August 2011 - Air-L - lists.aoir.org

LinkedIn pulls Facebook-style stunt (privacy)
by Richard Forno 14 Aug '11

14 Aug '11

FYI..... --- rick LinkedIn pulls Facebook-style stunt Privacy invasion by default By Richard Chirgwin http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/08/11/linkedin_privacy_stuff_up/ Posted in Security, 11th August 2011 02:00 GMT LinkedIn has become the latest social networking site to decide that new features can be added and switched on by default, and users don’t have to be notified. The feature allows LinkedIn to use profile information like names and photos in third-party advertising, and seems to have been first noticed by blogger Steve Woodruff here. The feature – hidden away in the Orwellian-named “Manage Social Advertising” option – has to be switched off through a user’s account settings. Permission for this is tucked away in a new condition in LinkedIn’s Terms of Use, which makes it an opt-out feature. Already, Radio Netherlands Worldwide has reported that the new profile setting may breach Dutch privacy law. The CBP, The Netherlands’ data protection agency, says the use of LinkedIn members’ photographs can only be used in advertising material with the users’ explicit consent. The Radio Netherlands piece notes that the Dutch view is in line with that of the EU Data Protection Working Party, and also states that LinkedIn failed to properly notify users of the change. ®

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Facebook cencorship and regulation research
by Korinna Patelis 13 Aug '11

13 Aug '11

Censoring Facebook practices are extremely complicated. We are doing some comparative research here in Athens as you might know Facebook did censor the Greek uprising of the indignants in greece as well as the rioting happening at time in July). Like with all monopoly media research the issue of access has again sprung up in that neither Facebook or the local authorities are publishing any information on exactly how all this happens and participating in our research is not up there in their priorities ( i think they mostly dont answer queries cause of lack of staff as oppose to anything else). I am however fascinated by the cultural discrepancy between local law enforcers and Facebook employes, which is one of the key aspects of what we are researching. Anyway the question is: is there anybody doing field research on Facebook censorship, that might be interested to share with us??????? Korinna Patelis Department of Internet and Communications, CUT <html> <body> <img src="http://www.cut.ac.cy/images/environmentalSign.gif"/> </body> </html>

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Call for Participation: Foundations of Digital Games 2012
by Mia Consalvo 12 Aug '11

