Goodbye 2024

We believe in a world in which technologies are at the service of communities and not used for exploitation, and it is in this sense that we insist on the development of projects that put every innovation in the hands of the people.

This year, in agreement with the Ministry of Education of Córdoba and the Faculty of Astronomy, Mathematics, Physics and Computer Science (FAMAF) of the UNC, we gave shape to one of the most ambitious projects we could imagine: training several hundred middle school teachers in Artificial Intelligence tools. We did it and documented it. That work will be input for everything we have in mind for the next 2025 AI agenda.

The data protection and privacy agenda called us once again throughout the year, with multiple challenges that forced us to take action and speak out, including the intelligence policies adopted by Javier Milei’s government in its first year in office, the creation of an Artificial Intelligence Unit Applied to Security (UIAAS) under Patricia Bullrich, as well as multiple issues related to the management of the policies of the new libertarian administration. Access to information has been weakened in this new phase, as have civil society’s capacities to advance transparency and community development policies.

2025 will be an election year and will once again bring us complex challenges to address: electoral politics, technologies in the electoral process, use of AI in party propaganda, challenges on the role of the press, protection of civic space for debate are some of the issues that open up in the immediate future.

We cannot forget that all our work remains faithful to the ideas of Free Software and free access to culture, the issues that have called us from the beginning, so the monitoring of WIPO, the coordination of actions at regional level with the Alliance for Fair Access to Knowledge and the development of copyright policies to promote a regional development of artificial intelligence are also part of our next projects.

Once again, it is essential to mention that none of what you will see in the following pages would be possible without a dynamic team committed to our mission and vision. This year also saw the addition of FAMAF undergraduate students who contributed a huge effort to accompany the work of the AI ethics team, to all of whom we also extend our thanks.

Finally, we could not do all that we do without the support of our donors, organisations that have relied on our work for more than two decades. In particular, we would like to welcome the opening of the Buenos Aires Office of the Heinrich Böll Foundation of Germany, who always accompany us in our projects and will now also have a home nearby to further strengthen the ties that bind us together.  The Ford Foundation, the Mozilla Foundation, the FAIR Network, the New Venture Fund, the Data Empowerment Fund, the Arcadia Fund, among other private contributors honour us with their support to Vía Libre’s mission.

You can find the full yearbook here.

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