Participatory platforms are supporting a new era of DIY citizenship, and social and environmental justice. However, these platforms and the notion of community is being commoditized. Media practitioners and community organizers are becoming increasingly dependent on appropriating a network of social media platforms despite the adverse environmental cost and breaches of our information rights. This lecture reviews independent maker spaces, eco-art, citizen-science and grassroots participatory platforms where alternate modes of media-making are possible.

This lecture also presents Kimberley Bianca's PhD work-in-progress where she is working in rural Colorado in the U.S to develop a participatory archive for senior citizens, youth, artists, activists, and citizen scientists to contribute art, data (mostly on water quality), photography, documentation of post-wildfires restoration efforts, and traditional stories. This will be the first arts-driven project with the citizen science initiative and platform CitSci (https://citsci.org). The archive will then be used in a public large-scale interactive projection experience.