12 Aug '11

Please distribute as appropriate: *Foundations of Digital Games 2012 May 29 - June 1, 2012 Raleigh, North Carolina http://www.fdg2012.org * CALL FOR PARTICIPATION * Important Dates* Workshop Proposal Submission: 17 October 2011 Full Paper & Panel Submission: 19 December 2011 Doctoral Consortium Submission: 09 January 2012 Research & Experimental Games Festival Submission: 19 January 2012 Paper, Panel & Doctoral Consortium Author Notification: 01 March 2012 Research & Experimental Games Festival Notification: 01 March 2012 Poster and Demo Submission: 12 March 2012 Poster and Demo Notification: 25 March 2012 Camera Ready Full Papers & Research Games: 27 March 2012 Camera Ready Posters and Demos: 29 March 2012 FDG 2012, the International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games, is a focal point for academic efforts in all areas of research and education involving games, game technologies, gameplay, and game design. The goal of the conference is the advancement of the study of digital games, including new game technologies, capabilities, designs, applications, educational uses, and modes of play. We invite researchers and educators to submit to FDG 2012 and share insights and cutting-edge research related to game technologies and their use. FDG 2012 will include presentations of peer-reviewed papers, invited talks by high-profile industry and academic leaders, panels, and posters. The conference will also host an interactive game demo session as well as Doctoral Consortium sessions. The Doctoral Consortium serves as a forum for young researchers and graduate students to present their work, exchange experiences with peers, discuss ideas for future research and receive feedback from established games researchers and the wider FDG community. The game festival event will showcase the latest experimental and research games and game technology created by university students and academic or industrial research groups. In addition, the conference organizers invite workshop proposals. Workshops are full-day and half-day sessions focused on emerging game topics, particularly those that bridge different communities. *Submission type:* Full Papers with a maximum length of 8 pages Posters with a maximum length of 2 pages Doctoral Consortium with a maximum of 3 pages (extended abstract) Demos with a maximum length of 2 pages Workshops with a maximum length of 2-page abstract Panel with a maximum length of 2-page abstract Research & Experimental Games with a maximum length of 2-4 pages *Submission Tracks*: Authors should submit to either general conference or to one of the following tracks: Game Studies (studying games, players, and their role in society and culture) Game design (methods, techniques, studies) Serious games (building and evaluating games for a purpose; learning in games) Games education (preparing students to design and develop games) Artificial Intelligence (agents, motion and camera planning, navigation, adaptivity, dialog) Game development (tools, frameworks, networking, databases) Graphics and Interaction (rendering, modeling, animation, understanding players and interfaces, interaction techniques) Panels (all areas) All submissions will be rigorously peer reviewed for their scholarly merit, significance, novelty, clarity and relevance to the advancement of the study and creation of games. All full papers must describe a completed unit of work and show rigorous and compelling evaluation of the ideas they present. Posters should describe novel work in progress that is not at the same level of research maturity as a full submission. Workshops should engage informal discussion around emerging areas. Papers and Panel Submissions Papers and panels must be submitted by 11:59PM HST on December 19, 2011. Papers must not exceed eight pages and panel submissions must not exceed two pages. Panel submissions should describe the focus of the panel, provide a list of confirmed speakers, and indicate their areas of expertise relative to the topic. All submissions must comply with the official ACM proceedings format using one of the templates provided at http://www.acm.org/sigs/pubs/proceed/template.html. Submissions must not have been published previously. In addition, a submission identical or substantially similar in content (in its entirety or in part) to one submitted to FDG should not be simultaneously under consideration at another conference or journal during the entire FDG review process (from the submission deadline until notifications of decisions are emailed to authors). Authors of an accepted paper that focuses on an experimental or prototype game will also be invited to demo the game on which their paper is based in the Research Games Festival. Technical and Game Demo Submissions FDG 2012 will include an interactive technical demo and game demo event to showcase the latest tools, systems, and games created by university students and academic or industrial research groups. Demos submissions will be accepted until 11:59PM HST on March 12, 2012. Research and Experimental Games Festival Submissions The Festival is designed to showcase games that are experimental or have a research component: including technological components that represent research advancements, or games that are designed to answer a research question or experiment with the design process. Submissions should include a link to the game as well as a 2-4 page writeup of the project, addressing how the game is innovative and how successfully the game fulfilled the goals of the developer. WORKSHOP PROPOSALS The conference workshops, held the day prior to the main conference, provide an informal setting for new developments to be discussed and demonstrated. We invite proposals for full-day and half-day workshops focused on specific topics related to the broader themes around games. We are particularly interested in topics that bridge different communities and disciplines. Concise proposals (max. 2 pages) should include: an extended abstract, the objectives and expected outcome of the workshop, the planned activities, the background of the organizer(s), the anticipated number of participants, and the means for soliciting and selecting participants. Workshop proposals should be submitted directly to the Workshops Chair, Rafael Bidarra, at R.Bidarra(a)tudelft.nl, no later than October 17th, 2011. DOCTORAL CONSORTIUM FDG 2012 is soliciting submissions from doctoral students for the FDG Doctoral Consortium. The FDG 2012 Doctoral Consortium provides a supportive environment in which PhD students can get early feedback on their research directions, both from fellow students and from experienced faculty in the area. The consortium is intended primarily for beginning PhD students who intend to pursue a career in academia. Since the goal of the Doctoral Consortium is to enable greater number of new PhDs in the area, applications from students who are close to completing their PhD will have lower priority (or are discouraged). Approximately 5 students will be invited to participate. Students participating in the consortium will submit a 3 page extended abstract describing their research, which will be reviewed by the conference program committee. Accepted abstracts will appear in the conference proceedings. Student authors of accepted papers will be invited to participate in both the main conference and the doctoral consortium and will receive financial support including conference registration, and an allowance for travel expenses. Accepted authors should contact the consortium chair for specifics. All students accepted into the Doctoral Consortium will be expected to attend both the conference and the Doctoral Consortium session. Interested students should submit a CV and 3 page extended abstract that discusses: * What the goals of your research are * Why those goals are important and who they would be important to * How your approach differs from previous approaches, if any * Your current results, if any * Plans for completing this research The extended abstract should not be a paper describing completed work, but a research proposal describing a promising unexplored research direction. Applicants should upload their 3 page extended abstract (PDF format) and their CV (as an attachment, PDF format ) to ?, by January 9, 2012. Applications should also have their advisors email a letter of recommendation by this date directly to Tiffany Barnes, with the subject line "FDG DC Recommendation". Applicants should make sure that advisors send the support letter by January 9, 2012. Important Dates for Doctoral Consortium: Doctoral Consortium proposal submissions: 9 January 2012 Advisor support letter: 9 January 2012 Doctoral Consortium notification of results: 1 March 2012 Registration for Authors: 20 March 2012 Please direct your questions to the Doctoral Consortium Chair Tiffany Barnes, at Tiffany.Barnes(a)uncc.edu. *FDG 2012 ORGANIZING COMMITTEE* Conference Chair Magy Seif El-Nasr, Simon Fraser University Program Chairs Mia Consalvo, Concordia University Steven Feiner, Columbia University Doctoral Consortium Chair Tiffany Barnes, University of North Carolina at Charlotte Workshops Chair Rafael Bidarra, Delft University of Technology Industrial Relations/Finance Chairs Susan Gold, Full Sail University Kent Foster, Microsoft Game Studios Local Arrangements Chair R. Michael Young, North Carolina State University Webmaster Pooya Amini, Simon Fraser University/Electronic Arts Program Committee Game studies: Nina Huntemann, Suffolk University Game design: Andrew Nealen, Rutgers University Games education: Jose Zagal, Depaul University Artificial intelligence: Ana Paiva, INESC-ID, Portugal Graphics and interaction: Joe Laviola, University of Central Florida Panels: Ian Bogost, Georgia Institute of Technology Serious games: Jen Jenson, York University Game development: TBA Games Research Festival: Cindy Poremba, Georgia Institute of Technology ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Please see www.foundationsofdigitalgames.org for additional information, or email Magy Seif El-Nasr, Conference Chair, at magyse(a)gmail.com -- Mia Consalvo, Ph.D. Visiting Associate Professor Comparative Media Studies Massachusetts Institute of Technology 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Building 14N-226 Cambridge, MA 02139-4307 USA consalvo(a)mit.edu 617.324.1868

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Re: [Air-L] Research on Content Creators?
by Catherine Middleton 12 Aug '11

12 Aug '11

My colleagues at the University of Western Ontario recently did an extensive study of user generated content. "The goal of the Mobilizing User-Generated Content for Canada’s Digital Content Advantage project is to define User-Generated Content (UGC) in its current state, identify successful models built for UGC, and anticipate barriers and policy infrastructure needed to sustain a model to leverage the further development of UGC to Canada's advantage." Trosow, S. E., Burkell, J., Dyer-Witheford, N., et al. (2010). Mobilizing User-Generated Content for Canada’s Digital Advantage. London: Faculty of Information and Media Studies, University of Western Ontario. http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/fimspub/21/

