diff --git a/en/content/05coati.md b/en/content/05coati.md index 1518ccc..e7af925 100644 --- a/en/content/05coati.md +++ b/en/content/05coati.md @@ -95,11 +95,9 @@ Sovereignty in interpreting technology has come to mean many things to us. In t [^1]: http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-09-29/how-do-all-those-leaders-un-communicate-all-those-languages -[^2]: All the modifications and schematics we use can be seen here: -https://coati.pimienta.org/electronics +[^2]: All the modifications and schematics we use can be seen here: https://coati.pimienta.org/electronics -[^3]: Our written guidelines can be consulted here: -https://coati.pimienta.org/documents/ +[^3]: Our written guidelines can be consulted here: https://coati.pimienta.org/documents/ [^4]: Grai Collective, Romania: grai@riseup.net diff --git a/en/content/09irc.md b/en/content/09irc.md index 202f313..c4bdf96 100644 --- a/en/content/09irc.md +++ b/en/content/09irc.md @@ -1,344 +1,96 @@ - -# Keeping technological sovereignty: The case of Internet Relay Chat -## Maxigas +# Keeping technological sovereignty -New technologies sometimes manifest a critique of the existing conditions, but -their empowering affordances are often lost as their features are -progressively integrated to the requirements of capitalism during their -subsequent development. The history of chat devices is a textbook example of -critique and recuperation in technological cycles. However, the social history -and contemporary use of IRC (Internet Relay Chat) proves that such historical -logic can be – and is – resisted in some exceptional cases. This case study -does not necessarily recommend IRC as a medium of communication for activists, -but rather seeks to put forward some theses on the history of technology that -could be found useful in certain situations. +## The case of Internet Relay Chat -The systematic study of such cases may contribute to the refinement of a taste -for critical technology adoption practices in communities who wish to keep -control over the technologies that mediate their social relations. Therefore, -an appreciation of critique and recuperation in technological cycles may help -to further technological sovereignty (Haché 2014) over longer time frames, -where local efforts could potentially become part of capitalist regimes of -oppression and exploitation over time. A corollary observation is that -technical features may result in crucially different technological affordances -depending on their context of use: this shows that pure techniques should -never be promoted or rejected in themselves. +**Maxigas** -## Internet Relay Chat +**New technologies sometimes manifest a critique of the existing conditions, but their empowering affordances are often lost as their features are progressively integrated to the requirements of capitalism during their subsequent development.** The history of chat devices is a textbook example of critique and recuperation in technological cycles. However, the social history and contemporary use of IRC (Internet Relay Chat) proves that such historical logic can be – and *is* – resisted in some exceptional cases. This case study does *not* necessarily recommend IRC as a medium of communication for activists, but rather seeks to put forward some theses on the history of technology that could be found useful in certain situations. [^1] -Internet Relay Chat is a very basic but very flexible protocol for real time -written conversations. It was first implemented in 1988, one year before the -World Wide Web. IRC reached the height of its popularity as a general purpose -social media during the first Gulf War and the siege of Sarajevo -(1992-1996). At this time it performed various functions that were later -fulfilled by specialised programs and platforms, such as dating, following -friends or file sharing. As the population of the Internet grew and market -consolidation set it on the turn of the millennium, IRC faded from the public -view. +*The systematic study of historical cases may contribute to the refinement of a taste for critical technology adoption practices in communities who wish to keep control over the technologies that mediate their social relations.* An appreciation of critique and recuperation in technological cycles may help to further technological sovereignty [@Hache2014d] over longer time frames, where local efforts could potentially become part of capitalist regimes of oppression and exploitation over time. A corollary observation is that technical features may result in crucially different technological affordances depending on their context of use: this shows that pure techniques should never be promoted or rejected in themselves. -However, it is known from seminal studies of contemporary peer production -communities that free software developers (Coleman 2012), hackerspace members -(Maxigas 2015), Wikipedia editors (Broughton 2008) and Anonymous hacktivists -(Dagdelen 2012) use primarily IRC for everyday backstage communication. While -the first group has always been on IRC, the latter three adopted it after the -apparent demise of the medium. “Why [do] these contemporary user groups – -widely considered as disruptive innovators and early adopters – stick to a -museological chat technology despite its obvious limitations within the -current technological landscape?” Currently popular social networking -platforms, such as Facebook and Twitter, offer similar features and appear to -be a more obvious choice. I propose that while IRC use can seem retrograde, it -is actually a critical technology adoption practice that empirically evades, -and analytically highlights the pitfalls of mainstream social media -monopolies. +# Internet Relay Chat -## Recuperation +**Internet Relay Chat is a very basic but very flexible protocol for real time written conversations.