June 2020 - Air-L - lists.aoir.org

Dismantling systemic racism: from OII
by Maya Ganesh 23 Jun '20

23 Jun '20

I just wanted to share a comprehensive and action-oriented anti-racist initiative by a group at the Oxford Internet Institute; some of you might have already seen this make the rounds. It includes a bibliography and 'templates' towards the dismantling of systemic racism in the University. Worth a look, and this may inspire others to adapt and apply the same. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScm8uANLU82FnRacOOoHf5NfsWMqdiN1AR… Best wishes, Maya -- Berlin | UTC + 2 PhD candidate, Leuphana University aisforanother.net | bodyofwork.in T: @mayameme Fingerprint: D108 EA05 471F 709B E644 18E6 2A9F A109 16D7 EE98

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CFP for the NordiCHI 2020 workshop on “Sharing & Cooperativism: Designing for Economies”
by Airi Lampinen 23 Jun '20

23 Jun '20

Dear all, Together with several colleagues of our COST action on the collaborative economy (http://sharingandcaring.eu/) we are happy to announce a call for participation (CfP) for the NordiCHI 2020 workshop on sharing, cooperatives, economics, and design. NordiCHI is the main Nordic forum for Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research, held bi-annually. "NordiCHI addresses the field broadly and is a meeting place for researchers from academia and industry, designers, practitioners, educators and others working within HCI and related disciplines.” (nordichi2020.org) We invite scholars, designers, and activists with a background in computing, design, economics, sociology, anthropology and beyond to participate in our workshop. The CfP is below, the submissions are lightweight and the remote attendance is possible. The NordiCHI 2020 workshop “Sharing & Cooperativism: Designing for Economies” aims to bring together practitioners and scholars working at the intersection of sharing, cooperativism, and design. By turning to sharing and cooperativism, we imagine building systems in relation to the wider social and political structures surrounding these concepts. Yet, in sharing and cooperativism, less emphasis is given to the possibilities that design can bring to the emerging interactions at the intersections of social, cultural, and economic issues. A progressive approach is needed to uncover the relationship of sharing and cooperativism to new design paradigms that allows us to move towards an alternative understanding of economies through design. Our aim is to ground this discussion through a design workshop that is well-aligned with the historical, political, and economic infrastructures in order to shape the relationship of design and economics in the context of sharing and cooperativism. We call for participants from diverse backgrounds to contribute to a critical discussion at the intersection of design, sharing, cooperativism, and economics on the workshop's thematic areas: (i) Local relational assets in sharing; (ii) Global sharing cultures, and (iii) Design beyond markets for sharing and cooperativism. More details: https://sharingcoopnordichi2020.wordpress.com/theme To apply, please submit a 1-4 page(s) position paper explaining your interests in design and cooperativism in the ACM Submission Template format by September 1, 2020 through our website https://sharingcoopnordichi2020.wordpress.com . To promote broader participation from design practitioners, and community activists, we offer the option of submitting alternative material in the form of a design portfolio, a short manifesto, or the like. Key dates: Submission Deadline: September 1, 2020, 5pm PDT Notification: September 8, 2020 Workshop: October 25/26, 2020 Organizers: Özge Subasi, Koç University (TR) Anton Fedosov, University of Zurich (CH) Oliver Bates, Lancaster University (UK) Airi Lampinen, Stockholm University (SE) Ann Light, University of Sussex (UK) and Malmö University (SE) More details: https://sharingcoopnordichi2020.wordpress.com Questions? Drop us an email at sharingcoopnordichi2020(a)gmail.com Looking forward to your contributions & please spread the word to colleagues who might be interested in participating! -- Airi Lampinen Department of Computer and Systems Sciences (DSV) Stockholm University airi(a)dsv.su.se | @airi_ | airilampinen.fi Weekly newsletter: tinyletter.com/airi_/

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Fwd: WiderScreen 2-3/2020: "Home Computer Cultures and Society Before the Internet Age"
by Kevin Driscoll 22 Jun '20