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Fwd: [csaa-forum] Surveillance and/in Everyday Life - Call for Papers
by natalya godbold 12 Aug '11

12 Aug '11

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Melissa Gregg <melissa.gregg(a)sydney.edu.au> Date: Thu, Aug 11, 2011 at 4:49 PM Subject: [csaa-forum] Surveillance and/in Everyday Life - Call for Papers To: "\"csaa-forum(a)lists.cdu.edu.au\"" <csaa-forum(a)lists.cdu.edu.au> Apologies for cross-posting Surveillance and/in Everyday Life: Monitoring Pasts, Presents & Futures An International Conference featuring Professor David Lyon, Queen’s University, Canada February 20th – 21st 2012 Sydney Law School, The University of Sydney, Australia CALL FOR PAPERS The intensification and diversification of surveillance in recent decades has been remarkable. CCTV cameras, private investigators, loyalty cards, body scanners, DNA swabs, RFID tags, Web 2.0 platforms/protocols and internet cache cookies constitute only some of the many instruments facilitating the routine extraction and collection of personal information. Advancement in technological applications, and wider cultures of risk, uncertainty, distrust and consumption, have all helped to legitimate and naturalize surveillance as a multi-purpose tool in the everyday lives of individuals and organizations. Yet, whilst surveillance seems increasingly embedded in the physical and cultural fabric of contemporary living, and whilst surveillance today is qualitatively and quantitatively different from previous modes, it is by no means a novel phenomenon. From time immemorial, detailed records have been accumulated on the health, morality, cognitive development, motivations, sexualities, incomes, work activities and whereabouts of certain populations – not to mention on animal relations, planetary constellations, environmental conditions, and the like. In the past, as in the present, forms of life have been and are targeted by a polymerous array of monitoring and recording devices. Moreover, surveillance as a mode of social regulation, a cultural medium, a symbolic resource and a companion species is set to further dominate the political, economic and socio-cultural landscapes of future human societies and social assemblages; but with what implications for social justice, social relations and subjectivities? This conference critically considers the significance of everyday surveillance in relation to temporality, exploring the changing nature of surveillance as it relates to cultural specificities, past transformations, present landscapes and possible/emergent futures. CONFERENCE THEMES & STREAM ORGANIZERS  HEALTH, BIO-INFORMATICS & BIO-SECURITY – abstracts to: martin.french(a)queensu.ca  WORK, ORGANIZATIONS & ECONOMY – abstracts to: gavin.smith(a)sydney.edu.au  CRIME, LAW & NATIONAL SECURITY – abstracts to: pat.omalley(a)sydney.edu.au  THEORISING SURVEILLANCE – abstracts to: kane.race(a)sydney.edu.au  MEDIA, CULTURE & CONSUMPTION – abstracts to: kathy.cleland(a)sydney.edu.au  PRIVACY & PUBLICITY – abstracts to: stephen.robertson(a)sydney.edu.au  TECHNOLOGIES, POLICIES & PRACTICES – abstracts to: garner.clancey(a)sydney.edu.au  OTHER – abstracts to: peter.marks(a)sydney.edu.au ABSTRACT INFORMATION/FORMAT & REGISTRATION FEES Authors are required to identify and specify on abstracts the general thematic stream (from those listed above) in which their paper best resides. Thus, please send a 250-word abstract for review to the designated stream organizer. Where possible, abstracts should be in a Microsoft Word format, in ‘Times’ font, size 12. The paper’s title and the author details section should be embolded and centred. To be considered by the panel, abstracts MUST include: a title, author name(s), departmental/institutional affiliation(s) and contact email address(es). Please note that the conference committee will evaluate the quality, merit and suitability of each abstract before a decision of acceptance/rejection is taken. Selected papers will be given a 20-minute presentational slot and 10-minutes for questions. Registration includes both tea/coffee breaks and lunch. Registration payment categories for this event are as follows:  Academic/Professional AUD $200* * For registrations made BEFORE December 15th 2011, $225 AUD thereafter.  Concession (Unwaged, Students and Pensioners) AUD $50 IMPORTANT DATES: Call for papers/panels circulated: AUGUST 10TH 2011 Abstracts (250-words) due: OCTOBER 3RD 2011 Acceptance letters distributed: OCTOBER 24TH 2011 Registration opens: OCTOBER 31ST 2011 Registration closes: FEBRUARY 1ST 2012 FURTHER INFORMATION: Please visit: http://surveillanceandeveryday.com/ -- Dr Melissa Gregg Department of Gender and Cultural Studies Quadrangle Building A14 University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia p + 61 2 9351 3657 | m + 61 408 599 359 | e melissa.gregg(a)sydney.edu.au http://www.arts.usyd.edu.au/departs/gcs/staff/profiles/mgregg.shtml New book: *Work’s Intimacy *http://www.politybooks.com/book.asp?ref=0745650279 Also out: *The Affect Theory Reader *(edited with Gregory J Seigworth) http://www.dukeupress.edu/Catalog/ViewProduct.php?productid=17901 _______________________________________ csaa-forum discussion list of the cultural studies association of australasia www.csaa.asn.au change your subscription details at http://lists.cdu.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/csaa-forum -- Natalya Godbold PhD Candidate (Human Information Behaviour / Health Communication) Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences University of Technology, Sydney ¯`~.. ¸><((((º>¸. .~´¯`~.. ¸><((((º>¸. .~´¯`~.. ¸><((((º>¸. .><((((º>`~.¸¸.~´¯`~.¸.~´¯`~...¸><((((º> .,,.~´¯`~.. ¸><((((º>¸. .....,,.><((((º>`~.¸¸.~´¯`~.¸.~´¯`~...¸><((((º> .~´¯`~.. ¸><((((º>¸. .,,.~´¯`~.. ¸><((((º>¸. .~´¯`~.. UTS CRICOS Provider Code: 00099F DISCLAIMER: This email message and any accompanying attachments may contain confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, use, disseminate, distribute or copy this message or attachments. If you have received this message in error, please notify the sender immediately and delete this message. Any views expressed in this message are those of the individual sender, except where the sender expressly, and with authority, states them to be the views of the University of Technology Sydney. Before opening any attachments, please check them for viruses and defects. Think. Green. Do. Please consider the environment before printing this email.

