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Re: [Air-L] Technology as ideologically neutral?
by Neal Thomas 10 Jul '12

10 Jul '12

Hi everyone; Just wanted to chime in late with a few more notable references: http://bit.ly/MfJUcq Habermas wrote an influential piece in debate with Marcuse, in his book Towards a Rational Society. It's entitled 'Technology and Science as Ideology', and was later the focus of an important critique in Feenberg's (already mentioned) Questioning Technology. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilbert_Simondon Feenberg makes occasional use of the philosopher Gilbert Simondon's theory of "concretization", as a way of understanding the relationship between experience and technological development, and the terms under which technical functions are reconciled with wider social contexts or environments. However one might opt to connect the concept up to ideology, Simondon takes a fascinating approach to technology in general -- arguing that we individuate technology, and our selves, by coordinating social, phenomenal and technical potentials in ways that regulate difference, in what he calls technical 'ensembles'. There are English translations of his works floating around the web, as well as this collection that may be of interest, released in January: http://www.euppublishing.com/book/9780748645251 http://bit.ly/NgZ8kw Lorenzo Simpson's Technology, Time and the Conversations of Modernity may also be of use, particularly in any discussion that concerns the relationship between ideology and the temporalities produced by digital technologies. http://www.generation-online.org/p/fpvirno10.htm Marx's 'Fragment on Machines' in the Grundrisse is another important piece of writing, which develops a line of thinking around the relationship between ever-improving industrial processes and living labour. For example: "The development of fixed capital indicates to what degree general social knowledge has become a *direct force of production*, and to what degree, hence, the conditions of the process of social life itself have come under the control of the general intellect and been transformed in accordance with it." The above link is Paolo Virno developing his own account of the 'general intellect' from out of this work. Finally, also worth mentioning is the work of critical historian David Noble. Books like Forces of Production and Progress Without People contain important historical research as to why social processes (and the ideologies they enact, in struggles between different actors) can be far more revealing than the approach that presumes technology to be ideologically neutral. Best, Neal Thomas, Ph.D Assistant Professor Dept. of Communication Studies UNC Chapel Hill http://www.hivemedia.ca/

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Re: [Air-L] Using screen captures in Thesis paper
by Marj Kibby 10 Jul '12

10 Jul '12

Associate Professor Marjorie Kibby, B.Ed, M.A, Ph.D, FHERDSA Director, Student Experience FEDUA Head of Discipline: Film, Media and Cultural Studies School of Humanities and Social Science The University of Newcastle Callaghan NSW 2308 Australia Marj.Kibby(a)newcastle.edu.au +61 2 49216604 >>> "Dan L. Burk" <dburk(a)uci.edu> 11/07/12 6:11 AM >>> Okay, I guess I had better step in. 1) Fair use is specific to the United States (and Israel). Emily appears to be located in Taiwan. She almost certainly has no fair use claim. Australian law does not have a general “fair use” defence but it does allow for "fair dealing" in the use of copyrighted material for the purpose of research or study. A quick Google suggests similar provisions under Taiwanese law. Marj

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CodeX 2012/13 Fellowship
by Thomas Jones 10 Jul '12

