Dear colleagues, We are pleased to announce that the Research Platform Governance of Digital Practices <https://digigov.univie.ac.at/> (University of Vienna) will host an *interdisciplinary and international winter school*: */Taming the iMonster: Regulating digital platforms/* Digital platforms, understood as the technical and social infrastructure for the collection, storage, curation, analysis, distribution or commercialisation of digital data, are frequently compared to a Leviathan <https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-04363-6_2>: A “monster” that people submit their natural freedoms to in order to receive something back that they consider essential. In the case of the platform-Leviathan, it is not physical security and the protection of their property that people receive in return, but the possibility to communicate across time and space, to connect different groups to buy and sell goods in a faster and more convenient manner, or to look for rides, jobs, houses, partners. Especially during and after Covid-19, submitting to the iMonster has been a necessary condition for many people to be able to do the things they need to do to hold a job or two and run their families. How do we best regulate digital platforms? This is the question that this interdisciplinary Winter School will focus on. *When: * 14 – 25 February 2021 | Mon-Fr 3-6pm Central European Time *Where:* online (Zoom) *Speakers include:* José van Dijck <https://www.uu.nl/staff/jftmvandijck>, /t.b.c./ (Universiteit Utrecht) Jonathan Gray <https://www.kcl.ac.uk/people/dr-jonathan-gray> (King’s College London & Public Data Lab) Alex Hanna <https://alex-hanna.com/> (Google) Jürgen Pfeffer <https://www.sites.hfp.tum.de/css/team/prof-dr-juergen-pfeffer/> (Technical University Munich) Jean-Christophe Plantin <https://www.lse.ac.uk/media-and-communications/people/academic-staff/jean-christophe-plantin> (LSE) *Participants:* mainly early-stage researchers (PhD students and post-docs), but open to colleagues from all disciplines with an interest in the topic */Participation is free, but places are limited./* If you would like to participate, please send a short outline of your motivation to participate, and a brief summary of the project(s) you are working on (1 page max.), to natalia.kancelova@univie.ac.at <mailto:natalia.kancelova@univie.ac.at> by *15 November 2021* at the latest. The members and affiliates of the Research Platform Governance of Digital Practices <https://digigov.univie.ac.at/team/> look forward to hearing from you! */For more info visit: https://digigov.univie.ac.at/teaching/winter-school/ <https://digigov.univie.ac.at/teaching/winter-school/>/*