Eugenia Kuyda
Eugenia Kuyda
Eugenia Kuyda is the CEO and founder of Replika, an AI companion designed to build deep emotional connection and help people feel better, and has been at the vanguard of AI for the whole of her career. Eugenia started working on conversational AI in 2012 - and launched the first publicly available chatbot fully powered by generative AI in 2015. Prior to that she was an investigative reporter and journalist. Replika is backed by Y Combinator and Khosla Ventures and has been recognized as one of the “Five Technologies that will Rock Your World” by New York Times AI tech ...
Mariam Rezaei
Mariam Rezaei is a multi-award winning composer, turntablist and performer. She previously led experimental arts project TOPH, TUSK FRINGE , and TUSK NORTH, and in November2022, she received the Paul Hamlyn Foundation #AwardsForArtists, in recognition of her contribution to music composition. Her music has recently been described as ‘genuinely ground-breaking’ (London Jazz News 2022) and ‘high-velocity sonic surrealism’ (4* TheGuardian 2022). Recent releaseBOWN(Heat Crimes) charted no.6 inThe Wire and no10 inThe Quietus’ best albums of 2023 and was The Quietus Album of the week. Boomkat described it as ‘harnessing extreme technical prowess—phenomenal stuff’.
Maria Chávez
Maria Chávez, born in Lima, Peru and based in NYC, is best known as an abstract turntablist, sound artist and DJ. Coincidence, chance and failures are themes that unite her work across mediums, including improvised performance, sound and marble sculpture, visual art, book objects and an extensive history with multi-channel installation. Her approach is rooted in Deep Listening, a form of embodied listening developed by her late mentor Pauline Oliveros. Maria’s practice is profoundly expansive, responsive and curious. Her work has been featured and supported by a myriad of institutions over the past decades including Rewire Festival, Counterflows ...
Tiffany Petty Gilliam
UMI Part II Course TA
Tiffany Petty Gilliam is an artist and media ecologist whose work connects fine art with academic communication. Known for her mixed-media and found-object pieces, Tiffany views art as a form of communication—expressive, vibrant, and deeply personal. She believes that art, like all communication, plays a critical role in shaping human experience and societal change.
A Ph.D. candidate in Communication at Duquesne University, Tiffany’s scholarship is informed by media ecology, the study of how media and technology impact human affairs. She is an active member of the international Media Ecology Association, where she ...
Fartein Nilsen
Fartein is a PhD Candidate in Social Anthropology at the University of Bergen, where he also earned his Master’s degree. His academic journey includes an ethnographic study in Iceland focused on neopaganism, culminating in his thesis, "A New Age for Old Gods: An Ethnographic Study of Ásatrúarfélagið in Iceland." This work explored how modernity and technological change influence the revival of pagan beliefs in Iceland and the broader Euro-American context.
For his PhD, Fartein investigates the social and cultural impacts of generative and conversational Artificial Intelligence in California’s AI industry. His research examines how AI technologies ...
