July 2016 - netsociety - server-nexa.polito.it

PhD scholarship in internet research - with a focus on the United States

by Klaus Bruhn Jensen

PhD scholarship in internet research with a focus on the United States (re-advertisement) The Department of Media, Cognition, and Communication, Faculty of Humanities, University of Copenhagen, Denmark, invites applications for a 3-year PhD scholarship. The successful candidate will be affiliated with the Peoples’ Internet (PIN) project sponsored by the Carlsberg Foundation. The scholarship is expected to begin November 1, 2016, or as soon as possible thereafter. Description of the project “The Peoples’ Internet – Market, state, and civil society in China, Europe, and the United States” will undertake a comparative study of the internet in different world regions. Digital networks are among the most flexible and universally applicable technologies ever invented by humans. But the many significant variations in the social uses of the internet around the world remain poorly understood. The PIN project compares the current state and future potential of the internet in three centers of the global economy and world politics – China, Europe, and the United States – focusing on the interplay of civil society with the other two key sectors of modern societies: market and state. The PhD candidate will be an integral part of the PIN research group. The PhD candidate will participate both in formal project events and in informal deliberations throughout the candidate’s affiliation with the project; will have the opportunity both to pursue personal research interests and to contribute to the overall theoretical and methodological framework of PIN; and will join a wider interdisciplinary research environment centered in the University of Copenhagen’s Center for Communication and Computing and its research group on Digital Communication and Aesthetics. In addition to coursework and other institutional obligations, the PhD candidate will undertake the following main activities: • six months of ethnographic fieldwork in the USA • review of regulatory regimes and cultural traditions in the fieldwork area • participation in analyses of population surveys • contributions to the dissemination of project findings and other outreach. The successful PhD candidate must be fluent in spoken and written academic English. Prior experience with cross-cultural studies and/or survey research within media and communication studies will be considered an advantage, but is not a requirement. It is expected that the successful candidate will be present, part of the research group, and engaged in the activities of PIN on a daily basis. Departing from the PIN project framework, the PhD project description must include: • a main section outlining preliminary research questions, methodological considerations, and a time schedule for a six-month ethnographic fieldwork in the United States of America • a section identifying preliminary issues to be addressed in a review of regulatory regimes and cultural traditions in the U.S. • a section discussing how insights from the fieldwork may inform and complement the survey component of the PIN project. Please notice that this position is advertised in parallel with a similar position where the focus is on Europe, please see: http://phd.humanities.ku.dk/how_to_apply/calls/phd-scholarship-in-internet-… The project proposal must lie within the overall framework of PIN. For further information, including a copy of the project framework, please contact the Principal Investigator of PIN, Professor Klaus Bruhn Jensen kbj(a)hum.ku.dk<mailto:kbj@hum.ku.dk> Application deadline: September 15, 2016 at 23.59 (CET), http://phd.humanities.ku.dk/how_to_apply/calls/phd-scholarship-in-internet-… ********************************************************** Klaus Bruhn Jensen Professor, dr.phil. Head of Centre for Communication and Computing Section of Film, Media, and Communication Department of Media, Cognition, and Communication University of Copenhagen Karen Blixens Vej 4 DK-2300 Copenhagen S Denmark kbj(a)hum.ku.dk<mailto:kbj@hum.ku.dk> www.media.ku.dk Tel +45-35328100 Fax +45-35328110 ********************************************************** *New publication* Special section of the International Journal of Communication: Audiences across Media (2015), http://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc

July 27, 2016

Preconference workshop @AOIR2016: The Internet Rules, But How? A STS Take on Doing Internet Governance