** It has been first implemented in 1988, one year before the World Wide Web. IRC reached the height of its popularity as a general purpose social media during the first Gulf War and the siege of Sarajevo (1992-1996). At this time it performed various functions that were later fulfilled by specialised programs and platforms, such as dating, following friends or file sharing. *As the population of the Internet grew and market consolidation set it on the turn of the millennium, IRC faded from the public view.* -Critique and recuperation in technological cycles is a process of integrating -societal demands into the capitalist system. New technologies sometimes embody -a demand for a better society and a critique of the existing conditions. While -such demands are typically addressed by subsequent versions of the same -technology, the same technology is also made to conform to the two main -requirements of the capitalist system. These latter two are the preservation -of social peace (i.e. repression), and the intensification of exploitation -(i.e. capital accumulation). It happens that the implementation of these two -requirements neutralises the societal gains from the demand originally -associated with the technology. +However, it is known from seminal studies of contemporary peer production communities that **FLOSS [^2] developers** [@Coleman2012a], **hackerspace members** [@Maxigas2015a], **Wikipedia editors** [@Broughton2008a] and **Anonymous hacktivists** [@Dagdelen2012a] use primarily IRC for everyday backstage communication. While the first group has always been on IRC, the latter three adopted it after the apparent demise of the medium. **“Why these contemporary user groups – widely considered as disruptive innovators and early adopters – stick to a museological chat technology despite its obvious limitations within the current technological landscape?”** Currently popular social networking platforms, such as Facebook and Twitter, offer similar features and appear to be a more obvious choice. *I propose that while IRC use can seem retrograde, it is actually a critical technology adoption practice that empirically evades, and analytically highlights the pitfalls of mainstream social media monopolies.* -One aspect or form of recuperation is commodification. Commodification is when -something at some point becomes a commodity to be brought and sold on the -market. Commodification targets authentic things, which are often already -perceived to be valuable – for instance as a moral good – but not yet -recognised as an object of monetary exchange. The loss of authenticity through -commodification produces anxiety in consumers, which can be diagnosed as the -affective trace of capital’s violence. +# Recuperation -To summarise, critique addresses a social problem as a demand. Recuperation is -the implementation of the demand, but in the same movement also the -transformation of the technological context in a way that neutralises the -critique. The requirements that the implementation of the demand has to -paradoxically fulfil are (a.) keeping social peace (repression) constant while -(b.) increasing exploitation (capital accumulation). Commodification is an -aspect or mode of recuperation that often happens in technological -cycles. Commodification targets authentic goods which are outside of the -market, and integrates them into the circulation of commodities. Anxiety is -the byproduct of commodification as the affective trace of capital’s violence. +*Critique and recuperation in technological cycles* is a process of integrating societal demands into the capitalist system. New technologies sometimes embody a demand for a better society and a critique of the existing conditions. While such demands are typically addressed by subsequent versions of the same technology, the same technology is also made to conform to the two main requirements of the capitalist system. These latter two are *the preservation of social peace (i.e. repression), and the intensification of exploitation (i.e. capital accumulation)*. It often happens that the implementation of these two requirements neutralises the societal gains from the demand originally associated with the technology. -## Chat history and other examples of recuperation +One aspect or form of recuperation is *commodification*. Commodification is when something at some point becomes a commodity to be brought and sold on the market. Commodification targets *authentic* things, which are often already perceived to be valuable – for instance as a moral good – but not yet recognised as an object of monetary exchange. The loss of authenticity through commodification produces *anxiety* in consumers, which can be diagnosed as the affective trace of capital’s violence. -Recuperation as a historical logic can be seen at work in a wide range of -technologies, from the history of chat to the development of personal -computing. I concentrate on the history of chat devices because this is the -context of the IRC story. While the history of chat devices is a textbook -example of critique and recuperation in technological cycles, the story of IRC -is a counter-example that shows the possibility of resisting the historical -logic of capitalism. + -Chat devices answered a basic human need to discuss arbitrary topics -informally in a real time environment. After a long and parallel history of -chat devices, in the 1990s they consolidated into IRC (more or less as a -corollary to the consolidation of Layer 2 networks into the Internet). The -next generation of chat devices were Instant Messengers (Maxigas 2014). On the -backend (Stalder 2013), IMs used proprietary protocols and centralised -infrastructures, instead of the community defined protocols of IRC and its -federated model. On the frontend (Stalder 2013), IMs were organised around -private conversations, in stark contrast with IRC’s concept of topical -channels (itself taken from Citizens’ Band – CB – radio). Later, as the World -Wide Web took off, chat features were integrated into Web 2.0 social