Gallery
foto: Bartosz Frąckowiak
Experiment overview
A performative presentation that transformed abstract digital concepts into tangible understanding through deliberate constraints and physical demonstration.
The lecture used a meticulously crafted ultra-lightweight presentation file - under 2MB and smaller than a typical selfie - delivered on a 12-year-old refurbished MacBook running Linux Elementary OS to challenge audience perceptions about digital resource requirements and hardware obsolescence.
Main objectives
The project confronted digital literacy gaps through:
1: Demonstrating circular computing by showcasing a functional 12-year-old laptop running modern software, challenging the prevalent replacement culture that drives electronic waste.
2: Creating cognitive dissonance by revealing the extreme disparity between necessary and typical digital files through an audience participation guessing game about the presentation’s file size.
3: Promoting open-source alternatives by making them physically accessible to participants through giveaway USB drives containing ready-to-install Elementary OS Linux.
Achieved results
The lecture successfully exposed widespread misconceptions about digital file sizes and hardware obsolescence through the audience participation guessing game, when I asked them to estimate the size of my presentation file.
Participants’ dramatic overestimation of the file’s size revealed fundamental gaps in understanding digital scale, while their surprise at the minimal cost of refurbishing older hardware challenged prevailing replacement culture - including the revelation that RAM modules were valued at merely 1 euro, despite their significant environmental production cost.
The ceremonial gifting of an Elementary OS installation drive to the participant who came closest to guessing the file size provided immediate access to circular computing alternatives while creating a memorable culminating moment.
Main reflection
The dramatic overestimation of necessary file sizes paralleled equally dramatic underestimations of older hardware capabilities, suggesting that planned obsolescence succeeds partly through user perception rather than technical limitations.
By making both the minimal presentation and the refurbished laptop physically present rather than theoretical, the lecture created memorable cognitive anchors that challenged digital wastefulness more effectively than abstract statistics could achieve.
The presentation also briefly addressed broader infrastructural questions about digital power dynamics between major technological powers like the United States and China, connecting individual computing choices to larger questions about who controls internet infrastructure and resources.