Data Based is a weekly Cyborgology feature producing original, insightful, and fun data visualizations.
technology
“There’s a strong, specifically technocratic conflation between efficiency and good in Silicon Valley”
“Drones date online, but drones don’t think about it the way that humans do”
“The Work of Art in the Age of the Internet”
“We have a billion folks using our services now, and we want to get to 3 or 5 billion one day”
“Throughout Zuckerberg’s talk, people and Facebook friends were used interchangeably“
“There’s a stereotypical Pinterest user and I can’t escape the feeling that it is what I have become”
Nathan is on Twitter [@nathanjurgenson] and Tumblr [nathanjurgenson.com]. more...
IBM’s SAGE, a large semi-automated air defense system from the Cold War era. C/o Wikimedia Commons I just left my department’s colloquium lecture series where Dr. Virginia Eubanks from SUNY- Albany was giving an excellent talk on the computer systems that administer and control (to varying degrees) earned benefits programs like social security, Medicaid, and Medicare. The talk was really fascinating and a question from Dr. Abby Kinchy during the Q&A really stuck with me: How do we study different (and often long-outdated) versions of software? Particularly, how do we chart the design of software that runs on huge closed networks owned by large companies or governments? Are these decisions lost to history, or are there methods for ferreting out Ross Perot’s old wares? more...
“Twitter seems to be making aspects of academic practice more visible”
“as long as people want to be seen reading, things to read will be printed”
“photos are disposable records of moments, to be taken in bulk and largely forgotten and unshared”
““It made it more real to folks,” he said. “There’s nothing like a hundred YouTube videos to do that””
“This makes the drone the greatest champion of neoliberal practices”
“The False Distinction Between “Online” And “The Real”
“The great sin of Facebook is that it made “like” far too important and too obvious”
“he is siphoning off my very lifeblood in the service of charging his Apple-issued heart replacement”
“Cyborg writing is the first instant of picking up the tools”
“Shaw thought the videos looked “pre-viral” and saw an opportunity to exploit them”
“Sandberg assumes that the feminist question is simply, how can I be a more successful worker?”
Nathan is on Twitter [@nathanjurgenson] and Tumblr [nathanjurgenson.com]. more...
“The primacy of contemplation over activity rests on the conviction that no work of human hands can equal in beauty and truth the physical kosmos, which swings in itself in changeless eternity without nay interference or assistance from outside, from man or god.” –Hannah Arendt in The Human Condition
Praxis Exploding, Image c/o Paramount Pictures I’ve been thinking a lot about methods lately. I want to spend a few paragraphs considering the current state of affairs for social scientists interested in science and technology as their objects of analysis. What kind of work is impossible in our current universities? What kinds of new institutions are necessary for breaking new ground in method as well as theory? Think of this post as an exercise in McLuhan-style probing of institutions of higher learning. I’m going to play with a lot of “what-ifs” and “for instances.” None of this is particularly actionable, nor am I even interested in proposing anything that would be recognized as “realistic” or even “pragmatic.” Mainly, I’m interested in stepping back, considering the state of our technosociety, and asking what kinds of questions need asking and what kinds of science is being systematically left undone. more...
This is the second installment of Data Based, a weekly Cyborgology feature producing original, insightful, and fun data visualizations.
“If autonomous vehicles obey traffic laws, income from traffic violations should go down”
“Tumblr encourages unbounded use. It allows you to experiment and play”
“Drones as killer robots, drones as children sent off to war”
“if engineers could come up with an iPotty that fits in your purse, links up to Twitter and takes photos, toilet access might catch up with phones” (thanks jenny!)
Nathan is on Twitter [@nathanjurgenson] and Tumblr [nathanjurgenson.com]. more...
Data Based is a brand new Cyborgology feature producing original, insightful, and fun data visualizations.
“It’s a fair guess that the attorneys in the Cannibal Cop case have never heard of digital dualism”
“our discomfort with Google Glass is drawn by body horror, not fear of surveillance institutions”
“the cultural and technological impact of Grindr is much broader than most people realize”
“A future of frictionless, continuous shopping fits with Google’s vision for the world”
“we really don’t have a choice between mediated and unmediated experience”
“with Silicon Valley at the helm, our life will become one long California highway”
“Is a tweet labor? Is a Facebook post labor?”
“Drone makers have been courting the paparazzi”
“there is no good pre-internet metaphor for what it’s trying to do”
“Drones permit and accelerate new topographies of warfare”
“we might someday wonder why our childhood memories are held under DRM”
Nathan is on Twitter [@nathanjurgenson] and Tumblr [nathanjurgenson.com]. more...