media -platforms. +# Histories -Eventually, surveillance came to be the key means for both maintaining social -peace and deepening exploitation on social media platforms.1 Everyday, -informal, even intimate gestures are captured and stored, sorted and mined for -the purposes of both targeted advertising and targeted repression. Such -revenue is indispensable to the capital accumulation mechanisms of a growing -section of capital, while the intelligence gained by authorities who share -access to the information flows is essential to the maintenance of social -order in both dictatorships and democracies. All this hinges on successful -platformisation: the ability of a vendor to install themselves as an -obligatory passage point for generally mundane and often minuscule social -interactions (Gillespie 2010). +**Recuperation as a historical logic can be seen at work in a wide range of technologies, from the history of chat to the development of personal computing.** The personal computer was the material expression – or functional implementation – of countercultural ideals of personal freedom in the 1970s [@Markoff2005a; @Turner2006a; @Zandbergen2011a]. The first PCs were constructed by hobbyists, most famously around the Homebrew Computer Club, but just as well by their counterparts in less hyped places such as Yugoslavia by people like Voja Antonić [@Antonic2014a]. Their ideal of *general computing* for everybody was realised to a considerable extent in rich countries, where PCs became available on the civilian market as household goods in the 1980s. Companies whose CEOs sometimes grew up in the Homebrew scene, such as Apple Inc. and the Microsoft Corporation lead this transformation, with considerable support from governments who were convinced by the revolutionary myth of computing legitimised by counterculturalist visions. PCs were interconnected through open standards to form the Internet. While in the 1990s few users built their own hardware any more, FLOSS allowed full control over their software. -The anxiety experienced by users stems from the fact that a supposedly -informal space of social interaction is mediated by capital and overseen by -the state, through mechanisms that look obscure, arbitrary and partial from -below. One can remember that the two defining characteristics of a healthy -civil society that can support technological sovereignty are its independence -from capital and separation from the state (Haché 2014). It is privacy in a -structural and collective sense that can be reclaimed through technological -sovereignty initiatives, but only through the continuous struggle of users for -taking the technological mediation of their social life into their own hands. +The history of the next cycle of personal communication devices – the mobile phones – is in contrast a purely corporate history, culminating in the smartphone. The smartphone, in turn, is far removed from the ideal of user-controlled general computing. Mobile networks are based on protocols whose details are trade secrets; SIM cards which run an operating system remotely controlled by the vendor, and even the popular Android FLOSS ecosystem is tightly coupled to Google Inc. services. While mobiles reach 100% of the global population and thus realised the demand of personal computing for everyone [@IANS2013a], the ideals of general computing and user control that provided the rationale for personal computing have been inversed [@Doctorow2011a]. -It is important to realise that neither chat (Latzko-Toth 2010) nor personal -computing (Levy 1984) were “inventions” in the sense that a good idea was -implemented and socialised through commodity circulation. Both found a -foothold in the market only after a relatively long period where fringe -elements fought for them, often breaking existing laws, regulations and social -norms. Society then slowly tamed these technologies – and now they are used to -pacify society itself. +**Chat devices** answered a basic human need to discuss arbitrary topics informally in a real time environment, in a coffee-house public manner where strangers can band together but there is also possibility for one-to-one private conversations. After a long and parallel history of chat devices, in the 1990s they consolidated into IRC. The next generation of chat devices were *Instant Messengers* [@Maxigas2014b]. On the backend [@Stalder2013a], IMs used proprietary protocols and centralised infrastructures, instead of the community defined protocols of IRC and its federated model. On the frontend [@Stalder2013a], IMs were organised around private conversations, in stark contrast with IRC’s concept of topical channels (itself taken from Citizens’ Band – CB – radio). Later, as the World Wide Web took off, chat features were integrated into Web 2.0 *social media platforms*. -## Backlogs +Eventually, *surveillance* came to be the key means for both maintaining social peace and deepening exploitation on social media platforms. [^3] Everyday, informal, even intimate gestures are captured and stored, sorted and mined for the purposes of both targeted advertising and targeted repression. Such revenue is indispensable to the capital accumulation mechanisms of a growing section of capital, while the intelligence gained by authorities who share access to the information flows is essential to the maintenance of social order in both dictatorships *and* democracies. For instance, surveillance – technically based on the analysis of log files – accounted for 89% of Google’s profit in 2014 [@Griffith2015a]. [^4] All this hinges on successful *platformisation*: the ability of a vendor to install themselves as an obligatory passage point for generally mundane and often minuscule social interactions [@Gillespie2010a]. The kind of digital milieus where average Internet users chit-chat nowadays have been variously described by scholars as *enclosures*, *walled gardens* and *social media