Technology, presence, use and innovation

Innovation does not come from technical mastery but from the singular use we make of it. Faced with AI and new technologies, it is our presence to ourselves that enables creative and personal applications.

How not to fall behind?

We often wonder where innovation comes from and how to participate in it to stay “up to date,” to avoid being left behind by the evolution of the world, to not remain stagnant in a changing world. This is one of the major challenges today regarding artificial intelligence, as seen in how AI is perceived in education, industry, and the cultural sphere. The question is how to stay on the side of innovation, how to ensure we have a cutting-edge profession, knowing that professions evolve as techniques evolve.

Artificial intelligence, at its core, is a set of techniques—what we call a technology (its application)—comprising multiple dimensions, from hardware like increasingly advanced microprocessors to the software that operates them in one way or another. That is the technical aspect. One might assume, quite understandably, that if we don’t master the technique—if we don’t become engineers—we’ll be left behind, and that the key is to master the technique to be part of innovation. This would imply that innovation comes only from the creators of AI techniques, in this example. Fortunately, it’s not that simple, and everyone has their place. Let’s explore how.

I’d like to clarify this with a few simple concepts to instill confidence in something other than a sole focus on technique, because this excessive focus, in my view, diminishes human capabilities. For instance, academic selection based on mathematics, which has been the norm for centuries, is a focus on technique—mathematics seen as a technical skill, far from their only dimension. There’s a kind of primacy of technique over other human competencies. This, as we know, leads to selection for the wrong reasons.

The Example of the Cinématographe

Take the invention of the Cinématographe in 1895: it was a technique. The Lumière brothers didn’t invent all of it, as the Cinématographe relied on a pre-existing technique—the 35mm film with four perforations, which allowed capturing a series of photographs per second and projecting them via a machine, creating the illusion of movement through rapid sequencing. Thomas Edison had invented this four years earlier, and the Lumière brothers simply built a device that used this technique, enabling both filming and large-scale projection, which Edison hadn’t done. He had separated the camera from the projector (the Kinetoscope), a device where viewers watched films through a peephole. The films looped, much like TikTok, and lasted 50 seconds—in 1891.

Yet, the Cinématographe’s technique, derived from a prior one, was still a technique. The Lumière brothers made films resembling living paintings: since their technique projected images on a large scale, they referenced painting. They set up their camera and filmed scenes of daily life. The magician Georges Méliès, upon discovering the first projection in a café basement near Saint-Lazare station, was fascinated by this technique and wanted to use it for magic—apparitions, disappearances, special effects, scale changes, costumes, movable sets, etc. He immediately saw that this technique would allow him to create special effects unlike his stage performances. For example, double exposure could multiply characters on screen—something impossible or very difficult to do live. He perceived not the usage before his eyes (filming reality) but the potential for his own purposes, which would reshape the very content of magic. He could invent new tricks thanks to this technique.

The Transformation of Usage into Technique

Georges Méliès asked the Lumière brothers to sell him their camera, which they refused, confusing innovation with technique. They didn’t see why they should sell their camera to this man, who might then compete by screening his own films and charging admission. For the Lumière brothers, innovation was the technique itself. They saw no other use than their own—filming and projecting living paintings. They didn’t grasp that their technique could do more. Méliès, however, saw that he could not “misuse” but rather employ the technique differently. He bought a camera in England (as the technology was spreading) and by 1895, he was creating narrative films with special effects, fantastical stories—a cornerstone of contemporary cinema. Many Hollywood blockbusters today rely on special effects and dreamlike imaginary worlds that captivate audiences. This was an application of the Cinématographe’s technique that Méliès invented, an innovation in visual expression and storytelling. In doing so, his usage became a new technique—he invented special effects techniques, which for him were uses of the Cinématographe, but for others later, became techniques they could employ for their own purposes.

Thus, there’s a layering of uses that become techniques, which are then reused in new ways, producing new techniques, and so on.

Even Thomas Edison’s inventions were based on prior ones—uses of earlier inventions that became techniques. The Cinématographe itself was a use of Edison’s technique. What I want to emphasize here is that those who invent a technique through their use, like the Lumière brothers with the Cinématographe, often confuse usage and technique. They didn’t see that their Cinématographe could make anything other than living paintings.

Films Shot with Mobile Phones

In 2005, when I founded the Pocket Films Festival with the Forum des images (films shot with mobile phones), video recording and sharing features were just emerging in phones. It was a technique designed for video calls and MMS. Skype (which closed in May 2025, replaced by Teams) already existed, and mobile technology manufacturers—whether networks, protocols, or devices—assumed they’d adapt video-calling techniques for mobile. Over nine years (2005–2013), this festival’s mission was precisely to invite people to invent unprecedented uses for this technique, to create things its designers hadn’t imagined.

This is crucial: innovation lies in usage, which may later become technique. Innovation starts with usage—doing something unexpected with a technique. In 2005, a feature film shot entirely on a mobile phone debuted at Cannes in 2006: Nocturnes for the King of Rome by Jean-Charles Fitoussi, with an incredible aesthetic. Many other usage innovations followed. All these were made by people without technical mastery, who didn’t know how mobile video worked but used it to bridge their world and the technology.

The Invention of Techno Music

In music, a genre like techno emerged largely from a machine—the Roland TR-909 drum machine, designed not for techno but as a practical tool for rock musicians. People used this technique their way, inventing a new musical style. Without it, techno wouldn’t exist. Innovation lies in usage, sometimes by non-specialists.

Inventions with Artificial Intelligence

Today, with AI, it’s exactly the same. Don’t be fooled by these techniques. They’re just techniques, however powerful. What matters for us, as individuals outside their creation, is what we do with them—what we invent, how we play with them, like taking a musical instrument and playing it our way, not as manuals or teachers prescribe. Manuals reflect this confusion between technique and usage. The maker designs a tool for a certain use, but innovation doesn’t come from them—it comes from how the technique is used (which may later become a new technique). Initially, it’s free, disruptive, different usage that drives innovation. Of course, understanding the technique can refine or personalize its use, but it’s not mandatory.

Return to Presence

For me, this ties deeply to presence, my primary philosophical lens: how to have a singular, personal use of a technique? It stems, I believe, from presence—being anchored in ourselves, in our singularities, during our encounter with the technique. We must remain ourselves. If we’re absent from ourselves and follow prescribed rules, we’ll be absent. But if we’re present (to ourselves, first), our encounter with a technique becomes genuine—a confrontation between two entirely different entities: the technique and the person. That’s our task. The encounter transforms us, but we also transform it. Our singular usage is our best offering to the world. That’s where innovation arises.

There’s no singular usage without presence in the encounter. This requires great self-trust, because by definition, we’re incompetent with a new technique when it appears.

Techniques can also be old. We can innovate with ancient techniques—not just cutting-edge ones. I can invent my way of using oil paint, for example. This isn’t to say learning techniques is pointless, but we mustn’t lose presence to ourselves, which can be subtle: using oil-painting methods learned patiently from teachers while staying delicately true to our own application. Innovation isn’t always prominent—it often resides in nuances.

Often, this presence to ourselves surpasses us: we try to match a “master,” fail, and in doing so, discover our singular usage—and there lies our innovation. Not in absolute mastery, but in inventing our own way. Thus, we can’t be “outpaced” by techniques if we dare to use them, even feeling incompetent.

(photo : DR)