22 Jun '20

Hello AOIR! A short note to announce an exciting special issue of WiderScreen about pre-internet computer cultures, subcultures, and "scenes." Eight articles explore people, places, and practices that have been relegated to the periphery of 1980s computing histories. See the email below for titles, authors, and other information about the special issue. All of the articles are open access and available on the public web: http://widerscreen.fi All my best, Kevin ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Gleb J. Albert <gleb.albert(a)uzh.ch> Date: Thu, Jun 18, 2020 at 3:05 PM Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] WiderScreen 2-3/2020: "Home Computer Cultures and Society Before the Internet Age" To: <members(a)lists.sigcis.org> Dear colleagues and list members, I am very happy to announce that a selection of papers on the history of home computer user- and subcultures in the 1980s and early 1990s, which had originally been presented at an international workshop at the University of Zurich in March 2017, are now available in a thematic issue of the Finnish media studies open-access journal "WiderScreen". The issue, edited by Julia Gül Erdogan, Markku Reunanen and myself, is available at: http://widerscreen.fi/ Here is the full table of contents: - Theodore Lekkas & Aristotle Tympas (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens): "Global Machines and Local Magazines in 1980s Greece: The Exemplary Case of the Pixel Magazine" - Patryk Wasiak (Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw): "The Polish Amiga Scene as a Brand Community" - Gleb J. Albert (Department of History, University of Zurich): "New Scenes, New Markets: The Global Expansion of the Cracking Scene, Late 1980s to Early 1990s" - Beatrice Tobler (Swiss Open-Air Museum Ballenberg): "BBS Worlds. Looking Back at the Swiss BBS Scene of the 1990s" - Petri Saarikoski (Digital Culture, University of Turku): "The Rise and Fall of BBS Culture in Finland, 1982–2002" - Ulf Sandqvist (Humlab, Umeå University): "Hobbyist and Entrepreneurs: A Study of the Interplay Between the Game Industry and the Demoscene" - Kevin Driscoll (Department of Media Studies, University of Virginia): "Demography and Decentralization: Measuring the Bulletin Board Systems of North America" - Julia Gül Erdogan (Institute of History, Department History of the Effects of Technology, University of Stuttgart): "West and East German Hackers from a Comparative Perspective" Best wishes, Gleb -- Dr. Gleb J. Albert Historisches Seminar, Universität Zürich Forschergruppe "Medien und Mimesis" Universität Zürich Historisches Seminar Culmannstr. 1 CH-8006 Zürich Switzerland Tel. +41-446346187 <http://uzh.academia.edu/GlebJAlbert> <http://www.fg-mimesis.de>

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2nd CFP: Borders, bordering and sovereignty in digital space // Online symposium // 2nd+3rd Sept
by Morris,CJ (pgr) 22 Jun '20

22 Jun '20

Dear all, Please find the second CfP for an online symposium that Chenchen Zhang and I are organising. The symposium builds on the three panels we had planned for the now postponed RGS conference and includes many of the original participants. We encourage interdisciplinary contributions from around the world and a number of contexts. General details: * Date: September 2nd/3rd * CfP Deadline: June 30th * COVID-19 and digital borders round table, with Professor Mimi Sheller * Data colonialism and sovereignty round table, with Professor Nick Couldry * Flexible time slots for flexible time zones, though centred around GMT day * Pre-recorded videos acceptable * Ideally less intense and more time to talk, so two-day schedule * Open to public viewing * Main aim is to engage in a conversation on these topics * Additional aim is a special issue on the conference theme * Hosted by Dr Chenchen Zhang and Dr Carwyn Morris Please submit your abstract through this Google Form: https://forms.gle/Pgs1vh7iJY8EaX7u8 (if you have issues, please email c.j.morris(a)lse.ac.uk<mailto:c.j.morris@lse.ac.uk>) CFP: National borders continue to operate in the digital space despite predictions otherwise. Scholars have argued that the global communication space and the nation state are both oppositional and co-constituting forces in internet governance. Digital (cyber) borders are produced through, for instance, regulatory systems, jurisdictional assertions, censorship regimes, and discourses of digital sovereignty and digital security. While governments draw on concepts of sovereignty and national security to assert control over a digital space that seems essentially borderless, civil society actors have also sought to put forward ideas of digital sovereignty along the lines of freedom and self-determination. This online workshop aims to address theoretical and empirical questions regarding processes of (de)bordering, (de)territorialization and sovereignty in digital space. How are the concepts of sovereignty, territory, and borders reproduced and transformed in the context of the digital? What are the emerging patterns of power and contestation with regard to the control over data and information flows? How is the national border - digital or physical - being (re)produced or contested in digital space? How do digital borders, territory and sovereignty affect contentious politics? And how are spatial inequalities in knowledge production impacting our understanding of evolving socio-spatial relations? We especially welcome contributions that engage with critical perspectives on the concepts of sovereignty, territory, and borders such as those focused on performance, discourse/practice, and governmentality. Papers might explore the following themes: * The production of digital territories and borders through legal, technological, and other means * Firewalls, censorship regimes, internet disruptions * The territorialization of services, infrastructure and populations * Concepts and discourses of digital, cyber and data sovereignty * The geopolitics of data and internet control * Digital borders and data protection law * How borders and practices of territorialization in digital space are contested * The impact of territorialization and bordering on populations * Conceptual and theoretical contributions * Contributions beyond methodological nationalism Please submit an abstract of no more than 250 words through the Google Form by the end of June 30th: https://forms.gle/Pgs1vh7iJY8EaX7u8 We encourage submissions by early career researchers and PhDs near completion (Chenchen and Carwyn tick those boxes) wherever in the world they are based. We also encourage people to submit in advance of the deadline so that we do not have a huge number of submissions all coming on one day. Best, Dr Chenchen Zhang and Dr Carwyn _ Department of Geography and Environment London School of Economics Tweeting @carwyn<https://twitter.com/carwyn>

