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  • Workshop

Take Back Your Technology Hands-on Workshop

Take back control about how you interact with technology; protecting your time, your mind, and your privacy. Design an intentional experience of using your smartphones, laptops, and other devices.

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October 26, 2026, 10:00am - 11:00am
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Hybrid: Research Data & Digital Scholarship Exchange (RDDSx), Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center, 1st floor; and Virtual
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Open to the Public
Two ceramic-like hands grip and pull on delicate threads that emerge from a "woven circuit board." The contrast between the rigid, heavy material of the hands and the soft, fragile threads creates a visual paradox, symbolising the insertion of human touch into the mechanized world.

Taking back control about how you interact with technology, protecting your time, your mind, and your privacy. Design an intentional experience of using your smartphones, laptops, and other devices.

This is a hybrid (in-person and virtual), beginner-friendly, non-technical workshop that is part of the AI Literacy Interest Group 2026 Book Club Series, in which we are discussing Empire of AI by Karen Hao.

Learning Objectives:

  • Determine when you want to enable or disable Gen AI tools on your devices
  • Understand how to disable Gen AI in commonly used search engines, browsers, and software
  • Explain what Gen AI-free alternatives and options are available for common tasks

Prerequisites:

  • No AI or technology experience required.
  • You are welcome to contextualize yourself on the data privacy considerations with the Empire of AI Chapter 2 “A Civilizing Mission” and Chapter 11 “Apex“

Device/Software required:

Please be sure to bring all the devices you would like to deactivate Gen AI on.

About the Facilitators:

Beth Twomey, Jaj Karajgikar, and Steve Scaduto

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