monopolies* [@LovinkRasch2013a]. -### As a Human-Computer Interaction limitation +The anxiety experienced by users stems from the fact that a supposedly informal space of social interaction is mediated by capital and overseen by the state, through mechanisms that seem obscure, arbitrary and partial from below. One can remember that the two defining characteristics of a healthy *civil society* that can support technological sovereignty are its independence from capital and separation from the state [@Hache2014d]. It is *privacy* in a structural and collective sense that can be reclaimed through technological sovereignty initiatives, but only through the continuous struggle of users for taking the technological mediation of their social life into their own hands. -IRC is different from many other chat devices in that users can only follow -conversations as long as they are logged in. If a particular user is not -online, there is no way to contact her. Conversely, when a user logs back to a -channel, she has no idea what she missed while she was offline. Due to the -flexibility of the medium, there are many workarounds for the lack of -backlogs, but the fundamental fact remains that solving this problem is out of -scope of the IRC protocol. Network operators could solve the problem if they -wanted, but in practice users are – literally – left to their own devices. +Notably, neither chat [@LatzkoToth2010a] nor personal computing [@Levy1984a] were “inventions” in the sense that a good idea was implemented and socialised through commodity circulation. Both found a foothold in the market only after a relatively long period where fringe elements fought for them, often breaking existing laws, regulations and social norms. Society then slowly tamed these technologies – and now they are used to pacify society itself. -### As a classic affordance +# Backlogs -When IRC was conceived (1988), the lack of backlogs was not a particularly -unique property of IRC - the feature was absent from several other chat -devices. However, by the end of the decade – when the population of the -Internet exploded – it took on a particular significance. While purveyors of -various other services had to look for a business model in order to ensure the -sustainability of their operations – IRC operators were not forced to -commodify their services. Why? +**Logs are consecutive lines of texts that record events and interactions, from logging in a service to a piece of conversation between hitting the Send button.** -Because keeping track of backlogs for each user would mean that resource -utilisation scaled exponentially with the number of users, whereas if the -server only broadcasts new lines as they arrive and then forgets about them, -connecting more users results in little overhead. This is more or less true -for both processing power and storage capacity: the two essential computing -costs to be taken into account when operating services. Similarly, keeping -backlogs would increase the complexity of server software, translating into -increased costs in terms of development and administration work hours. Thus, -the lack of backlogs arguably makes IRC more simple and efficient. +## As a Human-Computer Interaction limitation -How these factors played out historically was that workers at Internet Service -Providers or academic outlets could just let a spare server running in the -corner, without having to justify the expenses to funders or answering too -many questions from their superiors. Under-the-counter IRC hosting can be -thought of as the détournement of fixed capital by users, rather than the -recuperation of users’ demands by capital. Again, in the beginning of the -decade it was usual practice for the Internet community to run popular -services on a volunteer basis, or for institutions to contribute to the -running costs of public infrastructures. However, by the end of the decade the -dotcom bubble was in full swing and users flooded the networks, so that -operating media comparable to the popularity of IRC was serious business. +*IRC is different from many other chat devices in that users can only follow conversations as long as they are logged in.* If a particular user is not online, there is no way to contact her. Conversely, when a user logs back to a channel, she has no idea what she missed while she was offline. Due to the flexibility of the medium, there are many workarounds for the lack of backlogs, but the fundamental fact remains that solving this problem is out of scope of the IRC protocol. Network operators could solve the problem if they wanted, but in practice users are – literally – left to their own devices. -“Scaling” became a buzzword of the era. It referred to the architectural -problem of designing technologies that given enough resources could answer an -arbitrarily large amount of requests, following the growth of the user base -without collapse. The lack of backlogs allowed IRC to keep up with the radical -increase of Internet users and become a mass media of its own. IRC came to be -the most popular dating application before dating websites went online, music -sharing software before the rise and fall of Napster, and micro-blogging -service before Twitter cashed in on hashtags. Users saw nothing geeky or -techie in IRC in the 1990s: it was as commonplace as the ubiquitous GeoCities -home pages. +## As a classic affordance -An anecdote illustrates the relationship of IRC to the burgeoning IT -industry. It was already 1999 when Microsoft included an IRC client in the -default installation of its popular Windows operating system, taking note of -IRC’s mainstream appeal. In the first major attempt to recuperate IRC, the -software was developed by the company’s Artificial Intelligence research unit, -and the application connected automatically to the company’s own IRC -servers. Ironically, the Comic Chat IRC interface was never popular with -users, and the only artifact that went down in