The dependency on technology in contemporary design practice has raised critical questions of identity, authenticity, and responsibility at least on the side of the designer.  It may be claimed that the use of digital technologies in design, as well as in everyday activities, has deep and profound effects not only in the way thoughts and ideas are conceived, understood, and communicated but also in their intrinsic value, merit, and validity.  Digital techniques have become determinant factors, perhaps hidden, upon which the designers, practitioners, or critics base their ideas, thoughts, or even ideologies. Who is the designer today and how important are one's own ideas versus the techniques provided in an increasingly  digitally dominated world? How has the identity or brand of design firms been affected by the use of technology? Is it possible to design without a computer today?  How important is for designers to know the mechanisms of software or hardware and therefore the limits that these technologies impose on design and does that even matter anymore? 

The emergence of new social, political, and economic concepts, conditions, and practices such as that of globalization, ubiquity, outsourcing, or design/social networking together with their corresponding technologies have shaped our world in a way that has no precedence.  This new realm has emerged so rapidly, globally, and overwhelmingly, and yet so promising, enticing, and convenient, that very few care to address its long term consequences.  Meanwhile, as it appears from the current discourse, "anything goes" in design as long as it uses some new technology.  Fancy images generated through computer graphics have replaced reality and, in turn, reality has been dominated, altered, and adjusted to fit a technological utopia. It is as if the world of technology is expanding out of control and yet, as humans we remain the same.  Who can take a position in the midst of this situation?  Who cares enough to question the mainstream?

The second critical digital conference is ambiguously titled "Who Cares(?)" as a gesture of reaching out for critical positions about design in an age of responsibility, identity, and authenticity.  Arguments for and against the theme are welcomed as well as projects, designs, essays, or proposals that would manifest a critical viewpoint. The conference will be held at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design on April 17 to 19, 2009.