Affective Publics and Defective Politics

This post was written by Dylan O’Sullivan, a Research Masters student in New Media and Digital Culture at the University of Amsterdam. I. #CancelSpotify In the words of Bloomberg columnist Lionel Laurent, Spotify is having a “Facebook moment” (Ghosh, 2022). On the 1st of January, a group of scientific and medical professionals published “An Open…

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Expectations of the Transparency Agenda in Brazil

This post was written by Sandy Rafaela Krambeck, a Master’s student in New Media and Digital Culture at the University of Amsterdam. Brazil established its Access to Information Law (LAI) in 2012, which opened up possibilities to develop databases that can be subjected to new experiences with Artificial Intelligence (AI). Operação Serenata de Amor (OSA)…

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Quality Over Quantity: COVID-19 community data

This post was written by Anniek de Koning, research master student in Media Studies at the University of Amsterdam ‘To measure is to know’ is the mantra that underlies the increase in the collection of data that can be tracked, monitored, or analyzed. Datafication played a big role in the battle against the COVID-19 pandemic…

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Podcasts as Public Media: Challenges in the Age of Platforms

This post was written by Emma Breuer, Research Master student in Media Studies at the University of Amsterdam To provide the general public with up-to-date and scientifically-backed answers to pressing questions about COVID-19, local German public radio broadcaster NDR launched the daily podcast ‘Das Coronavirus-Update’ with virologist Christian Drosten in February 2020. With 15 millions…

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Digital Health Tracking – Private Choice or Public Necessity?

This post was written by Vanessa Richter, Research Master student in Media Studies at the University of Amsterdam Since their inception, commercial digital health tracking (DHT) platforms, such as Apple Health and Google-owned Fitbit, pushed towards adoption by public institutions. We’re seeing them reimagine public health today through public-private partnerships. While DHT might still be…

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Negation as the Informed Practice for Action: Exploring the Politics of Refusal in the Context of COVID-19

This post was written by Dieuwertje Luitse, Research Master student in Media Studies (New Media & Digital Culture) at the University of Amsterdam The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the global deployment of data-driven healthcare technologies (e.g., contact tracing apps) to mitigate the spread of the virus (Ada Lovelace Institute, 2021; Chiusi, 2020). However, as a…

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Shadowbanning in Relation to (De)platformization

This post was written by Laura Köpping, research master’s student at the Media Studies Department of the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Amsterdam “Help, I think I’ve been shadowbanned!” Posts like this seem to have increased in frequency on platforms like Instagram, TikTok and Twitter. These posts refer to a phenomenon that a…

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