The impacts of digital technology are numerous and extend beyond mere access. Indeed, the issues surrounding the social and environmental impacts of digital technology are rarely taught. Only 7% of professionals raise awareness about these topics during their training sessions.
As a result, Latitudes has adopted an innovative and comprehensive approach, focusing on six themes: digital sobriety, the environmental impact of digital technology, the challenges of digital citizenship and its impact on democracy, issues of diversity and accessibility in digital technology, and respect for humanity, including impacts on our health such as screen addiction and mental health on social media, and finally, the theme of civic engagement.
For the past eight years, Latitudes has been implementing educational programs on the social and environmental impacts of digital technology, which can take the form of card games like the AI Battle, aimed at developing critical thinking around the impact of artificial intelligence, and civic engagement programs like the Open Data University, which allows for the analysis of data in support of themes such as access to culture, ecological transition, and new mobility solutions.
"Today, we are a team of 15 employees and 550 volunteers spread across France, and our job is to educate citizens about the impacts of digital technology,” explains Augustin Courtier.
“This is ultimately a topic that is often misunderstood and appears technical and reserved for experts, but part of our work is to show that this is not the case. It is a subject that concerns everyone because the use cases of digital technology or artificial intelligence are indeed concrete in our daily lives.”
One of the topics that is particularly important to Latitudes is the concept of taking time. “In this constant acceleration regarding digital issues, we have just initiated our strategic cycle "Welcome to Long Time,” which is an invitation to ask the right questions, to take the time to digest all these technological evolutions, to learn to question this progress, and ultimately to ask what the right progress is?,” concludes Augustin Courtier.
