Doris Knecht read at the Lesefest Josefstadt, curated by Helmut Pokornig. She read excerpts from her book “Eine vollständige Liste aller Dinge, die ich vergessen habe”. YouTube has a video from similar event with her.
Pokornig asked whether the - wonderful - book was somehow “Frauenliteratur” (women’s fiction). Knecht quoted someone (I didn’t understand/don’t recall whom) emphasizing that if there is something like “Frauenliteratur”, then there also needs to be a male equivalent “Prostataprosa” (prostate prose).
#NSFW (Nikolaus Song For the Weeek)
This week’s song is from Sophie Hunger.
The YouTube video (a live version) is, again, worth being watched as well.
The trombone is amazing, in both versions.
2 more beautiful gifts: Silver Lane
And nice remix of There is still Pain Left:
Retrospect
PHDs
This week brought two different, yet interesting an dinnovative formats to debate with young colleagues on their PHDs projects. On Monday we had the yearly conference of the “Ars iuris” doctoral school. I was, in particular, impressed by the 3 opening presentation on fundamental matters, given by Karina Karik, Julius Schuhmann and Ines Rössl.
I asked Google Gemini about the event and received a very weird answer on the location. Google confused Juridicum’s top floor with an amergency shelter.
On Tuesday, there was a joint symposion with representatives from Kyoto University, including its president Nagahiro MINATO, University of Vienna, including its rector Sebastian Schütze, in presence of His Excellency Ryuta MIZUUCHI, Ambassador of Japan to Austria.
I had the privilege to moderate a PHD-pitchtalk session there which was very interesting. Students were required to present their PHD-projects in no longer than 3 minutes (with a brutal gong after this period so that extending was no option) - with a corresponding, assigned question afterwards.
This setting produced a very intense, diverse and inspiring 45 minutes session full of high quality presentations and communication among young researchers, despite their different disciplinary and cultural background. This is, in my view, a very interesting format, also for larger conferences. If one can’t put one’s argument in 3 minutes, one hasn’t thought it through fully yet.
Kölner Tage Datenschutzrecht
A similar format was used at the beginning of a data protection conference in Cologne on Thursday: A panel, consisting of 6 people, was asked to discuss 6 topics in 30 minutes each. The introductory remarks were - strictly - limited to 8 minutes.
I really liked the design as this lead to a very diverse and vivid discussion. My part was to report on the interplay between Digital Services Act and GDPR. I took a possibly unexpected approach, talking about the relation between age verification, youth protection and data protection in context of a company called Aylo Ltd. If you never heard of them: they are supposed to run Pornhub (safe link, trust me :-) ).
There are some recent developments with this company that made me speak about this:
I was in particular interested in the meaning of art. 28 section 3 DSA:
“Compliance with the obligations set out in this Article shall not oblige providers of online platforms to process additional personal data in order to assess whether the recipient of the service is a minor.”
The “talkshow format” of the first 3 hours worked really well thanks to Prof. Niko Härting’s brilliant moderation. Such arrangements need someone being able to hold things together. Härting was very impressive in keeping all of us involved for 3 hours.
The rest of the day was structured in a more traditional way, with wonderful presentations, including a tour d’horizon from Max Schrems
and a - just brilliant - talk from Prof. Dr. Louisa Specht-Riemenschneider presenting us a fairy tale on GDPR not being affected by all the new European acts.
Specht-Riemenschneider is the designated head of Germany’s Federal Data Protection Office; it was important to her that she (still) spoke in her personal capacity as an academic; the presentation was just brilliant - rhetoric- and contentwise. I will be very interesting to see how her input and positions will change the authority’s behavior and viewpoints.
The meeting venue was close to the dome so that I made it there in the evening (with thousands of drunk (mainly scottish) soccer fans that are not in the picture).
Do we know what AI knows?
That was this term’s “Semesterfrage”. The closing panel debate in UNIVIE’s big ceremonial hall, moderated by Der Standard’s new editor in chief Gerold Riedmann,
included, inter alia, an opening speech by Rector Schütze
and a keynote by Helga Nowotny
(and a panel debate with me on the panel). - This is a view from the audience
© Markus Korenjak
A full video of the event is available
and Der Standard has a summary:
International Organization on AI
Prof. Dr. Christiane Ahlborn from Trinity College Dublin gave a presentation on “Establising an Internatonal Organisation to Regulate Artificial Intelligence” on Wednesday.
Prof. Dr. August Reinisch (and me) chaired this. Some in the audience saw the “Hupka-Zimmer” at Juridicum for the first time at this occasion - which is funny as many of the most important meetings happen there, including, in particular, many sessions of hiring committees. I had many meetings on IT-governance there somewhere around 1995 - and almost nothing has changed since then.
The audience was a nice mixture of public international law and IT-lawyers; the outcome was not too promising, though. There are many doubts that such an organisation will be established and that it would be fit for purpose. This keeps me rather nervous, in particular when I look around some of the AI reports in the military.
Josef Hupka is a personality, one should know.
Climate Change
I recorded an #arsboni session in the laundry that is, in my view, a must see for everyone interested in climate, strategic litigation, legal politics, fundamental rights and constittional law. My dialogue partner is Michaela Krömer, an attorney and specialist in climate litigation.
Prospect
Inaugural Lecture
My colleague at the department, Prof. Dr. Iris Eisenberger, is going to give her inaugural lecture on “"Technologische Erosionen im Recht"on Friday, June 21.
Full program is online, free entry, registration requested.
UniVie Connect: Advancing AI Together
I am one of the speakers at an event trying to advance AI (research) together. It starts als this Friday at 10.00 am, so, most likely, right after you have read this:
This is a matchmaking event, mostly with people wiching to DO something in/with AI. So, if this is of interest, register and drop by, also spontaneously!
Internet Governance Forum
I will (most likely) participate (in the audience) at the Internet Governance Forum, organised by federal Minister Edtstadler on Thursday, June 27.
It seems to be somehow semi-public, a stream should be available.
#arsboni
Three sessions are ahead of us. I am proud of each and single one of them.
On Monday, June 24, at 10 CEST, we will ask how public Television can be and has to be financed in German speaking countries.
Monday afternoon, 17.00 CEST will be on the hottest recent political topic in Austria - with an old friend and arsboni scpecial guest, Prof. Dr. Karl Stöger.
And on Tuesday, June 25, in the afternoon, we will speak with the claimant’s attorney, Dr. Robert Kerschbaumer, in a very relevant supreme-court decision on compensation for damages in a shitstorm.
Source: OGH, https://www.ogh.gv.at/entscheidungen/entscheidungen-ogh/beteiligung-am-shitstorm-kann-teuer-werden/
Daisy
smiles when realizing that her ears can flatter while she runs.
© Birgit Forgó-Feldner
Have a wonderful week!
Kind regards
Nikolaus (Forgó)