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University of Michigan Faculty Openings
by Holly Kruse 11 Aug '11

11 Aug '11

Forwarded on request. Please do not send responses to me. Thanks. Holly ---------------------------- Original Message ---------------------------- Subject: University of Michigan - Department of Communication Studies From: "Brown, Jessica" <jessjb(a)umich.edu> Date: Thu, August 11, 2011 4:12 pm To: "'air-l-owner(a)listserv.aoir.org'" <air-l-owner(a)listserv.aoir.org> -------------------------------------------------------------------------- To Whom It May Concern, Would you be so kind as to forward our attached regular faculty advertisement to the Association of Internet Researchers Listserv? I would be grateful for any assistance you can provide. Please let me know if you have any questions or need further information. ---- The University of Michigan Department of Communication Studies Faculty Openings Beginning Fall 2012 Assistant Professor of Communication Studies The University of Michigan, Department of Communication Studies seeks applicants for tenure track positions. Expanding department emphasizes interdisciplinary study of the mass media. We seek top scholars to complement current faculty interests and strengths. We anticipate filling two positions. Anticipated starting date for all positions is September 1, 2012. All areas will be considered, with a special interest in the following areas: Global Media, Modernity and Modernization. Areas of particular interest include but are not limited to the relationships between media and economic development; comparative media systems; sociological and/or ethnographic analyses of international and/or global media institutions; comparative analyses of journalistic practices, news organizations and newsworthiness; the impact of traditional and emerging media on democratic institutions and/or protest movements outside of the United States; the impact of emerging media on deliberative processes outside the United States. Media and the Environment. Department of Communication Studies and Program in the Environment (PitE) seek applicants for a tenure track/tenured position. Our units emphasize interdisciplinary study of the mass media and the environment, respectively. Areas of particular interest are how the news media cover environmental issues, including climate change, energy use, sustainability; analyses of public service, corporate, or other persuasive campaigns about the environment, energy, sustainability and climate change; media effects on public knowledge about the environment, energy, sustainability and climate change; the role of new media in promulgating information about and affecting knowledge of the environment, energy, sustainability and climate change. Completed Ph.D. by September 2012 expected. All applicants must upload a cover letter, vita, evidence of teaching excellence, a writing sample, a statement of teaching philosophy and experience, a statement of current and future research plans, and three letters of recommendation. All application materials must be submitted electronically to http://sitemaker.umich.edu/onlinefacultyapplicationsystem. For full consideration, complete applications must be submitted by September 23rd. The University of Michigan is an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer. Women and minorities are encouraged to apply. The University is supportive of the needs of dual career couples.

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Re: [Air-L] Social Media and the UK Riots: ?Twitter Mobs?, ?Facebook Mobs?, ?Blackberry Mobs? and the Structural Violence of Neoliberalism (Christopher J. Richter)
by Mattie Palmer 11 Aug '11

11 Aug '11

Hello all, I worry that critical approaches might be a knee-jerk reaction to analyzing the impact of technology on the riots in the UK. While that might be warranted in situations more akin to the Arab Spring, where men and women took to the streets for the purpose of political demonstration, the riots in the UK are not in protest. It is not class warfare nor a plea for social justice. There is not an archaic caste system that needs toppled. It is looting and mob mentality. Thinking of this is important when looking at the role of social media and technology and the subsequent criticism of it. It's my opinion that many of the news outlets have focused on social media because it's still fairly recent that such open source technology has been used for macro-level social coordination. Compared to the chronology of social and political conflict, social media is in its neonatal period! It's the new toy... I haven't heard calls for Orwellian surveillance, but I'm also in the United States where such commentary might not make it into the headlines. I know with the 'flash mobs' here there have not been calls for the policing of social media and technology. I feel as though the media and policy makers have done well in identifying social media not as a catalyst or cause but rather a facilitator. Nevertheless, continually pinning the causes of social delinquency on structural oppression can be misguided. Unemployment has not caused nine and ten year olds to take to the streets - what jobs would they have had anyway? Sometimes it's entirely appropriate to call a duck a duck. Matthew Palmer ---------------------------------------------------- Matthew Palmer Lehigh University @TotallyRadGrad www.lehigh.edu/~mfp210/ ----------------------------------------------------

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Pre-conf wksp IXmaps invite
by Paterson, Nancy (Academic) 11 Aug '11

