Critical Algorithmic Studies
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Recent papers in Critical Algorithmic Studies
Der hier vorliegende ethnographische Text untersucht negative soziale Dynamiken, die durch die Nutzung sozialer Medien entstehen können. Das empirische Material basiert auf Feldforschungen, die zwischen 2013 und 2015 sowohl online als... more
Two definitions of algorithm, their uses, and their implied models of computing in society, are reviewed. The first, termed the structural programming definition, aligns more with usage in computer science, and as the name suggests, the... more
O artigo descreve e problematiza acerca da agência material dos atores não-humanos que compõem a plataforma de publicação direta da Amazon. Defende-se o argumento de que os algoritmos desempenham um importante papel nessa complexa rede,... more
Contemporary power manifests in the algorithmic. And yet this power seems incomprehensible: understood as code, it becomes apolitical; understood as a totality, it becomes overwhelming. This book takes an alternate approach, using it to... more
In 2016 Instagram integrated personalization algorithms into its system, promising to show the moments they believe we will care about the most. The platform's personalization logic and its commercial nature raise concerns regarding the... more
Am Anfang steht der Verdacht. All die polarisierenden Schlagzeilen, all die datengeladenen Infografiken, all die wütenden Ästhetisierungen des Protestes, je mehr wir uns diesem bildgewaltigen Geschrei sozialer Medien zuwenden, es... more
Although the cultural and social purpose of algorithms is the object of much public debate and contestation, their function is often compared with that of a renowned figure in the intellectual milieu: the curator. In this article I want... more
This study uses various conceptual definitions of control as an analytical lens to explore the Netflix platform. We experiment with various questions of control to examine how control is enacted on Netflix, how it is embedded in different... more
Esta dissertação tem por objetivo tecnografar as agências algorítmicas atreladas ao preço dinâmico da Uber a partir das dimensões retórica/narrativa, material/infraestrutural e afetiva/imaginária que o constituem. Mais especificamente,... more
The paper examines the intersection of technological design of Social Media communication, the notion of post-politics-affective turn in contemporary (Western) societies and the rise of populism as a trend in political communication.... more
O objetivo desta tese de doutorado é analisar o processo de "plataformização" do jornalismo pelo Facebook, com foco nas disputas e controvérsias em torno das parcerias comerciais, tecnológicas e editoriais estabelecidas entre a plataforma... more
Discourse analysts have worked on digital data for decades now (see Herring, 1999; Thurlow & Mroczek 2011), initially treating digital data as human texts (Blitvich & Bou-Franch, 2018), then increasingly as human, multimodal interaction... more
This dissertation traces the rise of digitally-driven policing technologies in order to make sense of how prevailing logics of governance are transformed by ubiquitous computing technology. Beginning in the early 1990s, police departments... more
Currently discussed under the term “echo chambers,” online networks reproduce gender and racial biases, as well as reinforcing social and economic inequalities embedded within society. As online communities have become more homogeneous,... more
From the recommendation of cultural content to the identification of potential criminals, a growing number of activities are ordinarily delegated to algorithms and AI systems. These are narrated as neutral technologies which make complex... more
Deleuze erweist sich in dieser Arbeit als einer der systematischsten Denker des Poststrukturalismus. Übernahmen aus der Mathematik durchziehen seine gesamte Philosophie – eine radikal immanent denkende Prozessphilosophie, die durchgehend... more
We are all living algorithmic lives. Our lives are not just media rich, they increasingly take place in and throu algorithmically programmed media landscape.[1] Algorithms, as a result of digitalisation and th computerisation of the... more
The alt-right, the different chapters of the pan-European movement Generation Identity and the rise of the so-called radical right populist parties in the West have been responsible for the renewed interest in the metapolitical project of... more
Moral critiques of computational algorithms seem divided between two paradigms. One seeks to demonstrate how an opaque and unruly algorithmic power violates moral values and harms users’ autonomy; the other underlines the systematicity of... more
Deleuze erweist sich in dieser Arbeit als einer der systematischsten Denker des Poststrukturalismus. Ubernahmen aus der Mathematik durchziehen seine gesamte Philosophie – eine radikal immanent denkende Prozessphilosophie, die durchgehend... more