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This Friday: King's College London Digital Humanities Conference - Digital Tensions, Fragmentations and Polarisations
by Cobby Avaria, Roy 22 Jun '20

22 Jun '20

Dear all, This is the final reminder for all of those interested in attending this year's King's College London Department of Digital Humanities Conference, which will take place this Friday, online. These are the key details: Title: 2020 LOATHING: Digital Tensions, Fragmentations and Polarisations [In Times of Pandemic] Date and Time: Friday 26th June, 3pm BST Registration: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/2020-loathing-digital-tensions-fragmentation… Lead Panellists: Dr Fernanda Bruno & Dr Jennifer Pybus The theme and panellists will provide a foundational first approach to the new digital environment opened up by the pandemic, and its consequences. The full programme is attached. Registrations for the event have already surpassed our expectations, but we want to spread the word. Please, share the programme with your extended network and students. If you have any questions, let us know at 2020Loathing(a)gmail.com. Best wishes, The Conference Team Cris, Linan and Roy

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SSN Interdisciplinary Seminar: 'The participant in troubled times' with Christopher M. Kelty
by Thao Phan 22 Jun '20

22 Jun '20

*'The Participant in Troubled Times' with Christopher M. Kelty (UCLA)* https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/ssn-seminar-the-participant-in-troubled-tim… Please join us for this seminar hosted by the Deakin Science and Society Network <https://scienceandsocietynetwork.deakin.edu.au/> (SSN). *Title:* The Participant in Troubled Times *Date/time: * Tuesday 23rd June, 10am - 11:00am (Australian Eastern Standard Time, GMT+10) *Abstract:* Christopher Kelty's new book The Participant (University of Chicago Press, 2019) is a historical ethnography of the concept of participation. It argues that participation is a problem for liberal representative democracy, and provides a genealogical account of how it has become central to our contemporary understanding of democratic institutions, social arrangements, platforms, algorithms, and infrastructures. Participation has been formatted, proceduralized, scaled-up, and turned into a tool-kit in the effort to spread it everywhere, and make it more effective. But at the same time, we forsake the core experience of participation: the feeling of being an instance of a collective---not a part of a whole, but the very feeling of being a collective itself. Through cases and vignettes, the book explores the tension inherent in treating participation as either a fundamentally individual or as a group phenomena; the opposition of participation and expertise, and the growth of "experts in participation"; and the desire to "scale up" participation through the proliferation of handbooks, sourcebooks, and tool kits that are the precursors of the platforms and algorithms that saturate our world today. It explores the idea of "contributory autonomy" and the desire to make individuals into collectives; and it explores how the immediate, affective feeling of participating should be understood as more than just a fleeting satisfaction, but as a valuable ethical experience often revealed through perplexity. *About the speaker:* Christopher M. Kelty is professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. He has appointments in the Institute for Society and Genetics, the department of Information Studies and the Department of Anthropology. Research interests center on social theory and technology, the cultural significance of information technology; the relationship of participation, technology and the public sphere. He is the author of the book Two Bits: The Cultural Significance of Free Software (Duke University Press, 2008), as well as numerous articles on open source and free software, including its impact on education, nanotechnology, the life sciences; participation as a political concept, open access in the academy, piracy, the history of software, and many other inadvisably diverse topics *Discussants:* Timothy Neale is DECRA Senior Research Fellow at the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation and Deputy Convener of the Deakin Science and Society Network. Radhika Gorur is Associate Professor in Education at Deakin University and a Director of the Laboratory of International Assessment Studies. *Watch the seminar:* Seminar will be available to stream on YouTube live. Access using the live link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAEindMn8_A Date/time: Tuesday 23rd June, 10am - 11:00am (Australian Eastern Standard Time, GMT+10) Q&A with the speaker to follow. To send questions/participate in the chat, you'll need to sign-in using a YouTube account. <https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-comment-on-youtube?r=AU&IR=T> The seminar will be recorded and available to watch on the SSN YouTube channel <https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVYFQV_UFX9CLreqpNzanVA> after the Livestream. If you have any questions, please send to ssn-info(a)deakin.edu.au