11 Aug '11

Hi, May I inquire if you could post this special IR12.0 pre-conf workshop invite to the AOIR list? Thankyou Nancy Paterson, PhD OCAD University IXmaps pre-conf wksp Oct 10, 2011- special info & invite Please consider attending the Pre-conference Workshop: IXmaps – Do you know where your packets go? taking place on Monday, October 10, 2011 from 12 noon to 5 pm. IXmaps [http://www.ixmaps.ca] presents a geographic visualization of paths or routes taken by URL requests over the internet – presenting information about internet data exchange points along the way demonstrating key features of internet routing and cloud computing that impact personal privacy. IXmaps displays a map of North America (Google Earth) on which is rendered the data route and information about interconnection points. Information revealed thus far includes the physical location, ownership, networks and ISPs, deep packet inspection and NSA surveillance as well as known links or alliances among the building owners, clients, and government or corporate entities. We are taking this opportunity to launch a user friendly new version of our data gathering software TRgen which we hope you might use to see where your data traffic goes - through what facilities and at the same time assist our data gathering capabilities. IXmaps debuted at ‘Securing the Cyber Commons: A Global Dialogue’, a cyber security forum, March 2011 at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto. IXmaps presented at ‘CSIEL: Cyber Surveillance in Everyday Life’, May 2011 at the University of Toronto Art Centre Gallery. IXmaps is a collaborative project between Nancy Paterson, PhD, Faculty of Art, OCADU and Andrew Clement, PhD, Coordinator of the Information Policy Research Program (IPRP) at the Faculty of Information, University of Toronto.

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Why censoring social media to stop #UKriots is such a bad idea: an experiment in social simulation
by Antonio A. Casilli 11 Aug '11