“There’s a strong, specifically technocratic conflation between efficiency and good in Silicon Valley”
“Drones date online, but drones don’t think about it the way that humans do”
“The Work of Art in the Age of the Internet”
“We have a billion folks using our services now, and we want to get to 3 or 5 billion one day”
“Throughout Zuckerberg’s talk, people and Facebook friends were used interchangeably“
“There’s a stereotypical Pinterest user and I can’t escape the feeling that it is what I have become”
Nathan is on Twitter [@nathanjurgenson] and Tumblr [nathanjurgenson.com]. more...
I just left my department’s colloquium lecture series where Dr. Virginia Eubanks from SUNY- Albany was giving an excellent talk on the computer systems that administer and control (to varying degrees) earned benefits programs like social security, Medicaid, and Medicare. The talk was really fascinating and a question from Dr. Abby Kinchy during the Q&A really stuck with me: How do we study different (and often long-outdated) versions of software? Particularly, how do we chart the design of software that runs on huge closed networks owned by large companies or governments? Are these decisions lost to history, or are there methods for ferreting out Ross Perot’s old wares? more...
“Twitter seems to be making aspects of academic practice more visible”
“as long as people want to be seen reading, things to read will be printed”
“photos are disposable records of moments, to be taken in bulk and largely forgotten and unshared”
““It made it more real to folks,” he said. “There’s nothing like a hundred YouTube videos to do that””
“This makes the drone the greatest champion of neoliberal practices”
“The False Distinction Between “Online” And “The Real”
“The great sin of Facebook is that it made “like” far too important and too obvious”
“he is siphoning off my very lifeblood in the service of charging his Apple-issued heart replacement”
“Cyborg writing is the first instant of picking up the tools”
“Shaw thought the videos looked “pre-viral” and saw an opportunity to exploit them”
“Sandberg assumes that the feminist question is simply, how can I be a more successful worker?”
Nathan is on Twitter [@nathanjurgenson] and Tumblr [nathanjurgenson.com]. more...
“The primacy of contemplation over activity rests on the conviction that no work of human hands can equal in beauty and truth the physical kosmos, which swings in itself in changeless eternity without nay interference or assistance from outside, from man or god.” –Hannah Arendt in The Human Condition
I’ve been thinking a lot about methods lately. I want to spend a few paragraphs considering the current state of affairs for social scientists interested in science and technology as their objects of analysis. What kind of work is impossible in our current universities? What kinds of new institutions are necessary for breaking new ground in method as well as theory? Think of this post as an exercise in McLuhan-style probing of institutions of higher learning. I’m going to play with a lot of “what-ifs” and “for instances.” None of this is particularly actionable, nor am I even interested in proposing anything that would be recognized as “realistic” or even “pragmatic.” Mainly, I’m interested in stepping back, considering the state of our technosociety, and asking what kinds of questions need asking and what kinds of science is being systematically left undone. more...
This is the second installment of Data Based, a weekly Cyborgology feature producing original, insightful, and fun data visualizations.
“If autonomous vehicles obey traffic laws, income from traffic violations should go down”
“Tumblr encourages unbounded use. It allows you to experiment and play”
“Drones as killer robots, drones as children sent off to war”
“if engineers could come up with an iPotty that fits in your purse, links up to Twitter and takes photos, toilet access might catch up with phones” (thanks jenny!)
Nathan is on Twitter [@nathanjurgenson] and Tumblr [nathanjurgenson.com]. more...
Data Based is a brand new Cyborgology feature producing original, insightful, and fun data visualizations.
“It’s a fair guess that the attorneys in the Cannibal Cop case have never heard of digital dualism”
“our discomfort with Google Glass is drawn by body horror, not fear of surveillance institutions”
“the cultural and technological impact of Grindr is much broader than most people realize”
“A future of frictionless, continuous shopping fits with Google’s vision for the world”
“we really don’t have a choice between mediated and unmediated experience”
“with Silicon Valley at the helm, our life will become one long California highway”
“Is a tweet labor? Is a Facebook post labor?”
“Drone makers have been courting the paparazzi”
“there is no good pre-internet metaphor for what it’s trying to do”
“Drones permit and accelerate new topographies of warfare”
“we might someday wonder why our childhood memories are held under DRM”
Nathan is on Twitter [@nathanjurgenson] and Tumblr [nathanjurgenson.com]. more...