The global #occupy movement so far: a map (and a database)
The Occupy movement has been in the front of the scene all throughout 2011, winning media attention, taking over where the Arab Spring and the Indignados left off and ideally avenging the Tea Party instrumental use of all the self-organization/non-hierarchical discourse. So, at the end of the year, it’s time for a little review.
Members of an Occupy-affiliated group, We All Occupy, have been collecting resources from activists from all over the world. The result: a listing of over 1300 geocoded Occupy locations, with websites, Facebook, and Twitter URLs where possible. A (still to be completed) database for all of you activists, data/citizen journalists. And of course, a global interactive map available on Mapbox for your viewing pleasure!
The philosopher and the smoker (on the death of Michael Dummett)
A philosopher is someone who claims the sentence « Father Christmas smokes » is an example of realism. Or at least this seems to be implied by the obituary of Sir Michael Dummett published in The Guardian on December the 28th, 2011.
An example would be the thought that Father Christmas smokes. Given that there is no such person as Father Christmas, then neither is there anything to make this thought true or false. (…) So the assumption that a given thought could be true or false even though we had no way of telling which – an assumption that Dummett called « realism » concerning the thought – was immediately problematical.
Influence, ignorance, and doubt: two scientific articles
As a young boy, I was familiar with the books and movies of the Italian pop-philosopher Luciano De Crescenzo. “The question mark”, was one of his favourite quotes, “is the symbol of good. The exclamation mark, the symbol of evil. When you meet someone who has doubts, you can take it easy. That means he’s a good person, someone broad-minded and tolerant… But if you meet someone who is overconfident, someone of unshakable faith – you should be afraid.” (Here is how it sounds in Italian, in this excerpt from his 1984 film Thus spake Bellavista).
A couple of recently published articles seem to make the same point – but in a more formal way. The first one has been published in Science on December 16th, 2011. Based on observations of animal behaviour (I know, I know… but bear with me please), the authors emit the educated guess that, within a human group, less-informed individuals are able to balance overly polarized political views.
Couzin, I., Ioannou, C., Demirel, G., Gross, T., Torney, C., Hartnett, A., Conradt, L., Levin, S., & Leonard, N. (2011). Uninformed Individuals Promote Democratic Consensus in Animal Groups Science, 334 (6062), 1578-1580 DOI: 10.1126/science.1210280
Dictators, democracies, and technology: Evgeny Morozov’s keynote speech at #28c3 (Berlin, 12.27.11)
This is the pre-release video of Evgeny Morozov’s keynote speech Marriage From Hell: On the Secret Love Affair Between Dictators and Western Technology Companies delivered on dec. 27th, 2011 at the 28c3, 28th Chaos Communication Congress « Behind Enemy Lines ».
Why sanctions on technology companies who do business with totalitarian countries are ineffective? How much know-your-customer rule should we delegate to technologies? Did the Arab Spring end censorship and Web filtering in the Middle-East and North Africa? Are Russia, China and Western democracies becoming more and more unconfortable with too much Internet freedom? Why we need to act NOW against domestic surveillance? These, and other important questions are answered in the speech (which by the way starts at 3:20…)
Compte rendu du séminaire « Idéologie des jeux vidéo » d’Olivier Mauco [Updated: 15 déc. 2011]
Dans le cadre de mon séminaire EHESS Étudier les cultures du numérique : approches théoriques et empiriques, le 14 décembre 2011 j’ai eu le plaisir d’accueillir Olivier Mauco (Paris 1 – UFR11, CeSSP) pour une séance complètement centrée sur les jeux vidéo. Lisez le compte rendu du séminaire sur Storify et retrouvez les slides sur le site Web d’Olivier Mauco.
« Idéologie » des jeux vidéo d’action : Configurations ludo-techniques de Pac-Man et GTA IV
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What’s this blog about?
I'm an associate professor of Digital Humanities at the Paris Institute of Technology (ParisTech) and a researcher in sociology at the Edgar-Morin Center (EHESS, Paris). Bodyspacesociety offers regular updates about my ongoing research, publications, and teaching. If you want updates on media features and conferences, please click here.
The views presented on this blog are solely mine and do not represent the positions of my institutions of affiliation.
New books out now!
The special issue of the journal 'Communications' Cultures du numérique is out. Also, you might want to check my latest book Les liaisons numériques. Vers une nouvelle sociabilité?. Both published by Editions du Seuil, both available in bookshops and online.
» Buy Liaisons numériques
» Visit the companion website
» Buy Cultures du numérique (Communications, n. 88)
All blog content, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 France License.
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