11 Aug '11

Dear all, a new blog post, co-written with Paola Tubaro: a social simulation experiment to explain why Internet censorship - as proposed by David Cameron - would end up in even more violent uprisings. The complete post (including figures, tables, and code) is available here : http://www.bodyspacesociety.eu/2011/08/11/is-a-social-media-fuelled-uprisin… Cheers, ---a ------------ IS A SOCIAL MEDIA-FUELLED UPRISING THE WORST CASE SCENARIO? ELEMENTS FOR A SOCIOLOGY OF UK RIOTS By Antonio A. Casilli & Paola Tubaro It's time we heard a little bit less about the economic and sociological justifications for what is in my view nothing less than wanton criminality. (Boris Johnson, public speech London, Aug 9, 2011) We are not social scientists. We have to deal with urgent situations (Paul McKeever, Police Federation Chairman, SkyNews Aug 11, 2011) Nowadays sabotaging the social machine involves reappropriating and reinventing the ways of interrupting its networks. (The Invisible Committee, The Coming Insurrection, Semiotext(e), 2009, p. 112) --Why social media bring democracy to developing countries and anarchy to rich ones? O sublime hypocrisy of European mainstream media! The same technologies that a few months ago were glorified for single-handedly bringing down dictators during the Arab Spring, are now at the core of an unprecedented moral panic for their alleged role in fuelling UK August 2011 riots. In a recent post, Christian Fuchs rightly maintains: [Quote: "Social Media and the UK Riots: Twitter Mobs, Facebook Mobs, Blackberry Mobs and the Structural Violence of Neoliberalism | Christian Fuchs"] And, o! exquisite refinement in the ancient art of double standard: the same conservative press that indignantly deplored dictators censorship of online communication, now call for plain suppression of entire telecommunication networks as unashamedly exemplified by this piece in the Daily Mail. Fact is, moral panic about social media is the specular reflection of the acritical enthusiasm about these very same technologies. They both spring from the same technological determinism that acclaims new gimmicks and buzzwords to smooth away the economic and social roots of unrest. Having said that, what can we, as social scientists, say about the role of social media in assisting or even encouraging widespread political conflict? Very little indeed, insofar as we do not have data on actual social media use and traffic during riots. It would take months to gather that data and who can wait for so long in a media environment that spits out quick and dirty analyses by the hour? The best approach is a more innovative one, relying on social simulation. This is a new methodology that compares alternative computer-generated social scenarios to detect what variables come into play in specific social processes1.One of these variables is the use of social media to organize flash-mobs in order to build field-awareness in urban uprising settings. We aim to demonstrate that the more we repress and censor social media in a situation of civil unrest, the worse the situation gets for everybody in a given society. --Epsteins civil violence model (revisited) Social scientists have been modelling civil violence via agent-based simulation for almost a decade now2. One major contribution on which we will build upon for our model was presented by Josh Epstein in a 2002 article3. Agent-based simulations are like games based on very simple rules and bringing forth complex results. The model basically describes a society where there is only one type of social agent (represented by circles in figure 1). (Before you scream at oversimplification, just ask yourself if you feel more comfortable with the political characterization that conservative media have been pushing in the last few days, where there are two types of citizens: looters and those who are ready to defend their communities. At least, Epsteins standard social agent reminds us that anyone can become a looter, according to the situation). The agents behaviour is influenced by several variables. The first one is the agents personal level of political dissatisfaction (grievance, indicated by lighter or darker green colour in figure 1). That can lead this person to abandon his/her expected state of quiet and become an active protester (red coloured circles in figure 1). However, the decision to act out whether it is to go on a looting spree or to burn the parliament and overturn the government is conditioned by the agents social surroundings (neighbourhood). Does s/he detect the presence of police (blue triangles in figure 1) in the surroundings? If the answer to this question is no, s/he will act out. If the answer is yes, another question is asked: is this police presence counterbalanced by a sufficient number of actively protesting citizens? If the answer to this second question is yes, then the agent acts out. Sometimes, in an utterly random way, one citizen gets caught by the police and is sent to jail for a given period of time (black circles in figure 1). (Again, if you are marvelling at the simplicity of this rule, just bear in mind how tricky it is for the UK police to really distinguish who did what in a riot and how many of these days arrests will eventually turn out to be arbitrary). [Figure 1 - Circles represent social agents, whose level of grievance is indicated by lighter or darker shades of green. Active protesters are colored red and jailed protesters black. Blue triangles represent police officers.] Of course the model takes into account other mitigating factors, such as the perceived risk of being arrested and government legitimacy. And of course there is the possibility of moving from one place to another to team up with other protesters and run havoc. We will come back to this point because this seems determinant for the use of social media. The main result of Epsteins model is that, in a typical situation, civil violence does not look like a linear process. The naïve vision of political conflict as cumulative processes where confrontation escalates until the government comes tumbling down is fallacious. Civil or political unrest is what Epstein calls a punctuated equilibrium. Long periods of stability where rebellion is smouldering are followed by short violent outbursts. [Figure 2 - A typical civil unrest pattern: outbursts of violence (red curve) punctuate long periods of stability when political tension is building up (blue curve).] There is another variable which is, to us, crucial for understanding social media use to create flash mobs to deploy in a civil violence situation: this variable is called vision in Epstein model. Vision is an individual agents ability to scan his/her neighbourhood for signs of cops and/or active protesters. The higher the vision, the wider the agents range. What we have done here is to modify the consequences of vision. In the original model4, agents and police officers move to randomly chosen places within their vision range. We have introduced a new rule that makes agents move to places in their vision range that are surrounded by the maximum number of active protesters. The result of the modified simulation (if you wish to download the code, just click here) is consistent with the tactical use of mobile technologies by protesters in order to gain a cognitive advantage against police forces and have a better awareness of the field, its resources and possible weak spots. This simple change simulates the behaviour of individuals involved in civil unrest, using BBM or Twitter to detect, and to converge in, hot spots. If the value of « vision » is higher (like in a situation where online networking tools are widespread and not censored), each agent has complete information as to whats going on even in remote locations. If social communication is censored, the value of « vision » is lower, and agents have partial or non-existent awareness of their surroundings and tend to move randomly. --Internet censorship: a source of protracted high-level violence Our social simulation code reproduces the functioning of a certain social system (lets say a city like London) over a significant period of time (in our case 1000 time steps), for different values of the parameter vision caeteris paribus (that is: while leaving the others parameters unchanged cf. Table 2 in Annex 1 at the end of this post). Running the model again and again and