history from the whole -enterprise was the Comic Sans font, which is still the laughing stock of -Internet users. Microsoft never figured out how to make money from the largest -online chat phenomena of the time. +When IRC was conceived (1988), the lack of backlogs was not a particularly unique property of IRC. The feature was absent from several other chat devices. However, by the end of the decade it took on a particular significance. **The lack of backlogs allowed IRC to keep up with the radical increase of Internet users and *become a mass media of its own***. In the 1990s IRC was the most popular dating application before dating websites went online, music sharing software before the rise and fall of Napster, [^5] and micro-blogging service before Twitter cashed in on hashtags. Users saw nothing geeky or techie in IRC: it was as quotidian as the ubiquitous GeoCities [^6] home pages. -### As a modern affordance +In the beginning of the 1990s it was usual practice for the Internet community to run popular services on a volunteer basis, or for institutions to contribute to the running costs of public infrastructures. However, by the end of the decade the dot-com bubble [^7] was in full swing and users flooded the networks, so that operating media comparable to the popularity of IRC was serious business. While purveyors of various other services had to look for a business model in order to ensure the sustainability of their operations, IRC operators did not need to commodify their services. Why? -The lack of backlogs came to mean a very different thing in the age of mass -surveillance. For instance, take a sticker from the Riseup collective (the -largest anarchist/activist email provider) on my laptop. It is advertising -their services with the slogan “No Logs, No Masters”. They can disperse with -keeping logs because they are based in the United States: in Europe, the -implementation of the EU Data Retention Directive requires communication -service providers to keep logs. Ironically, IRC is not included in the scope -of the legislation, probably thanks to its obscurity. As I explained earlier, -surveillance (technically based on the analysis of log files) is not only seen -as indispensable for national security, it is also generating the -advertisement revenue of companies like Google, accounting for 89% of its -profits in 2014 (Griffith 2015).2 The kind of digital milieus where average -Internet users chit-chat nowadays have been variously described by scholars as -enclosures, walled gardens and social media monopolies (Lovink and Rasch -2013). +Because keeping track of backlogs for each user would mean that resource utilisation scaled exponentially with the number of users, whereas if the server only broadcasts new lines as they arrive and then forgets about them, connecting more users results in little overhead. This is more or less true for both processing power and storage capacity: the two essential computing costs to be taken into account when operating services. Similarly, keeping backlogs would increase the complexity of server software, translating into increased costs in terms of development and administration work hours. -In contrast, IRC networks are made up of federated servers run by otherwise -unconnected actors, from individual geeks through academic institutions to IT -companies or even criminal organisations. So much so, that upon logging in to -a mainstream IRC network today, it is actually hard to find out who is -sponsoring the resources behind the server. The model of Internet-wise, -community-run, community-policed and community-developed communication -resources may seem atavistic today, when even starry-eyed activists think that -it is impossible to change the world without becoming entrepreneurs and -finding a “sustainable” business model. However, running the infrastructure as -a commons works for IRC just as well as in the 1990s. It allows users to -understand and control the media they use to share and collaborate: an -essential condition for nurturing technological sovereignty. +How these factors played out historically was that workers at Internet Service Providers or academic outlets could just let a spare server running in the corner, without having to justify the expenses to funders or answering too many questions from their superiors. Under-the-counter IRC hosting can be thought of as the détournement of fixed capital by users, rather than the recuperation of users’ demands by capital. An anecdote illustrates the relationship of IRC to the burgeoning IT industry. -The late Fidel Castro said that “a revolution is not a bed of roses. A -revolution is a struggle between the future and the past.” Here, we could say -the past and the present. Like Cuba, despite IRC’s relevant affordances that -answer to the burning questions of the day, both are increasingly -anachronistic in the context of the contemporary technological and political -landscape. Using, maintaining, and developing IRC became increasingly -cumbersome: like building a veritable time machine that can bring back -techno-political conditions from the past. +It was already 1996 when Microsoft included an IRC client in the default installation of its popular Windows operating system, taking note of IRC’s mainstream appeal. [@KurlanderSkellySalesin1996a] In the first major attempt to recuperate IRC, the software was developed by the company’s Artificial Intelligence research unit, and the application connected automatically to the company’s own IRC servers. [@LatzkoToth2010a] Ironically, the Comic Chat IRC interface was never popular with users, and the only artifact that went down in history from the whole enterprise was the Comic Sans font, which is still the laughing stock of Internet users. Microsoft never figured out how to make money from the largest online chat phenomena of the time. -The same feature that allowed IRC to become a mass media in the 1990s actually -prevents