10 Jul '12

Pardon the intrusion, but aside from this being a career aspiration of my own, I think this would be of great interest to those on this list: CodeX 2012/13 Fellowship Codex – The Stanford Center for Legal Informatics is accepting applications for a Resident Fellowship for the 2012-13 academic year. Codex is a cross-disciplinary research center jointly operated by Stanford Law School and the Stanford School of Engineering. The center's mission is to explore the application of technology toward improving the quality, efficiency, and accessibility of the legal system. Codex research fellows will have the opportunity to spend one to two years at Stanford Law School collaborating with scholars in computer science and other relevant disciplines. Fellows will work on the center's existing projects, and will have the opportunity to explore related research on their own and commence new projects. Fellows will work with cutting edge technologies emerging from Stanford's engineering departments, and will be expected to bring a legally oriented perspective toward integrating these technologies into the law. Sample projects include automating the process of intellectual property licensing and developing automated legal compliance systems. Fellows will also be involved in bringing in leading thinkers in the field to speak at the law school on these topic areas and will work with law and computer science students to engage them in the center's activities. Qualifications: Applicants should have a J.D. or equivalent law degree. Because the primary focus of the center is employing technology within the law, applicants should also have experience in computer science or engineering related fields. We welcome applicants with practical/professional technical experience in these fields as well as those with formal computer science or engineering undergraduate or graduate training. Applicants should be capable of learning and be comfortable with the technological aspects of the center's projects. Salary for the fellowship will be approximately $52,000 per year with benefits. How to Apply: All qualified and interested applicants must apply via the Stanford jobs website: http://jobs.stanford.edu/ search for this specific posting by entering job number: 48371 in the keyword search field. Applicants should submit: * a resume; * a brief letter (no more than 2 pages) describing the applicant's interest in issues applying technology to the law, the applicant's background, and the research that they propose to conduct; * a list of references; Review of applications will begin immediately, and all applications must be received by July 30, 2012. Please note that the Codex Center has a technological emphasis and is not focused on technology policy or legal substantive areas such as intellectual property, cyberlaw, or privacy. For more information about the Stanford Codex Center and its projects please visit the website at http://codex.stanford.edu<http://codex.stanford.edu/>, or contact CodeX Executive Director Roland Vogl at rvogl(a)law.stanford.edu<mailto:rvogl@law.stanford.edu>. ************************************ Dr. Roland Vogl, Esq. Executive Director and Lecturer in Law Stanford Program in Law, Science & Technology<http://lst.stanford.edu/> CodeX - The Stanford Center for Legal Informatics<http://codex.stanford.edu/> Transatlantic Technology Law Forum <http://ttlf.stanford.edu/> rvogl(a)law.stanford.edu<mailto:rvogl@law.stanford.edu> Stanford Law School Crown Quadrangle 559 Nathan Abbott Way Stanford, CA 94305-8610 Tel: (650) 723-8532<tel:%28650%29%20723-8532> Fax: (650) 725-2190<tel:%28650%29%20725-2190> Thomas Jones | Graduate Student | School of Information Studies http://about.me/othertomjones Syracuse University Hinds Hall Syracuse, New York 13244 t 919.809.9454 e tajone02syr.edu ischool.syr.edu THE CAMPAIGN FOR SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY campaign.syr.edu

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Possible Post-Doc at University of Toronto Scarborough
by Michael Petit 10 Jul '12

10 Jul '12

Hello, The Department of Arts, Culture and Media at the University of Toronto Scarborough has the possibility of securing a competitive post doc fellowship (PDF) in digital media and information and communication for AY 2012-2013. The deadline for our department to submit an application is July 16, 2012. The PDF award is valued at $50,000 (Cdn) for one year, comprised of salary, benefits and a research allowance of up to $5,000. (Teaching is optional but not required.) This is a very short notice deadline and we require all submissions by this coming Friday, July 13. No extensions to the deadline are possible. We are particularly interested in candidates with a focus on media and activism, as this focus compliments the research interests of current faculty. If you are interested, please forward a short statement of research interests and current CV to me at mepetit(a)utsc.utoronto.ca. Michael Petit, PhD Director, Media Studies and Joint Program in New Media Department of Arts, Culture and Media University of Toronto Scarborough 1265 Military Trail Toronto, ON M1C 1A4 416.287.7164 mepetit(a)utsc.utoronto.ca

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Literature on when 'new' media is translated into 'old' formats?
by Deller, Ruth A 10 Jul '12

10 Jul '12

Hi all Wondering if anyone knew of anything that's been written about the transfers of online media into 'old' formats - I'm thinking the likes of blogs/Twitter accounts/online fic/etc that have become print books, YouTube stuff or podcasts that have translated to radio/TV/DVD, that kind of thing... Ruth

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Meaningful Play 2012 Deadline Extended
by Casey O'Donnell 09 Jul '12