generating alternative scenarios, shows us the outcomes of lower or higher values of vision indicating the effects of more or less censorship of social media. Lets have a look at the results in figure 3 (click to expand the image): [Figure 3 - Red patterns represent number of violent protesters over time within different levels of social media censorship: from 0 vision (total censorship, upper left) to 10 vision (no censorship, lower right).] As we can se, different values of vision generate different patterns of civil unrest over time. All scenarios display an initial outburst pretty much what we have been experiencing in the last few days. What happens next is influenced by the level of censorship government applies. In the case of total censorship (vision = 0) the level of violence stays at its maximum virtually forever. Think Egypt Internet kill switch incident in January 2011 and remember its consequences on violence escalation in the country and, ultimately, on Mubaraks regime The other cases correspond to less and less censorship. Values between 1 (almost complete censorship) and 9 (almost no censorship) correspond to different levels of protracted civil unrest: the stronger the censorship, the higher the average level of endemic violence over time (best linear fit represented by the black lines in figure 3). The last case, corresponding to perfect social agents vision (and thus to no censorship at all) deserves a little more comment. Apparently this situation is characterized by incessant high-level outbursts of violence, with peak active levels that seem to be even more significant that in other cases. Yet, the average trend of violence over time (black fitting line) remains low. Moreover, if we want to measure the size of violent outbursts, looking at their peak active level is not sufficient. Looking at time intervals between outbursts, at the duration of outbursts, and at the level of social peace between outbursts, help us discover that this scenario is actually the best for everyone. In the absence of censorship, agents protest, sometimes violently, nevertheless they are able to return to significant levels of quiet (green line in figure 4), when social unrest is halted. [Figure 4 - In the absence of censorship, high levels of social unrest are possible (see peaks in red line), but between uprisings social system is able to come back to significant levels of quite (green line)] This is the only scenario where active protest drops down to zero for extended and repeated periods of time (cf. Table 1 in Annex 1 at the end of this post): exactly what Epstein described as punctuated equilibrium in his initial model of civil violence. And although that does not seem to match our wildest dreams of social harmony, it still is a situation where citizens are free to voice their dissent on social media, to coordinate their efforts and act about it albeit in confrontational ways while still enjoying a higher level of quiet over time (see figure 5). [Figure 5 - Levels of civil violence over time as function of levels of censorship. (Higher vision means less censorship and less civil violence).] In the absence of online censorship, social agents have vision= 10. This corresponds to the lowest levels of civil violence over time. --Some concluding remarks It is not our role to pass judgments on politicians and police officers disapproval of sociological justifications of the UK riots or on their dismissal of social sciences as at best a luxury we cant afford in times of unrests. Their shoot-first-ask-later stance, although probably moved by good intentions, can lead to ill-advised policy choices, like in the case of Internet censorship that we have chosen to discuss here. Of course other factors have to be taken into account to use a civil violence model inspired by Epstein. As shown in a recent paper by Klemens et al. (2010) rebellious outbursts are more likely given increased hardship (the recent financial crisis does seem to come into play here). Civil violence is also influenced by loss of government legitimacy which in this case seems consistent with the unpopular budget cuts promoted by David Cameron, not to mention the recent Murdoch/NoTW phone hacking scandal. Finally, protest outbursts are less likely given increased repressive capacity5. Which does not equate to the naïve argument that what we need is more cops routinely conveyed in situations of civil unrest. Repressive capacity, in the case of UK riots, has been about adapting police procedures to compensate for the clear tactical advantage rioters showed over the first few days of August an advantage that seemed consistent with the increased level of vision and field awareness allowed by mobile communications, as discussed here. The growing presence of MET police and law enforcement initiatives on Facebook, Flickr, and Google groups can actually account for the subsequent limitation of violent outburst by reducing the rioters communicational advantage. Other studies have applied social simulation to censorship in situations of civil violence. Garlick and Chli (2009), for example, insist that restricting social communication pacifies rebellious societies, but has the opposite effect on peaceful ones6. Our intention is to show that the choice of not restricting social communication turns out to be a judicious one in the absence of robust indicators as to the rebelliousness of a given society. What we have tried to do is to demonstrate how, even in the absence of empirical data, social sciences can still help us interpret how social factors come into play, and possibly avoid trading democratic values and freedom of expression for an illusory sense of security. ANNEX Vision levels % time spent in quiet (no civil violence) 0 0 1 0 2 0 3 0 4 0 5 0 6 0 7 0 8 0.3 9 10.2 10 32.5 Table 1 % of time without riots corresponding to levels of vision. Parameter Values Initial cop density 4% Initial agent density 70% Number of cops 64 Number of agents 1120 Government legitimacy 80% Max jail term 30 time steps Vision 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 Table 2 Parameters used in the model FOOTNOTES 1 We have presented our approach to this method in this article, in case you wanted to give it a shot. Otherwise just go on reading this post. ↩ 2 A summary if these researches is in Amblard, F, Geller, A, Neumann, M, Srbljinovic, A and Wijermans, N (2010) Analyzing social conflict via computational social simulation: A review of approaches. In Martinás K, Matika D, and Srbljinovic A (Eds.) Complex Societal Dynamics Security Challenges and Opportunities. Amsterdam: IOS Press. pp. 126-141. http://iros.morh.hr/_download/repository/Gelleretal1.pdf ↩ 3 Epstein, J. M. (2002) Modeling civil violence: an agent-based computational approach. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, n. 99 Suppl 3, pp. 7243-7250. ↩ 4 Here we use the NetLogo version presented in Wilensky, U. (2004). NetLogo Rebellion model. http://ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo/models/Rebellion. Center for Connected Learning and Computer-Based Modeling, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL; Id. (1999). NetLogo. http://ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo/. Center for Connected Learning and Computer-Based Modeling, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL. ↩ 5 Klemens, B., Joshua M. Epstein, J. M., Hammond, R. A. & M. A. Raifman (2010) Empirical Performance of a Decentralized Civil Violence Model, The Brookings Institution, Center on Social and Economic Dynamics Working Paper No. 56, http://www.brookings.edu/papers/2010/0625_empirical_performance_epstein.aspx. ↩ 6 Michael Garlick and Maria Chli (2009) The effect of social influence and curfews on civil violence. Proceedings of The 8th International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems Volume 2, AAMAS 09, Budapest, Hungary: International Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems, pp. 13351336, http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1558109.1558281. ↩ CITE To cite this post: Casilli, Antonio A. and Paola Tubaro (2011) Is a social media-fuelled uprising the worst case scenario? Elements for a sociology of UK riots. Joint post Bodyspacesociety/Paola Tubaros Blog, August 11, URL:http://www.bodyspacesociety.eu/2011/08/11/is-a-social-media-fuelled-uprising-the-worst-case-scenario-elements-for-a-sociology-of-uk-riots

