history – Looks Like New

How did open social media platforms originate?

MEDLab — Fri, 23 Jun 2023 00:00:12 +0000

In the aftermath of a chaotic Twitter takeover, many people have moved away from centralized social media platforms to a new set of social platforms that are open-source, decentralized, and user-centered—like Bluesky, Mastodon, and Nostr. But civic-minded social platforms are nothing new.

This episode presents some of Open Social Media’s origin stories from three speakers who have been involved in the development, culture, and communities of their platforms: Christine Lemmer-Webber (co-editor, ActivityPub), Evan Henshaw-Plath (founder, Nos), and Golda Velez (early participant, Bluesky). We will explore how queer experiences and activist movements, for instance, have played a vital role in shaping the design and direction of emerging platforms.

What was the earliest social media like?

MEDLab — Thu, 25 Aug 2022 20:30:12 +0000

Do social media networks have to be addictive, or polarizing, or advertising-funded?

This conversation explores lessons from the past that could help us make social media better today. Our guest is University of Virginia media studies professor Kevin Driscoll, author most recently of “The Modem World: A Prehistory of Social Media.” He brings us stories of an almost-lost era before the Internet became widespread, whose traces are still very much with us.

What can the Internet learn from the past?

MEDLab — Thu, 27 Jan 2022 22:09:32 +0000

When we design the future, we rely on history, whether we like it or not. In December 2021, the MEDLab and the United Nations Internet Governance Forum launched a virtual art exhibition called “Excavations: Governance Archaeology for the Future of the Internet.”

This online exhibition is an interdisciplinary, artistic experience interrogating narratives of the past and working through future possibilities for the Internet. We had a conversation with MEDLab’s Darija Medić and Nathan Schneider to learn more about this work.

Where did public media come from?

MEDLab — Thu, 28 Oct 2021 22:27:39 +0000

Long before our present day audio boom, public broadcasting in the United States flourished. Radio, a powerful way to connect people, underwent many transformations and federal regulatory shifts that impacted what it became.

Where did public media come from? We explore these origins in the early 1900s with Dr. Josh Shepperd, assistant professor of Media Studies at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

What happened to hacktivism?

MEDLab — Fri, 28 Feb 2020 19:24:58 +0000

The cultures of computer hacking have made their way from marginal subcultures to becoming driving forces in the world as we know it. Facebook’s headquarters is on a street called Hacker Way. A hack of the Democratic National Committee’s emails helped elect the current US president. Free Software produced by volunteer hackers around the world powers the internet. Hackers have been noble whistleblowers, supporters of authoritarian states, and White supremacists. Our guide to it all is anthropologist Gabriella Coleman, who has immersed herself in these cultures for many years now, the author of several books and co-founder of a new website on hacker ephemera, Hack_Curio.

What’s New With Textiles?

MEDLab — Thu, 26 Sep 2019 22:07:39 +0000

We might not think about textiles as advanced technology, but in fact it was textile looms that helped inspire the designs of the earliest computers. This month we hear from Steven Frost, is an artist and an instructor of Media Studies at the University of Colorado Boulder, who hosts the Colorado Sewing Rebellion at the Boulder Public Library. He talks about the transgressive potential of threads and the transformative power of repair.