it from mainstream adoption in the 2010s. Users dropping into a -channel, asking a question, then leaving in frustration 20 minutes later are a -case in point. These lamers living in the age of mobile connectivity cannot -keep their IRC clients logged in for hours on end, like the owners of desktop -computers once did, and IRC users who have access to always-on servers do -today. Now, only relatively sophisticated users get the full IRC experience, -and feel part of the chat channels community. Such elitism excludes less -motivated users, but keeps the conversation within the circles of those “who -care about the quality of the material”:3 active members of peer production -communities. +IRC networks have no corporate overlords. Instead, they are made up of federated servers run by otherwise unconnected actors, from individual geeks through academic institutions to IT companies or even criminal organisations. So much so, that upon logging in to a mainstream IRC network today, it is actually hard to find out who is sponsoring the resources behind the server. The model of Internet-wise, community-run, community-policed and community-developed communication resources may seem atavistic today, when even starry-eyed activists think that it is impossible to change the world without becoming entrepreneurs and finding a “sustainable” business model. However, running the infrastructure as a commons works for IRC just as well as in the 1990s. It allows users to understand and control the media they use to share and collaborate: an essential condition for nurturing *technological sovereignty*. -## Conclusions +## As a modern affordance -It seems that technical deficiencies can have positive social -consequences. The same limitation – the lack of backlogs – that allowed IRC to -become a mass media in the 1990s, prevents its mass adoption in the -2010s. However, it also poses problems for data mining and surveillance, which -eventually forestalls its recuperation. As a user-controlled technology, it -now plays an important part in the media ecology of the Internet, as the -everyday backstage communication platform for peer production communities. +**The same feature that allowed IRC to become a mass media in the 1990s actually *prevents its from mainstream adoption in the 2010s***. Users dropping into a channel, asking a question, then leaving in frustration 20 minutes later are a case in point. These *lamers* living in the age of mobile connectivity cannot keep their IRC clients logged in for hours on end, like the owners of desktop computers once did, and IRC users who have access to always-on servers do today. Now, only relatively sophisticated users get the full IRC experience, and feel part of the chat channels community. Such elitism excludes less motivated users, but keeps the conversation within active members of peer production communities. -These relatively sophisticated user groups benefit from the simplicity, -flexibility and open architecture of the medium, which allows them to -customise it to their needs. Conversely, most Internet users are used to be -served by corporate social media platforms that cater to their needs -effortlessly. The contrast between the two approaches to technology adoption -begs the question whether it is more desirable to work for the democratisation -of knowledge or merely the democratisation of technology. +FLOSS developers, Anonymous hacktivists, Wikipedia editors and hackerspace members adopted IRC as their backstage communication channels. By now it is the only contemporary chat device on the Internet that allows informal, largely public, topic-centric discussions in a non-commercial environment free of state oversight and corporate exploitation. These criteria are paramount to groups that work together to produce for the common good and which deal with sensitive topics. Of course, topical, public, informal discussions were the original demand behind the popularity of chat devices. -The lack of backlogs helped to build technological sovereignity for Internet -users for a decade and later sheltered peer producers from the capitalist -requirements of exploitation and repression. Those who care about IRC had to -navigate a terrain of changing social conditions – including rifts in the -technological landscape and paradigm shifts in political economy – which -recontextualised the significance of technical features and limitations. The -contemporary use of IRC is based on properties and patterns of the medium that -were commonplace in the 1990s but were superseded by more capitalist media -since then. Therefore, it can be conceptualised as a time machine which brings -past technological and political conditions to the present, with surprising -consequences.4 +However, through three cycles, features and affordances shifted towards personal conversations with people that you already know, while even group chat features came to be tightly coupled to surveillance. Chat devices are available for all today, yet historical changes undermined the original demands and the social critique that saw chat as a place for congregation and collaboration free from the interference of the state and capital. In light of these developments, the lack of backlogs – that makes surveillance technically complicated – came to mean a very different thing: it still protected the *technological sovereignty* of user groups, but only those that invested time and energy to hold on to it. -## Bibliography + -Broughton, John. 2008. Wikipedia: The Missing Manual. 1st ed. O’Reilly Media. +# Conclusions -Coleman, Gabriella. 2012. Coding Freedom: The Ethics and Aesthetics of -Hacking. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. +**It seems that technical deficiencies can have positive social consequences**. The same limitation – the lack of backlogs – that allowed IRC to become a mass media in the 1990s, prevents its mass adoption in the 2010s. However, it also poses problems for data mining and surveillance, which eventually forestalls its recuperation. As a user-controlled technology, it now plays an important part in the media ecology of the Internet, as the everyday backstage communication platform for peer production communities. -Dagdelen, Demet. 