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Social Media and the UK Riots: “Twitter Mobs”, “Facebook Mobs”, “Blackberry Mobs” and the Structural Violence of Neoliberalism
by Christian Fuchs 11 Aug '11

11 Aug '11

Social Media and the UK Riots: “Twitter Mobs”, “Facebook Mobs”, “Blackberry Mobs” and the Structural Violence of Neoliberalism A blog post on the role of social media in the UK riots by Christian Fuchs http://fuchs.uti.at/667/ “One formula [...] can be that of the mob: gullible, fickle, herdlike, low in taste and habit. [...] If [...] our purpsoe is manipulation – the persuasion of a large number of people to act, feel, think, known in certain ways – the convenient formula will be that of the masses”. — Raymond Williams “What is true of London, is true of Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, is true of all great towns. Everywhere barbarous indifference, hard egotism on one hand, and nameless misery on the other, everywhere social warfare, every man’s house in a state of siege, everywhere reciprocal plundering under the protection of the law, and all so shameless, so openly avowed that one shrinks before the consequences of our social state as they manifest themselves here undisguised, and can only wonder that the whole crazy fabric still hangs together”. This passage could be a description of the social conditions in the United Kingdom today. It is, however, a passage from Friedrich Engels’ report about the “Working Class in England”, published in 1845. In his book “Folk Devils and Moral Panics, first published in 1972, Stanley Cohen shows how public discourse tends to blame media and popular culture for triggering, causing or stimulating violence. “There is a long history of moral panics about the alleged harmful effects of exposure to popular media and cultural forms – comics and cartoons, popular theatre, cinema, rock music, video nasties, computer games, internet porn” – and, one should add today, social media. “For conservatives, the media glamorize crime, trivialize public insecurities and undermine moral authority; for liberals the media exaggerate the risks of crime and whip up moral panics to vindicate an unjust and authoritarian crime control policy” (Cohen, Stanley. 1972/2002. Folk devils and moral panics. Oxon: Routledge. Third edition. page xvii). The shooting of Mark Duggan by the London police on August 4th 2011 in Tottenham triggered riots in London areas such as Tottenham, Wood Green, Enfield Town, Ponders End, Brixton, Walthamstow, Walthamstow Central, Chingford Mount, Hackney, Croydon, Ealing and in other UK areas such as Toxteth (Liverpool), Handsworth (Birmingham), St. Ann’s (Nottingham), West Bromwich, Wolverhampton, Salford, or Central Manchester. Parts of the mass media started blaming social media for being the cause of the violence. The Sun reported on August 8th: “Rioting thugs use Twitter to boost their numbers in thieving store raids. [...] THUGS used social network Twitter to orchestrate the Tottenham violence and incite others to join in as they sent messages urging: ’Roll up and loot’“. The Telegraph wrote on the same day: “How technology fuelled Britain’s first 21st century riot. The Tottenham riots were orchestrated by teenage gang members, who used the latest mobile phone technology to incite and film the looting and violence. Gang members used Blackberry smart-phones designed as a communications tool for high-flying executives to organise the mayhem”. The Daily Mail wrote on August 7th that there are “fears that violence was fanned by Twitter as picture of burning police car was re-tweeted more than 100 times”. Even the BBC took up the social media panic discourse on August 9th and reported about the power of social media to bring together not only five, but 200 people for forming a rioting “mob”. Media and politicians created the impression that the riots were orchestrated by “Twitter mobs” and “Blackberry mobs”. And also, as usual in moral panics, the call for policing technology could be heard. The Daily Express (August 10th, 2011) wrote: ”Thugs and looters are thought to have sent messages via the BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) service to other troublemakers, alerting them to riot scenes and inciting further violence. Technology writer Mike Butcher said it was unbelievable the service had not already been shut down. He said: ’Mobile phones have become weaponised. It’s like text messaging with steroids – you can send messages to hundreds of people that cannot be traced back to you.’ Tottenham MP David Lammy appealed for BlackBerry to suspend the service“. The police published pictures of rioters recorded by CCTV and asked the public to identify the people. The mass media published these pictures. The Sun called for “naming and shaming a rioter” and for “shopping a moron”. The mass media also reported about citizens, who self-organized over social media in order to gather in affected neighbourhoods for cleaning the streets. Blaming technology or popular culture for violence – the Daily Mirror blamed “the pernicious culture of hatred around rap music, which glorifies violence and loathing of authority (especially the police but including parents), exalts trashy materialism and raves about drugs“ for the riots – is an old and typical ideology that avoids engaging with the real societal causes of riots and unrest and promises easy solutions: policing, control of technology, surveillance. It neglects the structural causes of riots and how violence is built into contemporary societies. Focusing on technology (as cause of or solution for riots) is the ideological search for control, simplicity and predictability in a situation of high complexity, unpredictability and uncertainty. It is also an expression of fear. It projects society’s guilt and shame into objects. Explanations are not sought in complex social relations, but in the fetishism of things. Social media and technology-centrism, both in its optimistic form (“social media will help our communities to overcome the riots”, “social media and mobile phones should be surveilled by the police”, “Blackberrys should be forbidden”, “more CCTV surveillance is needed”, “CCTV will help us find and imprison all rioters”) and its pessimistic form (“social media triggered, caused, stimulated, boosted, orchestrated, organized or fanned violence”), is a techno-deterministic ideology that subsitutes thinking about society by the focus on technology. Societal problems are reduced to the level of technology. Let’s talk about the society, in which these riots have taken place. Is it really a surprise that riots emerged in the UK, a country with high socio-economic inequality and youth unemployment, in a situation of global economic crisis? The United Kingdom has a high level of income inequality, its Gini level was 32.4 in 2009 (0 means absolute equality, 100 absolute inequality), a level that is only topped by a few countries in Europe and that is comparable to the level of Greece (33.1) (data source: Eurostat). 17.3% of the UK population had a risk of living in poverty in 2009 (data source: Eurostat). In early 2011, the youth unemployment rate in the UK rose to 20.3%, the highest level since these statistics started being recorded in 1992. The UK is not only one of the most advanced developed countries today in economic temrs, it is at the same time a developing country in social terms with a lot of structurally deprived areas. Is it a surprise that riots erupted especially in East London, the West Midlands and Greater Manchester? The UK Department of Communities and Local Government reported in its analysis “The English Indices of Deprivation 2010”: “Liverpool, Middlesbrough, Manchester, Knowsley, the City of Kingston-upon Hull, Hackney and Tower Hamlets are the local authorities with the highest proportion of LSOAs amongst the most deprived in England. [...] The north east quarter of London, particularly Newham, Hackney and Tower Hamlets continue to exhibit very high levels of deprivation“ (pages 1, 3). Decades of UK capitalist development shaped by deindustrialization and neoliberalism have had effects on the creation, intensification and extension of precariousness and deprivation. Calls for more police, surveillance, crowd control and the blames of popular culture and social media are helpless. It is too late once riots erupt. One should not blame social media or popular culture, but the violent conditions of society for the UK riots. The mass media’s and politics’ focus on surveillance, law and order politics and the condemnation of social media will not solve the problems. A serious discussion about class, inequality and racism is needed, which also requires a change of policy regimes. The UK riots are not a “Blackberry mob”, not a “Facebook mob” and not a “Twitter mob”; they are the effects of the structure violence of neoliberalism. Capitalism, crisis and class are the main contexts of unrests, uproars and social media today. -- Prof. Christian Fuchs Chair in Media and Communication Studies Department of Informatics and Media Uppsala University Kyrkogårdsgatan 10 Box 513 751 20 Uppsala Sweden christian.fuchs(a)im.uu.se Tel +46 (0) 18 471 1019 http://fuchs.uti.at http://www.im.uu.se NetPolitics Blog: http://fuchs.uti.at/blog Editor of tripleC: http://www.triple-c.se Book "Foundations of Critical Media and Information Studies" (Routledge 2011) Book "Internet and Society" (Paperback, Routledge 2010)

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