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Support for the Open Technology Fund
by Niels ten Oever 21 Jun '20

21 Jun '20

Dear AoIR Community, As you might have heard or read, Michael Pack, a Bannon ally, has been appointed as the director of the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM). This body oversees four organizations, namely Middle East Broadcasting, Radio Free Asia, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and the Open Technology Fund. Last Wednesday Pack has fired the heads of all aforementioned bodies, and replaced OTF's independent expert board [0]. The Open Technology Fund has been fundamental in the support of tools and research into privacy, anti-censorship, and decentralization tools. Examples of projects that have been supported by OTF are Signal, Tor, GlobaLeaks, as well as many researchers through the Information Controls Fellowship and other programs. A number of human rights and digital rights organizations have already put out statements about this: Citizen Lab: https://citizenlab.ca/2020/06/keep-the-open-technology-fund-open/ Human Rights Watch: https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/06/19/us-congress-should-back-open-technology… Article 19: https://www.article19.org/resources/us-protect-open-technology-fund-and-pro… OONI: https://ooni.org/post/2020-06-19-save-internet-freedom-support-the-open-tec… CCC: https://www.ccc.de/en/updates/2020/support-otf IFF: https://internetfreedomfestival.org/save-internet-freedom/ Access Now: https://www.accessnow.org/otf-global-internet-freedom-at-risk/https://www.c… I would like to ask you to support OTF by signing the following statement, either as individual, or with your organization, or perhaps with you research group. https://saveinternetfreedom.tech/ If you have any questions or would like to get involved in the campaign, feel free to reach out. Best, Niels [0] https://edition.cnn.com/2020/06/17/media/us-agency-for-global-media-michael… -- Niels ten Oever Researcher and PhD Candidate - DATACTIVE Research Group - University of Amsterdam Postdoctoral Scholar (abd) - Communications Department - Texas A&M University Research Fellow - Centre for Internet and Human Rights - European University Viadrina Associated Scholar - Centro de Tecnologia e Sociedade - Fundação Getúlio Vargas W: https://nielstenoever.net E: mail(a)nielstenoever.net T: @nielstenoever P/S/WA: +31629051853 PGP: 2458 0B70 5C4A FD8A 9488 643A 0ED8 3F3A 468A C8B3

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Special Issue on Big Data in Epidemics
by Muhammad Imran 20 Jun '20