Syllabus. “Big data” describes everything from weather satellites to Google search histories and Twitter feeds. “Data exhaust” — the “waste” information we leave behind about ourselves whenever we use computers or cellphones — has become... more
Deleuze's Postscript on the Societies of Control has been the most common entry point for interrogating the ways in which contemporary digital technologies have altered the social and the subjective from a Deleuzo-Guattarian perspective.... more
This paper proposes situated data analysis as a new method for analysing social media platforms and digital apps. An analysis of the fitness tracking app Strava is used as a case study to develop and illustrate the method. Building upon... more
This article addresses the need to find alternative ways to envision, develop and govern public service media's (PSM) online services and data-driven systems. By critically discussing both opportunities and shortcomings of how European... more
Our objective in this paper is to present and discuss the complexification of the process of platformization of journalism by Facebook, triggered by the implementation of the Facebook Journalism Project (FJP), in January 2017. Since... more
Over the past decade, commercial social media platforms have scaled up, in terms of the number of users, and scaled out, in terms of integration into public life, taking on infrastructural significance. This paper adapts sociologist... more
How is life mapped, analyzed, and regulated through the algorithmic? This text investigates a particular algorithmic object—Palantir Gotham, a platform promising to uncover insights from vast amounts of information. Developed initially... more
Algorithmic vision, the computational process of making meaning from digital images or visual information, has changed the relationship between the image and the human subject. In this paper, I explicate on the role of algorithmic vision... more
This is a statement at the broadest level of abstraction of my basic concerns and research interests. The particular objects and practices I study are not mentioned except in passing. It is a revised version of the conclusion of the... more
Platform companies that intermediate on-demand labour markets, usually described as gig economy platforms, are currently at the forefront of debates about the future of work. It has been widely documented in the literature that major gig... more
Under conditions of so-called Platform Capitalism, software and algorithms undertake the important task of designing the interaction amongst online users and establishing criteria of relevance for content. As such, they operate as... more
The Like button is simultaneously a means of social interaction and a tool to evaluate social media content. Likes are built into the infrastructure of platforms, fueling personalized searches, recommendations, and targeted advertisements... more
This article deals with choice-inducing algorithms-algorithms that are explicitly designed to affect people's choices. Based on an ethnographic account of three Israeli data analytics companies, I explore how algorithms are being designed... more
In this paper we explore how digital marketers think about marketing in the age of Big Data surveillance, automatic computational analyses and algorithmic shaping of choice contexts. Our starting point is a contradiction at the heart of... more
The growing ubiquity of algorithms in everyday life has prompted cross-disciplinary interest in what people know about algorithms. The purpose of this article is to build on this growing literature by highlighting a particular way of... more
Nosso objetivo neste artigo é apresentar e discutir a complexificação do processo de plataformização do jornalismo pelo Facebook, a partir da implementação do Facebook Journalism Project (FJP), em janeiro de 2017. Desde então, a... more
Hate speech and toxic communication online is on the rise. Responses to this issue tend to offer technical (automated) or non-technical (human content moderation) solutions, or see hate speech as a natural product of hateful people. In... more
Under conditions of so-called Platform Capitalism, software and algorithms undertake the important task of designing the interaction amongst online users and establishing criteria of relevance for content. As such, they operate as... more
O artigo mapeia o significado e as qualidades atribuídas ao “dado” nos documentos destinados aos usuários e investidores da Fitbit, terceira maior plataforma no setor global de vestíveis. Foram analisados o relatório financeiro (IPO) do... more
This commentary is part of Salter MB (ed) et al. (2019) Horizon Scan: Critical security studies for the next 50 years. Security Dialogue 50(4_suppl): 9-37. Digital data matter for (in)security practice. And yet they remain ‘neglected... more
This article conceptualizes algorithmic consumer culture, and offers a framework that sheds new light on two previously conflicting theorizations: that (1) digitalization tends to liquefy consumer culture and thus acts primarily as an... more