Why AMPLIFY?
François Matarasso, June 2025
The early days of the Internet were driven by utopian dreams that it would be ‘a tool to empower humanity’,[i] giving people the means to access, create and share knowledge for the universal good. Thirty years later, Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, wrote that ‘for all the good we’ve achieved, the web has evolved into an engine of inequity and division; swayed by powerful forces who use it for their own agendas.’[ii]
Today, humanity is in a similar situation with Artificial Intelligence (AI) and there is the same risk that idealistic promises will lead to damaging results. The benefits of AI are loudly trumpeted but its effects on our lives are as uncertain as were those of the Internet and potentially just as ambiguous. Above all, the outcome seems likely to be uneven, as some benefit disproportionately while more find themselves disadvantaged. The innovations of AI are further complicated by the move towards immersive technologies, including virtual worlds or metaverses, that over powerful experiences but might also make it harder for people to make informed choices about their lives.
The defence of democratic values in an authoritarian world requires the European Union to invest in genuinely human-centred, open source digital alternatives to those controlled by US, Chinese or corporate interests. Only the EU has the will and the capacity to protect the human diversity that is the essence of democracy and ensure that the interests of citizens shape the technological future rather than the reverse.[iii] We need European tools to keep control of our own data whilst also competing in the rapidly changing digital world.
AMPLIFY is a small initiative but it is nonetheless part of Europe’s response to the challenges of this new AI and immersive landscape. By developing new digital tools, AMPLIFY PORTABLE and AMPLIFY IMMERSIVE, the project aims to offer artists in the Cultural and Creative Industries (CCIs) free resources to explore the physical/digital interface, also known as phygital experiences. The intersection between artistic and digital space is particularly important because both are fields of economic, social and cultural power. European art is immensely rich but it competes with American and now Asian production. Harnessing the creative potential of digital experiences is essential to ensuring the continuing vitality of creative work and attracting new audiences used to screens and buttons and increasingly to eXtended Reality (XR) headsets.
AMPLIFY is testing its tools in four contrasting but complementary pilots. Each one involves artists and communities from the first step to the last in a commitment to ethical, human-centred design that differentiates the project from technology-driven initiatives.
- Fèisean nan Gàidheal passes on the love of Gaelic music, dance, language and culture to the rising generation through tuition, concerts and festivals. They have contributed to the revival of interest in traditional music in the past 40 years. AMPLIFY PORTABLE will help make online tuition easier and more enjoyable, making sessions more accessible and reducing the financial and environmental costs of travel in remote rural areas.
- The Liceu opera house in Barcelona is working with the peripheral community of Sant Andreu district to create a new co-created opera that draws on local history. They will use AMPLIFY IMMERSIVE to record and share the oral history of the area, notably the memories of former political prisoners held in the women’s prison and those of the former workers of an old textile factory. Through this initiative, they will build awareness of the district’s feminist legacies and an audience for a new inclusive opera.
- Toscana Produzione Musica is a producer of contemporary jazz and world music in festivals and cutting edge events. They are inviting musicians and producers to explore the potential of AMPLIFY IMMERSIVE to enhance audience experiences through spatial audio and visual effects. One possibility being tested is the viability and desirability of having the musicians and the audience gathered in different places.
- Cooperativa Paulo Lameiro are extending their world-class concerts for babies to involve babies directly as composers by collecting their responses to live music and translating them in real time into playable visual scores. With AMPLIFY PORTABLE and innovative sensors this pilot breaks new ground for the underserved constituency of young families, as well as introducing completely new modes of audience participation and co-creation.
AMPLIFY is a small project and time limited (2024-27), at least when compared with the AI and XR investment of big technology corporations and nation states. It cannot affect the progress of that technology. What it does seek to do is expand the range of digital tools that protect creative and cultural diversity within the European space so that artists and audiences can benefit from the digital revolution without having to buy into commercial or authoritarian values. In doing so it contributes to a truly human-centred digital transition, where open, trustworthy, explainable, fair, ethical and fit for people are the core values for the technological development.
Notes:
[1] Tim Berners-Lee, Marking the Web’s 35th Birthday: An Open Letter, Medium, 12 March 2024, https://medium.com/@timberners_lee/one-small-step-for-the-web-87f92217d085
[2] Tim Berners-Lee, One Small Step for the Web…, Medium, 29 September 2018, https://medium.com/@timberners_lee/one-small-step-for-the-web-87f92217d085
[3] ‘Virtual Worlds fit for people’, https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/virtual-worlds