09 Jul '12

* Apologies for Cross Posting * Meaningful Play 2012 October 18 - 20, 2012 East Lansing, MI, USA http://meaningfulplay.msu.edu Call for Submissions DEADLINE EXTENDED to July 29, 2012 Whether designed to entertain or to achieve more "serious" purposes, games have the potential to impact players' beliefs, knowledge, attitudes, emotions, cognitive abilities, physical and mental health, and behavior. Meaningful Play 2012 is a conference about theory, research, and game design innovations, principles and practices. Meaningful Play brings scholars and industry professionals together to understand and improve upon games to entertain, inform, educate, and persuade in meaningful ways. The conference will include thought-provoking keynotes from leaders in academia and industry, peer-reviewed paper presentations, panel sessions (including academic and industry discussions), innovative workshops, roundtable discussions, and exhibitions of games and prototypes. Meaningful Play 2012 and the Journal of Gaming and Culture have partnered to bring a special issue of the journal containing top papers from the Meaningful Play 2012 conference. Top paper authors will be invited to revise their Meaningful Play paper for publication consideration in the special issue. The Journal of Games and Culture is a peer-reviewed, international journal that promotes innovative theoretical and empirical research about games and culture within interactive media. Complete details on the journal are available at: http://gac.sagepub.com/ Paper, Panel, Poster, Roundtable, Workshop, and Game Submissions are sought from both researchers and practitioners in academia and industry. Graduate and advanced undergraduate students are also encouraged to submit either jointly with an industry professional or faculty mentor or alone. Details on the conference, including the call for submissions, are available at: http://meaningfulplay.msu.edu Be sure to LIKE us on Facebook for the latest Meaningful Play program announcements (http://www.facebook.com/GamesAndMeaningfulPlay ) Please visit http://seriousgames.msu.edu/ for information on Michigan State University's new fully online graduate certificate in serious games. -- Casey O'Donnell, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Department of Telecommunication, Information Studies and Media (TISM) Games for Entertainment and Learning Lab (GEL) Michigan State University http://www.caseyodonnell.org

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teaching social computing / critical social media?
by dan mcquillan 09 Jul '12

09 Jul '12

hi there in the last academic year i prototyped a 20 week course for 2nd year computing students called 'social computing'. i append below the syllabus and a link to the blog where the raw(!) slides and lecture notes can be found under a CC-by-nc-sa license. i'll also be teaching a 1st year version this year, and an MA module. i'd be interested to hear from anyone who's also teaching a social computing / critical social media course or similar, especially with ideas and/or notes to share :). the syllabus: 1. the emergence of web 2.0 2. internet infrastructure & global social media 3. seeing through social networks 4. the dark side of social networks 5. open source code, copyright & culture 6. programming & participatory culture 7. computing and crowds 8. crowdsourcing, flashmobs & crowdfunding 9. social computing & business 10. social business 11. datascapes 1: tracking, scraping & opendata 12. datascapes 2: visualisation & big data 13. liveness 14. mobile 15. civic hacking 16. civic hacking case studies 17 hackspaces & 3D printing 18 getting stuff done: agile, lean & startups 19 critical theory 20 review (pub quiz!) thanks to barry wellman for the heads up on 'Networked'. cheers dan http://www.gold.ac.uk/computing/staff/d-mcquillan/

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Re: [Air-L] Informatization?
by michael gurstein 09 Jul '12

