and cooperation between human actors and technical agents. The workshop “Artificial Sociality” focuses on the diverse and heterogeneous configurations of human-machine relationships and takes an interdisciplinary perspective to examine which new forms of human-machine sociality can be derived from the increasing implementation of AI technologies, sensors and synthetic agents.
One focus to which the workshop of Interrobang belongs, takes an interactive format with a co-design session. The program starts with four discussion groups, each focused on a key theme: the definition of artificial sociality and its determining factors (including machine–machine relationships), the domains and use cases where artificial sociality proves beneficial, the implications of digital artefacts as social actors, and the challenges in building “good” social relationships with AI. After these discussions, the hands-on part invites each group to select a domain or use case, choose a type of relationship within it, and develop contrasting scenarios—a dystopian “Black Mirror” vision and a utopian “White Mirror” vision. This collective exercise aims to spark critical debate and produce concrete insights for the design of AI-driven systems.