2012. “Anonymous, WikiLeaks and Operation Payback: A Path to -Political Action Through IRC and Twitter.” Paper presented at the IPP2012: Big -Data, Big Challenges?, Oxford Internet Institute, Oxford, -UK. http://ipp.oii.ox.ac.uk/sites/ipp.oii.ox.ac.uk/files/documents/Dagdelen2.pdf. +These relatively sophisticated user groups benefit from the simplicity, flexibility and open architecture of the medium, which allows them to customise it to their needs. Conversely, most Internet users are used to be served by corporate social media platforms that cater to their needs effortlessly. The contrast between the two approaches to technology adoption begs the question **whether it is more desirable to work for the democratisation of knowledge or merely the democratisation of technology**. -Fuchs, Christian. 2012. “Google Capitalism.” TripleC: Cognition, -Communication, Co-Operation 10 (1): 42–48. +*The lack of backlogs helped to build technological sovereignty for Internet users for a decade and later sheltered peer producers from the capitalist requirements of exploitation and repression.* Those who care about IRC had to navigate a terrain of changing social conditions – including rifts in the technological landscape and paradigm shifts in political economy – which recontextualised the significance of technical features and limitations. The contemporary use of IRC is based on properties and patterns of the medium that were commonplace in the 1990s but were superseded by more capitalist media since then. Therefore, it can be conceptualised as a *time machine* which brings past technological and political conditions to the present, with surprising consequences. [^8] -Gillespie, Tarleton. 2010. “The Politics of ‘Platforms’.” New Media & Society -12 (3): 347–364. doi:10.1177/1461444809342738. +# Bibliography -Griffith, Erin. 2015. “Bad News for Google Parent Alphabet: The ‘G’ Will Still -Foot the Bill.” Article in Forbes -Magazine. http://fortune.com/2015/08/10/google-ads-money/. +[^1]: A gentle introduction is @Bango2013a, while activists may find @AI2017a useful for a jump start. -Haché, Alex. 2014. “Technological Sovereignty.” Passarelle 11 (11): -165–171. http://www.coredem.info/rubrique48.html. +[^2]: Free and Open Source Software. -Ippolita. 2015. The Facebook Aquarium: The Resistible Rise of -Anarcho-Capitalism. Revised and updated English edition. Theory on -Demand 15. Amsterdam: Institute for Network -Cultures. http://networkcultures.org/blog/publication/no-15-in-the-facebook-aquarium-the-resistible-rise-of-anarcho-capitalism-ippolita/. +[^3]: “The legacy of the 20th century has accustomed us to think that social control pertains only to the political, but it has long since become primarily an economic question of commercial implications. It is no coincidence that the NSA has made use of the collaboration with Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Apple and so on, to obtain data for the surveillance program PRISM.” [@Ippolita2015a 7] -Latzko-Toth, Guillaume. 2010. “Metaphors of Synchrony: Emergence -Differentiation of Online Chat Devices.” Bulletin of Science, Technology & -Society 30 (5): -362–374. doi:10.1177/0270467610380005. http://bst.sagepub.com/content/30/5/362.short. +[^4]: “Google is a profit-oriented, advertising-financed moneymaking machine that turns users and their data into a commodity.” [@Fuchs2012b 47] -Levy, Steven. 1984. Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution. Anchor Press, -Doubleday. +[^5]: The software and company that brought peer-to-peer file sharing into the limelight and folded after a much publicised copyright controversy (1999-2002). -Lovink, Geert, and Miriam Rasch. 2013. Unlike Us Reader: Social Media -Monopolies and Their Alternatives. INC Reader #8. Institute of Network -Cultures. http://gen.lib.rus.ec/book/index.php?md5=C5785D014EFDDBB415354677C0FF7A8A. +[^6]: Popular free web hosting service (1994-2009) that allowed users to upload their own websites: “an important outlet for personal expression on the Web for almost 15 years” according to the Internet Archive [-@Archive2009a]. -Maxigas. 2014. “History of Real Time Chat Protocols.” Relay#70 Panel F -(February). http://relay70.metatron.ai/history-of-real-time-chat-protocols.html. - -———. 2015. “Peer Production of Open Hardware: Unfinished Artefacts and -Architectures in the Hackerspaces.” PhD thesis, Barcelona: Universitat Oberta -de Catalunya, Internet Interdisciplinary -Institute. https://research.metatron.ai/maxigas_dissertation.pdf. - -Stalder, Felix. 2013. “Between Democracy and Spectacle: The Front and the Back -of the Social Web.” In Unlike Us Reader: Social Media Monopolies and Their -Alternatives, ed. Geert Lovink and Miriam Rasch. INC Reader #8. Amsterdam: -Institute of Network Cultures. http://felix.openflows.com/node/223. +[^7]: A speculative investment bubble (1996-2001) inflated by the growth of the World Wide Web and burst because it was not clear how companies offering online services could turn a profit on traffic. +[^8]: With the support of a postdoctoral grant from the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) and the sponsorship of the Central European University Foundation, Budapest (CEUBPF) for a fellowship at the Center for Media, Data and Society in the School of Public Policy. diff --git a/en/content/10gamification.md b/en/content/10gamification.md index 3ee4325..c3d45dc 100644 --- a/en/content/10gamification.md +++ b/en/content/10gamification.md @@ -150,7 +150,7 @@ interactions with the device. Habitual behaviour is manifested in a cycle. ## Give us our game back! -We need to approach the concept of cognitive ergonomics ( from ancient Greek +We