20 Jun '20

[Apologies for cross-posting] Special Issue on Big Data in Epidemics =============================== Journal: Big Data Research (IF: 2.952; CiteScore: 7.43) Link: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/big-data-research/call-for-papers/special… Introduction to the special issue ------------------------------------------ On February 11, 2020 the World Health Organization announced the official name for the disease that is causing the 2019 novel coronavirus outbreak, first identified in Wuhan China. More than 110 countries are affected thus far, raising concerns of widespread fear and increasing anxiety in individuals subjected to the threat of the virus. Humankind has experienced epidemic diseases before, such as the Spanish flu, HIV, and SARS. With the development of science and technology and the continuous attempts of scientific research by universities, university hospitals, and medical research institutions, relevant data on epidemics and viruses accumulates at an increasing rate. There are three main challenges associated with these rapidly growing and inherently complex and heterogeneous amounts of data: - Gaps exist between researchers in different fields, and different approaches and methods make it difficult to understand the problem in depth; - The accumulated data is vast and complex calling for novel methods for extracting valuable insights, removing irrelevant variables, and guiding potential applications in a targeted manner. - There is still a lack of efficient methods, models, and tools in the field for data utilization and application in practice. Hence, it is crucial that advances in Big Data research, Deep Learning, Data Analytics, and Data Science find their way to these applications, and that research results can be successfully integrated into drug screening, crowd disease prevention and control, trend prediction, epidemic surveillance and other fields. In this special issue, we solicit papers that focus on deploying the potential of Big Data Research towards understanding, monitoring and diminishing the impact of disease outbreaks. This includes methods for processing related data in a fast and accurate manner, techniques for identifying useful data trends and epidemics in epidemiological, medical screening, and trend prediction environments, as well as data-driven studies on the implications of epidemic diseases and their countermeasures on real-world and online social behavior, transportation, industrial activity, and climate. Topics for the special issue ----------------------------------- Topics of interest include, but are not limited to: . Big data in trend prediction of epidemic diseases and disease outbreaks. . Big data in public health management for effective monitoring and control of epidemics and disease outbreaks. . Geo-Social big data analytics for epidemic transmission routes analysis. . Data-driven methods for large-scale health surveillance. . Data-driven methods for the understanding of the mechanisms contributing to a disease outbreak. . Data-driven methods for better understanding of diseases with outbreak potential. . Data-driven methods in clinical decision support during disease outbreaks. . Data-driven drug discovery for epidemic diseases. . Methods for data-driven analyses of outbreak-related epidemiological, clinical and social data and of combinations thereof. . Epidemic knowledge graph construction and their applications. . Data-driven analysis of implications of epidemic diseases and their countermeasures on social behaviour, industrial practices, and environmental impact. . Tools that support the above functionality using automated processing and machine learning pipelines, or novel visualizations, targeting both expert and lay users. . Social media for predicting and tracking epidemics, pandemics, and disease outbreaks. . Novel techniques for gaining situational awareness and extracting actionable information from social media during health emergencies such as COVID-19. . Use of social media to determine outbreak hotspots and spread. Paper Submission Format and Guidelines: ------------------------------------------------------ All submitted papers must be clearly written in English and must contain only original work, which has not been published by, or is currently under review for, any other journal, conference, symposium, or workshop. Submissions are expected to not exceed 30 pages (including figures, tables, and references) in the journal's single-column format using 11 point font. Detailed submission guidelines are available under "Guide for Authors" at: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/big-data-research/ All manuscripts and any supplementary material should be submitted through the Elsevier Editorial System (EES). The authors must select " SI: Big Data in Epidemics" as Article Type when they reach the Article Type step in the submission process. The EES website is located at: https://www.editorialmanager.com/BDR/default.aspx. All papers will be peer-reviewed by at least two independent reviewers. Requests for additional information should be addressed to the guest editors. The decisions for papers submitted before July 15 will be made before September 15. Important dates: ---------------------- . Paper submission due date: September 15, 2020 . Notifications: Papers will be reviewed as they arrive in the submission system . Expected publication: Papers will be published electronically as soon as they are accepted. The estimated completion of the Big Data Research special issue is June 2021 The special issue may request documentation related to informed consent, ethics approval and donor organ/tissue source, including approved translations when original documents are in a language other than English. Failure to provide verifiable documentation may result in the withdrawal of a manuscript. Guest Editors: ------------------ - Myra Spiliopoulou (myra(a)ovgu.de) Otto-von-Guericke Univ. Magdeburg, Germany - Panos Papapetrou (panagiotis(a)dsv.su.se) Stockholm University, Sweden - Muhammad Imran (mimran(a)hbku.edu.qa) Qatar Computing Research Institute, Doha, Qatar Best, ----- Dr. Muhammad Imran Scientist Qatar Computing Research Institute Hamad Bin Khalifa University Doha, Qatar. Tel: +974 4454 1521 https://mimran.me/ <http://mimran.me/>

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AI Ethics: Mozilla Trustworthy AI and Santa Clara Principles
by Abhishek Gupta 19 Jun '20

