The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society

https://repository.tudelft.nl/islandora/object/uuid%3A17c5e959-3f00-404c-b4db-748968bdcc2c/datastream/OBJ/download

Blockchain in government: Benefits and implications of distributed ledger technology for information sharing

The Dialectics of Seeing: Walter Benjamin and the Arcades Project

erhaps because networking and microcomputer companies have been so successful during the past few years, the current tendency in Washington, D C , is to give the industrial sector all the credit for the grand successeq in computing of the past half-century In fact, at least as much of the technology that has driven this revolution originated in acadernid, and much 01 the research in both sectors would not have been under taken without the far sighted support of the U S government By far the largest Federal supporter of computer R&D has been the Information Processing Techniques Office of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa, or, during the first couple years of the Clinton administration, themselves in military terms alone Examples of Darpa-sponsored technologies employed effectively by the Pentagon include such military computer networks as Milnet and Simnet, graphically oriented flight simulators used by the U S Air Force, packet-switching radio and satellite systems for a digital military communications system, and advanced command-and-control systems, among many others Darpa originated in 1958 as a response to the Soviet Union's launch of the first spacc satcllite, Sputnik In setting up the agency, President Dwight D Eisenhower's intention was to transcend the rivalries among the military services in advanced research and development The agency's early years were devoted to the space program and nuclear test verification, and it was not until 1962 that the Information Processing Techniques office was formed But the computing program grew with a vengeance, and within a year its expcriditures were large1 than dll other U S government outlays on computing R&D combined The influence of Darpa's computing office h a s been most not iceable in breakthrough technologies In t h e 19605, for example, it supported the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Project MAC, which built the first timesharing computer The result was that

Inventing the internet

Liberation technology

Bitcoin is a decentralised currency and payment system that seeks to eliminate the need for trusted authorities. It relies on a peer-to-peer network and cryptographic protocols to perform the functions of traditional financial intermediaries, such as verifying transactions and preserving the integrity of the system. This article examines the political economy of Bitcoin, in light of a recent dispute that divided the Bitcoin community with regard to a seemingly simple technical issue: whether or not to increase the block size of the Bitcoin blockchain. By looking at the socio-technical constructs of Bitcoin, the article distinguishes between two distinct coordination mechanisms: governance by the infrastructure (achieved via the Bitcoin protocol) and governance of the infrastructure (managed by the community of developers and other stakeholders). It then analyses the invisible politics inherent in these two mechanisms, which together display a highly technocratic power structure. On the one hand, as an attempt to be self-governing and self-sustaining, the Bitcoin network exhibits a strong market-driven approach to social trust and coordination, which has been embedded directly into the technical protocol. On the other hand, despite being an open source project, the development and maintenance of the Bitcoin code ultimately relies on a small core of highly skilled developers who play a key role in the design of the platform.

https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01382007/document

The invisible politics of Bitcoin: governance crisis of a decentralised infrastructure

Drawing mainly on the e-Diasporas Atlas project (www.e-diasporas.fr), this article seeks to understand how the Web has affected diasporic self-representations. More specifically, by engaging with both media theory and migration studies, it addresses the new modes of boundary formations that arise in the context of migration flows, and how these are mediated by the Web. It sheds light on two main levels of online diasporic identity-building. The first can be situated firmly within a paradigm of 'graphic reason', and relates to the socio-semiotic traces documented on diasporic websites. The second examines traces of another kind, which are formed by the hyperlinked networks of e-Diasporas on the Web, and which can be situated within a paradigm of 'digital reason'. Some of the consequences for diasporic identity-formation are drawn out, particularly issues relating to strategies of visibility on the Web.

/pdf/traces-of-dispersion-online-media-and-diasporic-identities-2ixq4x5xdu.pdf

Traces of dispersion: online media and diasporic identities

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID2852691_code1101445.pdf?abstractid=2852691&type=2

The Invisible Politics of Bitcoin: Governance Crisis of a Decentralized Infrastructure

State control over the Russian internet (Runet) has been enforced by dedicated administrations and private digital entrepreneurs since the early 2010s. Along with them, groups of digital vigilantes report on “negative” online content and claim to be fighting against activities considered to be criminal or contrary to social norms. However, their ideological convictions and moral supports are diverse and changing. This article analyses two nonprofits: Molodezhnaia Sluzhba Bezopasnosti (MSB, Youth Security Service) and Liga Bezopasnogo Interneta (LBI, Safe Internet League), which sponsors an emergent “cyber Cossack” movement. MSB, which can be referred to as “citizen investigators,” has developed a high degree of technical and legal experience and cooperates actively with the police. LBI promotes a conservative vigilantism to ensure “virtuous browsing,” with a strong focus on education. In March 2019 hearings at the Russian Civic Chamber on a bill addressing the activity of kiberdruzhiny (cyber patrols) revealed tensions between the “politically involved” (Duma members and kiberdruzhiny’s organizations) supporting the bill and the “experts” (representatives of internet companies and security specialists) opposed to it alleging the proposed law’s inefficiency. A third group, the supporters of a free and democratic Runet, is absent from the official debates but speaks out on social networks and through independent media against the development of civil surveillance.
Article in English
DOI: 10.25285/2078-1938-2019-11-3-46-70

/pdf/from-citizen-investigators-to-cyber-patrols-volunteer-28uuyx93rn.pdf

From Citizen Investigators to Cyber Patrols: Volunteer Internet Regulation in Russia

Que nous promet Internet ? Le pouvoir a la portee de tous ou la marchandisation generale ? L'intelligence collective ou la dispersion chaotique des esprits ? A distance egale des naivetes technophiles et des prejuges technophobes, Benjamin Loveluck fait ressortir l'ambivalence de ce reseau planetaire dont beaucoup de notre avenir depend desormais

Benjamin Loveluck

Papers

The invisible politics of Bitcoin: governance crisis of a decentralised infrastructure

Traces of dispersion: online media and diasporic identities

The Invisible Politics of Bitcoin: Governance Crisis of a Decentralized Infrastructure

From Citizen Investigators to Cyber Patrols: Volunteer Internet Regulation in Russia

Internet, vers la démocratie radicale ?