09 Jul '12

I'm fairly sure it is an anglicization of the French "informatisation"... Which if I'm not mistaken was first used in the Nora/Minc Report L'informatisation de la société: rapport à M. le Président de la République http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapport_Nora-Minc and wikipedia even seems to have had the same thought :) Informatization - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Informatization - Origin of the term. The term informatisation was coined by Simon Nora and Alain Minc in their publication L'Informatisation de la société: Rapport à M. le ... M -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces(a)listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Alexander Halavais Sent: Sunday, July 08, 2012 5:41 PM To: katja.mayer(a)univie.ac.at Cc: air-l(a)listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-L] Informatization? I have largely seen this term used in Japanese (in which the -ization suffix is a lot less cumbersome), and used in the sense of other developmental -izations, like "modernization," "industrialization," and "internationalization," to refer to public policy designed to encourage changes in social and economic structure. I have seen it used in other contexts--e.g., by IGOs--but always assumed for some reason it was borrowed from the Japanese. Alex On Jul 8, 2012 10:26 AM, "Katja Mayer" <katja.mayer(a)univie.ac.at> wrote: > Dear list members, > > if you hear or read "informatization", how would you contextualize > this term? > > I am asking this, because I have a rather specific idea of what > informatization entails (a rather quantitative, technocratic context, > looking for measurements of technological diffusion and impact on > labour, e-commerce and other fields...) and I would like to know more > about other approaches. > > Are there any other connotations? Maybe in french literature? (Since > the term was used in the 1978 presidential report by Nora/Minc: > L'informatisation de la societe.) > > Thanks for your assistence, > Katja > > --- > Dr. Katja Mayer > Department of Social Studies of Science > University of Vienna, Austria > http://homepage.univie.ac.at/**katja.mayer<http://homepage.univie.ac.a > t/katja.mayer> ______________________________**_________________ > The Air-L(a)listserv.aoir.org mailing list > is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org > Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/** > listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org<http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir .org> > > Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/ > _______________________________________________ The Air-L(a)listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/

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Re: [Air-L] Technology as ideologically neutral?
by Andrew Herman 09 Jul '12

09 Jul '12

This is indeed a fascinating discussion and I like the way that Jeremy has turned the question here. J: can you explain a bit more what you mean when you hold that objects themselves have politics in themselves but necessarily ideologies in themselves? Charles: at the end of the day, would you please post all the readings that people have suggested? And let us not forget Slack and Wise, Culture and Technology: A Primer. Andrew Herman, Ph. D. Associate Professor Department of Communication Studies Director, Graduate Program in Cultural Analysis and Social Theory Wilfrid Laurier University Waterloo, Ontario N2L 3C5 CANADA 519 884-1970 x3693 >>> jeremy hunsinger <jhuns(a)vt.edu> 07/07/12 3:28 AM >>> I find this to be an interesting debate, though mostly the question is where the ideology actually exists. Does it exist in the object itself? relations to the object from other objects? relations to the object to semiotic systems around it? relations to socius or culture? or in the systems alone, cultures alone, socius, alone, etc. basically there is a matrix here of ideologies, contexts, objects and their axiologies operating both ontologically ala mereological constructions and epistemologies. With many blurry middle grounds. I hold that artifacts have politics in themselves, but i'm not sure that all artefacts have ideologies in themselves. The question i tend to raise and ask people to write about is... what is the politics of the toaster, because the toaster has a whole political economics and a politics, but does it have an implied ideology. Now the design of a toaster can certainly have ideological components, but the idea of a toaster may perhaps not, though granted whether the idea exists outside of the set of objects is another debate for the Platonists to take up. however... I wonder about the neutrality of the internet because as I've argued here before, that while there is no real internet beyond reference to a conceptual idea that encompasses many technologies and systems that lack what i'd all think of as a unity beyond the concept. So does it as a whole have a neutrality or an ideology? there is a certain technocratic rationality to it, and that rationality certainly has a traditionally critiqued ideology, but is that in it, or in the design of it, or in the relations of it within historic contexts? and isn't neutrality and the claim to it, an ideological claim? I've always tended to argue that the claim toward neutrality and objectivity is almost always ideological. one of my favorite authors on this technology as ideology is Paul Virilio and my second favorite is Walter Benjamin in Arcades Project. _______________________________________________ The Air-L(a)listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/

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Re: [Air-L] Informatization?
by Vivienne Waller 09 Jul '12

09 Jul '12

Shoshana Zuboff coined the word "informate" in her 1988 book "In the Age of the Smart Machine". Here, to informate is to translate newly automated activities into data and information for wide-ranging display - with the consequence of loss of the environmental affordances that previously assisted in the conduct of the activity. In this context, informatization is the practice of informating Regards Viv

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