19 Jun '20

Hi everyone, The Montreal AI Ethics Institute is hosting two sessions to share our insights with the *Santa Clara Principles* for their work on transparency and accountability in content moderation and with the *Mozilla Foundation* on their Trustworthy AI RFC drawing from our diverse perspectives and experience and having done so before for various other public consultations. *Date*: June 23 (*Mozilla Trustworthy AI*) and June 25, 2020 (*Santa Clara Principles*) *Time*: 11:45 AM - 1:15 PM *Venue*: Details to join the Zoom session online will be sent once you register We hope that you will join us at the session, the tickets can be reserved from the following link: https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/ai-ethics-mozilla-rfc-for-trustworthy-ai-part-2… https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/ai-ethics-santa-clara-principles-for-content-mo… Other upcoming events can be found here: https://montrealethics.ai/meetup Looking forward to seeing you at the session, thanks! Abhishek

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Friendly reminder: CfP 'The Politics of Metadata' - J. of Digital Culture & Society
by Karin Hansson 19 Jun '20

19 Jun '20

Call for Papers: The Politics of Metadata Issue 1/2021, Digital Culture & Society, http://digicults.org Edited by: Anna Dahlgren, Karin Hansson, Rámon Reichert and Amanda Wasielewski Abstract submission: June 28, 2020 Author submission: July 1, 2020 Full paper submission: October 1, 2020 Final version: December 30, 2020 This special issue of the Digital Culture & Society journal invites theoretical and methodological contributions discussing the politics of metadata. The transformation of image collections from files and boxes to digital interfaces has had implications for the way images are annotated and ordered. In particular, new issues arise in relation to the practices of and policies for creating descriptive metadata. The first generation of digitization in the 1990s sparked a lively debate around images and their credibility, which played out in the news media, political circles, and in relation to history writing (Mitchell, 1994; Ritchin, 1990). Despite the fact that photographic manipulation is as old as the medium itself, the ease and availability of software that allowed consumers to “photoshop” images on their personal computers ushered in an era of digital distrust. Yet, as pointed out by Rubinstein and Sluis, “In the past, concerns about manipulation of pixels caused people to doubt the veracity of the digital image; however, manipulation of metadata can have much more dramatic and far-reaching consequences and they indicate that the construction and design of metadata inflicts archiving and classification practices yet also the conditions of use“ (Rubinstein and Sluis, 2013). In other words, while many people worry about the consequences of digital image manipulation, the data we collect on our data, which is used to order and recall a vast array of digital material, can also be subject to biases and manipulations that are just as insidious and often more difficult to detect. The design and use of metadata is therefore always culturally, socially and ideologically inflected (Baylis, 2014; Bunnik et al., 2016; Loukissas, 2017; Pollen, 2016). Indeed all metadata situate the images they furnish historically, geographically, politically and organizationally. The actors and their agendas and interest, whether these are institutions (museums, archives, libraries, corporate image suppliers) or individuals (image producers, social media agents, researchers) affect the character of metadata (Schwartz, 1995; Schwartz and Cook, 2002). If, for example, nationality is an important founding rationale for a museum their images will be tagged with national origin which in itself is a historical construct and sometimes quite problematic (Rodini, 2018). Such interest may also vary over time. While the gender of the image producer is of vital concern in memory institutions today the issue whether an image or art work is produced by a woman or a man has not always historically been of interest for collections managers (Pierce, 2019). Thus the available metadata is the result, and also part of, negotiations between conflicting interests accumulated and transformed over time (Baca, 2016). In sum these are examples of the politics of metadata. When it comes to big data and data-driven research, we have to pay particular attention to the effects of the interfaces we use. Metadata and the archiving practices that produce it are increasingly important for collecting institutions—and for visual culture at large—as a means to navigate the rapidly growing volume of data, situating them historically, socially, and locally (Baylis, 2014; Bunnik et al., 2016; Loukissas, 2017; Pollen, 2016). The fact that images today are copied and redistributed in infinite numbers as well as modified, manipulated, and placed in new contexts raises question about how images are furnished with descriptive metadata and by whom. Metadata not only affects the searchability and visibility of images but, by extension, how they are used and interpreted. Image collections today create descriptive metadata in three major ways: by employing professional cataloguers within the institution that governs the collection, by enlisting the help of the general public via online interfaces, or by automation using algorithm based tools and machine learning, like pattern recognition. In this