need to approach the concept of cognitive ergonomics (from ancient Greek “ergon – nomos”, “rules of the labor”): thanks to the digital media, we can lower our cognitive load and, for example, and delegate to some device the task of remembering all the dates and numbers of our agenda. A very useful @@ -265,9 +265,9 @@ not always. Training is more effective in that buttons will be pressed down more frequently if the positive reinforcement is not automatic, but possible or probable. A common example with humans is provided by gamblers at slot machines almost everywhere: players know that they will not always win, if -ever, yet they continue to chip in, because the operant conditioning (I can -win) is more powerful than immediate frustration (I did not win this -time). Behavioural training is perhaps the greatest deceit in gamification, +ever, yet they continue to chip in, because the operant conditioning (“I can +win”) is more powerful than immediate frustration (“I did not win this +time”). Behavioural training is perhaps the greatest deceit in gamification, and it is standard to video games and in fact, any other type of game. The interaction with digital media needs not necessarily to be limited to a @@ -346,15 +346,11 @@ behaviors. Finally, the fourth step is to compare our stories with those of others. Very often we find that our compulsive habits are very much similar to those of our peers, but we also discover that there exists a great many ways to make a -change - as long as we do really want it. +change – as long as we do really want it. -[^1]: “The Performance Society”, in Ippolita, In the Facebook Aquarium, INC, -Amsterdam, 2015, p. 23. +[^1]: “The Performance Society”, in Ippolita, In the Facebook Aquarium, INC, Amsterdam, 2015, p. 23. -[^2]: Flow, or in the zone / in the groove. See Mihály Csíkszentmihály, Flow: -the Psychology of optimal experience, Harper & Row, New York 1990. +[^2]: Flow, or in the zone / in the groove. See Mihály Csíkszentmihály, Flow: the Psychology of optimal experience, Harper & Row, New York 1990. + +[^3]: A brief introduction can be found in S. A. McLeod: Skinner: Operant Conditioning. 2015. https://www.simplypsychology.org/operant-conditioning.html The classic work is B. F. Skinner: Science and human behavior. 1953. http://www.bfskinner.org/newtestsite/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/ScienceHumanBehavior.pdf -[^3]: A brief introduction can be found in McLeod, S. A. (2015). Skinner: -Operant Conditioning. Retrieved from: -https://www.simplypsychology.org/operant-conditioning.html The classic work is -Skinner, B. F. (1953). Science and human behavior. http://www.bfskinner.org/newtestsite/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/ScienceHumanBehavior.pdf diff --git a/en/content/11rats.md b/en/content/11rats.md index 53912d6..f6efc6a 100644 --- a/en/content/11rats.md +++ b/en/content/11rats.md @@ -112,19 +112,19 @@ traditions have an already inherently environmental, sustainable and holistic foundation. We need technologies that create well-being, beauty and community. -## Re-appropriated Technologies from personal experience +## Re-appropriated technologies from personal experience Over the past 10 years I have tried to carry the theory into practice, I have adapted and changed my ways, I have created protocols and free licenses that -defend our Re-appropriated technologies. I have tried to generate collective +defend our re-appropriated technologies. I have tried to generate collective workshops where people exchange experiences and skills and which could extend to productive activity that will cover basic needs and enrich the communities. -I have discovered an existing market niche for Re-appropriated technologies: +I have discovered an existing market niche for re-appropriated technologies: one way to describe it would be “in order to be productive and sustainable, a producer of organic walnuts or almonds has no intermediate solution between a nut-cracker and a super machine costing thousands of Euros. Re-appropriated -Technologies would occupy that space, adapting to the user and to their +technologies would occupy that space, adapting to the user and to their environment”. Society as a whole, and the majority of social movements, have not defended diff --git a/en/content/12cooperatives.md b/en/content/12cooperatives.md index 3c814f3..232e406 100644 --- a/en/content/12cooperatives.md +++ b/en/content/12cooperatives.md @@ -258,18 +258,15 @@ These challenges give a comprehensible vision of the times to come, and the creation of these autonomous zones opens possibilities to different ways of understanding work, the commons, sustainability and economy. -[^0]: As a reminder, free technologies, in a nutshell, are the technologies - and services based on the freedom given by free/libre software and it’s - philosophy: +[^0]: As a reminder, free technologies, in a nutshell, are the technologies and services based on the freedom given by free/libre software and it’s philosophy: - * **Freedom 0**: The freedom to run the program for any purpose. - * **Freedom 1**: The freedom to study how the program works, and change it to - make it do what you wish. - * **Freedom 2**: The freedom to redistribute and make copies so you can help - your neighbour. - * **Freedom 3**: The freedom to improve the program, and release your - improvements (and modified versions in general) to the public, so that - the whole community benefits. +* **Freedom 0**: The freedom to run the program for any purpose. + +* **Freedom 1**: The freedom to study how the program works, and change it to make it do what you wish. + +* **Freedom 2**: The freedom to redistribute and make copies so you can help your neighbour. + +* **Freedom 3**: The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements (and modified versions in general) to the public, so that the whole community benefits. [^1]: * http://riseup.net (USA) * http://autistici.org (ITA)