by Julia Pohle

Dear all For all among you attending the AoIR conference in Berlin in October, please find below the programme of our pre-conference "The Internet Rules, But How? A STS Take on Doing Internet Governance". Please keep in mind that the Early Bird deadline for AoIR2016 is August 1st. Best regards, Julia, on behalf of the workshop organisers --- The Internet Rules, But How? A Science and Technology Studies (STS) Take on Doing Internet Governance Organizers: Dmitry Epstein (University of Illinois, Chicago), Christian Katzenbach (Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society, Berlin), Francesca Musiani (ISCC – CNRS/Paris-Sorbonne/UPMC Paris), Julia Pohle (WZB Berlin Social Science Center) Over the last decade, the regulation and governance of the Internet at the national and international level have attracted growing attention by policy-makers and researchers. This is particularly the case in post-Snowden times which increased distrust of formal government institutions and their ‘dangerous liaisons’ with the private sector. Accordingly, observing and researching governing processes as they relate to the Internet is both timely and important. Traditionally, researchers and practitioners in Internet governance (IG) focused on new institutions established to discuss and negotiate the technical coordination of the Internet or related policies. Recently, authors have criticized this institutional focus, and perspectives from Science and Technology Studies (STS) suggest to rethink and substantiate questions of ordering and governing the net. In this view, the ‘doing’ of IG more broadly consists in practices and controversies of the design, regulation, and use of material infrastructures, as well as digital uses and practices. This preconference workshop seeks to nurture the growing interest in researching and observing IG from STS-informed perspectives. More broadly, the workshop aims to facilitate a discussion and an exchange of perspectives about the intertwined roles of design, infrastructures, and informal communities of practice in IG. This workshop is part of a broader effort of advancing an STS-informed conversation on Internet governance: it builds on the panel on STS perspectives on IG that took place during AoIR 2015 in Phoenix and a forthcoming special issue of the Internet Policy Review <http://policyreview.info/> (to be published in early September 2016). Tentative program 08:45 Welcome 09:00 Keynote, Laura DeNardis 09:45 Session I. STS and Theoretical Perspectives on Internet Governance * Moderator: Dmitry Epstein * Doing Internet Governance: Constructing Normative Structures inside and outside Intermediary Organisations Tobias Mast, Markus Oermann and Wolfgang Schulz * Situated Governance: On Topological Limits to Internet Governance Ashwin Mathew * Designing a Public Intervention: Towards a Sociotechnical Approach to Web Governance Faranak Hardcastle, Susan Halford and L. Moreau * Building an Authoritarian Counter‐Hegemony? Iran in the Global Debate about Internet Governance Marcus Michaelsen 11:15 Coffee Break 11:30 Session II. Controversies: Unpacking Internet Governance o Moderator: Julia Pohle o Privacy Concerns in the Domain Name System Samantha Bradshaw and Laura DeNardis o SNS Infrastructure as an Actor Inbar Michelzon Drori o Critical infrastructure due diligence – ISPs, security and privacy (tbc) Joanna Kulesza o Migrating Servers, Elusive Users: Reconfigurations of the Russian Internet in the Post-Snowden Era Ksenia Ermoshina and Francesca Musiani 13:00 Lunch 14:00 Session III. Round table: Doing STS-informed Internet Governance Research * Moderator: Francesca Musiani * Internet Policy as a Minority Rights Issue Andrea Hackl * Search engine imaginary. Visions and values in the co-production of search technology and Europe Astrid Mager * Human rights and internet infrastructure. Sociotechnical imaginaries and grassroots ordering in internet governance Stefania Milan and Niels ten Oever * Opening the black box of discursive production in multistakeholder policy-making Julia Pohle 15:30 Coffee Break 16:00 Round table: Opening the Black Boxes of Today’s Internet (Governance) * Moderator: Christian Katzenbach * Participants: Laura DeNardis (tbc), Jeanette Hofmann, Tarleton Gillespie (tbc), Stéphane Couture, Dmitry Epstein 17:30 End of the Workshop

July 18, 2016

Research stay at WZB Berlin - Internet Policy group

by Julia Pohle

Dear all, The Internet policy project group <https://www.wzb.eu/en/research/international-politics-and-law/internet-poli…> at the WZB Social Science Center Berlin <https://www.wzb.eu/en/about-the-wzb> welcomes (doctoral or postdoctoral) visiting fellows who study different aspects of Internet policy and regulation from a social science perspective and wish to visit Germany for a short-term research stay. In particular, we are looking to support applications for third-party funding for longer research periods such as the Individual Fellowships of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (find the current call below). Please feel free to get in touch if you are interested in a research stay at our institution or in any other kind of cooperation with our group (julia.pohle(a)wzb.eu) Best regards Julia --- Call for Individual Fellowships of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) within Horizon 2020 for postdoctoral researchers: Individual Fellowships allow excellent postdoctoral researchers from abroad to come and spend up to 24 months at the WZB. At the time of the deadline for submission of proposals, researchers shall not have resided or carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in Germany for more than 12 months in the 3 years immediately prior to the call deadline. Researchers of all nationalities are eligible to apply for an Individual Fellowship. An MSCA grant usually includes: - up to two years' salary - a mobility allowance - research costs (as well as overheads for the host institution). There are two types of individual fellowship: *European Fellowships* are particularly attractive to researchers either coming to, or moving within, Europe. Furthermore, they can help to restart research careers after a career break (e.g. parental leave), and they can also facilitate the reintegration of researchers coming back to Europe. *Global Fellowships* fund secondments outside Europe for researchers based in the EU or associated countries. There is a mandatory one-year return period, which is not affected by the mobility rule. European and Global Fellowships can also include an optional period of secondment of up to 6 months in the private sector in Europe. The current call can be found on the Participant Portal: https://ec.europa.eu/research/participants/portal/desktop/en/opportunities/… -- Dr. Julia Pohle Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung(WZB)/ WZB Berlin Social Science Center Politikfeld Internet / Internet Policy Internationales Recht und Politik / International law and politics Reichpietschufer 50 10785 Berlin / Germany Office: +49-(0)30-25491-220 Email:julia.pohle@wzb.eu

July 1, 2016