To the ESRC Digital Good Network

An initial expression of interest in your intention

to commission an artwork or visualisation

representing the Digital Good Network’s research and findings.

Like most people - including policy makers, I find the presentation of complex issues challenging.

We prefer simple descriptions that get straight to the point.

Simple definitions of a digital society could be framed where there is an assumption that almost everyone is familiar with that concept’s essential underlying infrastructure, the internet.  And an indication that something is good or precious in everyday communications is often suggested by the simple addition of a heart-shaped emoji.

So, the URL I purchased for this page online is

And, today, the purpose of this page is for the following proposal to be read.

Your discussion paper in March 2025 described some core elements of the Digital Good Network’s research activities as connectedness and building blocks.  So, the following ‘logo’ could sit above similar information summarised in a Z-fold leaflet.

 []@[] 

That logo’s set of building blocks connected by the world’s most recognisable communications key could be seen as a meaningful symbol which anyone can type easily in plain text on almost any device anywhere in the world.

And the following design (which can be typed just as easily) could sit beneath every leaflet’s strapline.

             @ >

Visualisations of that research activity and its findings would be framed and given matching themes in accordance with the Digital Good Network’s central question: What should a good digital society look like and how do we get there?

On 2D panels, suggestions of what a good digital society should look like would sit at the heart of the matter while suggestions of how we get there would be shown along iterative lines.

This theme could be expanded through animated graphics displayed on digital A boards.  It could also appear in an illuminated 3D sculpture that would have humanity (represented by that symbolic heart) seated at the centre of some symbolic network (representing the internet).

Here’s a few of the rough, expeditionary sketches I made whilst exploring that idea.

I’m not a professional artist (I’m a retired healthcare worker) but I’m currently paying arts & crafts professionals to assemble parts of a much smaller project (but along similar lines) in Brighton, where I live.

Those professionals regularly work in graphic design, LED neon and 3D sculpture.  And what they do (for companies such as Plunge Creations) is often used during the staging of large events, in films and on TV.

I decided to submit this initial expression of interest because I might learn stuff during this process which could be useful in that smaller project mentioned above.  And it also fits with my concern for humanity in the light of what we are given to understand about the current development of digital technology.

It’s also a personal thing, since that future which so much concerns us might be a place where my grandchildren will have to live.

But, when asked what can be done - whenever some worrying vision regarding our near future is being discussed, I find increasing numbers engaged in those conversations just shake their heads and say it’s already too late.  Many report feeling increasingly overwhelmed by what the writer Alvin Toffler would have described as Future Shock.  And it might not be entirely inappropriate (to borrow from another American writer, the existential psychologist, Rollo May) to suggest that a failure to imagine any future in which we could meaningfully live out our passions and purpose could eventually lead to the normalisation in our communities of some profound state of helplessness, apathy and despair.

In your invitation to submit expressions of interest, you suggest the negative consequences of digital innovations are currently getting a lot of attention since even the most well-intentioned technologies can end up doing harm, but [you go on to suggest] we need to do more than just make that harm visible.  We need to imagine a better future and ask ourselves what kind of digital society we would want to find when we get there.

So, I guess it could be said that somewhere around here we’ve reached a crucial point in history calling for the employment of a good imagination.  ❤️ 

Peter Sharrock

Concern for Humanity Regarding AI

Art & Design Installation Project 

Friends’ Meeting House

Ship Street

Brighton

vhc@btinternet.com

30 June 2026