Attending the EYA Festival 2019 today I noted some things I wanted to state in a blog post. One observation I made while listening and comparing the presentations was, that all the participants had ideas, that were or at least wanted to be ethical correct. If the drive to create things is to help someone with something, that in my opinion alone deserves recognition and gives hope that our generation is actually going to make a change.
One group called „eye build it“ developed a special software to enable physically disabled people to work in 3d programs by using affordable eye-tracking devices. What I really liked about the idea was, that you really can give a meaning to peoples lives who would have struggled finding one without it. I would really enjoy to see some of the biggest companies in the world using this tool to open doors for disabled people to unleash their potentials.
There was another group called „imagilabs“ whose initial intention it was to learn very young people the basics of coding. I kinda liked the idea, because everyone should have access to the knowledge he or she needs. For me the crux of the matter was that, this whole program was only meant for girls. In my opinion, that isn’t what equality looks like and it never will. Another thing that grinded my gears about „imagilabs“ was the fact that education should be sold with their program. The thought of someone not being able to afford this product, is one very very little piece that is helping to seperate the poor from education. Besides the girl-exclusivity and the monetization I liked a lot of things what they did. They decided for example to give people using the programs the possibility to exchange and discuss topics.
All in all I enjoyed the presentations and I am kinda proud that the EYA Festival took place at the FH Joanneum in Graz.
