An Interview with Spencer Chang | Are.na Editorial

The term I reach for most is “communal computing.” What I care about most is technology as a medium for humanity. I care about making technology feel more like a material that we can use to connect better with each other or express ourselves or create things; tools and spaces that allow us to gather, play, and share in the joy of making things toge... See more

anything can be critical to a formulation if you have the right containers

When I started formalizing Gather into the shape that it is now, I wanted it to feel like a very accessible exploration of this. Building an app basically forces you to remove all the complexity. There are a lot of explorations that are more desktop-centered — that's what my work was focusing on back when I was working full-time in tech. It always ... See more

Spencer Chang is a programmer, artist, and writer who creates new interaction mediums, website environments, open protocols, and local-first applications. For the last year or so, Spencer has been conducting independent research on what they term “communal computing,” or making tools and spaces that allow for people to gather, play, and create thin... See more

We're all technological beings now; it's ingrained into the way we operate. It's almost an extension of our body. And we already know how we want to shape that technology. We just need to be better supported to do so.

“communal computing.” What I care about most is technology as a medium for humanity. I care about making technology feel more like a material that we can use to connect better with each other or express ourselves or create things; tools and spaces that allow us to gather, play, and share in the joy of making things together.

a lot of times ideas and projects are formed out of a more ambient kind of thinking and talking and doing. Research is not always this thing of sitting down and concentratedly looking through archives or something.

It’s research, but not in a traditional sense of research. It’s almost like a personal philosophy research or something. It’s how you form your opinions about a specific category of things. The terms I use most often are “textured” and “resonant” — I think when you see collections that have been cared for over many years and have a very specific vi... See more

The question behind it was “how can anyone, whether they’re technical or not, create or cultivate their own database?” When I started doing independent research last year, that was one of the main questions that was swirling. It’s fundamental to a lot of the other explorations that I'm doing now, looking at how alternative forms of technology might... See more