special issue we seek to address the ideological and political aspects of metadata practices within image collections from an interdisciplinary perspective. The overall aim is to consider the implications, tensions, and challenges involved in the creation of metadata in terms of content, structure, searchability, and diversity. We invite proposals including, but not limited to, the following topics: • The relationship and systemic tensions between professional and amateur taggers, between metadata standards and folksonomies. What are the decisive differences between descriptive metadata produced by professional cataloguers and amateurs through crowdsourcing in terms of content, structure, and usability? What are the differences between private and public metadata? The numerous metadata standards, which govern much of the professional‘s metadata production display a heterogenous field (Margulies, 2017; Mayernik, 2020; Riley, 2017, 2009). Simultaneously many institutions are not using any of the established standards (Waldron et al., 2017). Folksonomies, in turn, have been studied and implemented as ways to bridge between expert and non-expert vocabularies (Cairns, 2013), and potentially to feed into the creation of formal taxonomies or ontologies (Gil et al. 2017). • The issue of anonymity and social identity in relation to metadata production. What are the implications of anonymity for metadata producers within cultural heritage institutions, corporate image suppliers, or public crowdsourcing platforms? How can this be understood and/or challenged in the context of social media practices where a particular user’s reputation and output history is often the determining factor in gauging the trustworthiness of the information produced? (Esteve, 2019) • The challenge in creating metadata that is coherent and reflects diverse perspectives In order for images to be searchable, reliable, and usable, collections need to create metadata standards for accuracy and uniformity (Zhang et al., 2019). Simultaneously, there is an increasing demand for descriptive metadata to be inclusive, i.e. encouraging participation and heterogeneity in representation. Given that these two objectives might contradict or come into conflict with one another, how can cultural heritage institutions strike a balance between them? • Issues of standards, centrality, and networks in relation to metadata production For example, what is the relationship between metadata standards and their institutional, geographical settings? Who are the major agents in the field of metadata production and what are the implications of this? How might we develop more horizontal systems for the production of descriptive metadata?(Piotrowski, 2009) Paper proposals may relate to, but are not limited to, the following questions concerning the metadata paradigm. Interdisciplinary contributions, such as those from science and technology studies or the digital humanities, are particularly encouraged. When submitting an abstract, authors should make explicit to which of the following categories they would like to submit their paper: 1. Field Research and Case Studies (full paper: 6000-8000 words) We invite articles that discuss empirical findings from studies that approach the relationships between data science, digital humanities, digital histories, computational intelligence, cultural studies, art history, gender studies, science and technology studies. These may include practices of circulating or collecting data as well processes of production and evaluation. 2. Methodological Reflection (full paper: 6000-8000 words) We invite contributions that reflect on the methodologies employed when researching the practices of the new tendencies of metadata production. These may include, for example, the specificities of methodological reflection of scientific fieldwork in online/offline environments; challenges and opportunities faced when qualitatively researching quantifiable data and vice versa; approaches using mixed methods; discussions of mobile and circulative methods; and reflections of experimental forms of research. 3. Conceptual/Theoretical Reflection (full paper: 6000-8000 words) We encourage contributions that reflect on the conceptual and/or theoretical dimension of the metadata paradigm, and discuss or question how the data-driven research on metadata can be defined, what it can describe, and how it can be differentiated. 4. Entering the Field (2000-3000 words; experimental formats welcome) This experimental section presents initial and ongoing empirical work in digital media studies. The editors have created this section to provide a platform for researchers who would like to initiate a discussion concerning their emerging (yet perhaps incomplete) research material and plans as well as methodological insights. Deadlines and contact information • Initial abstracts (max. 300 words) and a short biographical note (max. 100 words) are due on: June 28, 2020. • Authors will be notified by July 10, 2020, whether they are invited to submit a full paper. • Full papers are due on: October 01, 2020. • Notifications to authors of referee decisions: November 20, 2020 • Final versions due: December 30, 2020 • Please send your abstract and short biographical note to: anna.dahlgren(a)arthistory.su.se<mailto:anna.dahlgren@arthistory.su.se>, khansson(a)dsv.su.se<mailto:khansson@dsv.su.se>, ramon.reichert(a)univie.ac.at<mailto:ramon.reichert@univie.ac.at>

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